2008 Woodie Awards
Student Government Cuts Club Funds Across the Board
Elaine Labate
Issue date: 2/15/06 Section: News
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In the past, Manhattan College's budget was decided solely by the Finance Committee, which is composed of 11 people, five on the executive board, five on the legislative board, and one chairperson.
The procedure used to be that this Finance Committee would look at the proposed events for each club, and then create their budget from there. Recently, Student Government decided that it was not really up to the Finance Committee alone to decide which events were necessary, so the procedure was changed this semester, and now requires the Activities Committee of Student Government Legislature to meet and review the proposed events before they go to the Finance Committee.
This semester, before the Finance Committee met, the Activities Committee of Student Government Legislature looked over the budget in a non-numerical way, approving or denying the requests of the clubs based on how necessary their requests seemed, and not monetary figures. From what the Activities Committee of Student Government Legislature decided, some requests did not reach the Finance Committee.
Another new procedure this semester allowed the Finance Committee to send forms to the clubs and have them fill the forms out electronically. Senior Tom McCarthy, Executive Treasurer of Student Government and the Chair of the Finance Committee, noted that the aid of this electronic form submission made the whole procedure easier for them to handle this year.
The budget given to the Finance Committee and Student Government for this year was $878, 400. Of this initial amount, approximately $452,000 was spent during the fall semester, leaving $400,000 for the spring semester. Tom McCarthy explained that, "the most difficult part of deciding the budget is that the money we have is half of what is requested, so we have to try to get the amount down, which is a difficult situation."
When attempting to divide the budget, the Finance Committee broke down the different clubs and organizations into categories, such as Communication, Performing Arts, Greeks, Student Government, Co-curricular, and Extracurricular. The Greeks, Extracurriculars, and Co-Curriculars are considered differently than organizations like the Student Government, the Quadrangle, and the Yearbook. This semester the decision was made to give$200 to the Greeks, Extracurriculars, and Co-Curriculars to be used to cover operating costs. After that, there was $22,000 left over, which was then given to the Monetary Allocation Committee, which will oversee that money for Extracurriculars and Greeks to plan events.