Funds toward campus organizations this year were allocated in a fair and transparent manner said undergraduate student government officers, addressing concerns that previous allocations were unfair.
Applicants for the 2008 Student Government Operational Fund were met with a funding request cap of $3,000, designed to curb discrepancies from previous years when groups would request excessive amounts of money, Parsa Sobhani, finance committee chairman, said.
With requests as high as $60,000, it became common for groups that requested more funds to receive more, he added.
As part of the Undergraduate Student Association Council’s broader campaign to be more transparent, Sobhani and the Budget Review Committee, which handles the allocations, proceeded to change the bylaws to reform the system.
“We’re trying to change the culture of how people apply for money,” Sobhani said.
“We spent a lot of time and effort to make it fair.”
Among the reforms made were the mandatory $3,000 cap as well as requiring individual USAC officers to report funding requests through their offices.
All the steps, Sobhani said, he believes are helping USAC be more accountable to its constituents.
The allocation controversy stems from a 2005 decision where new student groups were granted access to a $100,000 pool paid for by undergraduate fees.
Without a cap on requests, groups discovered that requesting more money often resulted in getting more money, Sobhani said.
USAC allocation documents from 2007 show the discrepancies from this procedure.
The Asian Pacific Alumni Students Association received $98, while the Asian Pacific Coalition received $1,644.
“Groups knew the formula and it was too big of an influence on allocating the money,” Sobhani said.
Operational in nature, the funds were meant to keep the groups afloat through pens and pencils. They were not meant just for “lavish retreats,” Sobanhi said.
The 2008 recommendations by the Budget Review Committee and approved by USAC in September, divides $117,000 among 149 campus groups in what looks to be a more egalitarian allocation.
The majority of the groups receive between $600 to $800.
Among the fund disbursements, the Bruin Democrats received $847, while the Republicans got $645.
Allocations were based on a point system where proper protocol and procedure accounted for 32 percent of the points, explaining the difference between the two political groups.
The Republicans were not as prepared in their presentation, Sobhani said.
Despite receiving less funding that last year, Roger Reyes, the LGBT coordinator for Samahang Pilipino, said the allocations were fair.
“As an organization we’re suffering but I’m glad that (the process) is more fair,” he said.
While USAC approved the recommendations, Academic Affairs Commissioner Jeremiah Garcia voted against the action citing there was still some “significant flaws” in the process.
“The formula (equally distributed) the money but there needs to be greater deviation for the scores,” Garcia said. “It was better than it was in the past but my vote was more to make a point that things needed to get better.”
Garcia went on to say that many groups do not use all their allocated funds, and therefore it is unfair for groups who received little or no funding.
Sobhani said he believes that the student government will continue to make the allocation process more transparent and accountable.