Congress amends Title II

As part of its continued reforms of the Student Code, the finance committee of Student Congress passed a bill Tuesday providing members more control over student fees.

Under Title I of the code, Student Congress may examine eight student fees only after a referendum. With changes to Title II, eliminations don’t have to go to student body vote, allowing Student Congress to directly act on the fees.

Congress member Adam Horowitz said the committee has not acted on the current policy.

“The Student Code says that (Student) Congress has the right to regulate these eight student fees and we never really do anything with them,” he said.

The unanimously passed bill also included a change to the order in which a proposed fee is considered.

Under the bill, the oversight committee of Student Congress would research proposals and work with the student fee audit committee to present bills to the student fee advisory subcommittee.

Horowitz presented the amendment to the committee and said it would clarify any confusion.

“We want to make sure we have a unified student voice, and we don’t want to risk (the oversight committee) and SFAC both going to SFAS with conflicting reports,” he said.

The amendment also replaces several members of SFAC with one member of the oversight committee to promote efficiency.

“It would be better to have a smaller SFAC that actually had everyone really interested in doing their job,” he said.

The finance committee also passed a funding request with modifications for a Habitat for Humanity concert in the fall. The request was set at $2,840.00 but was decreased to $20 by the committee.

Maya Sharodi presented the request and said a large portion of the funding would be used for the rental of Memorial Hall for the event. But committee member Lisa Heimbach said that would conflict with the Student Code, which prohibits funding for programs outside the current fiscal year.

“I feel like we’re appropriating this money with this fiscal year’s money and I don’t feel like its appropriate,” she said. “It’s not fair to the students who paid their fees this year and are going to graduate and won’t be here to enjoy this event that their fees will be funding.”

But committee member Kristen Johnson said a delay in funding could jeopardize the rental.

“By the time they actually get the money, it might be really late to get funding for Memorial Hall because Memorial Hall gets booked up very quickly,” Johnson said.

The committee also decided to fund Habitat for Humanity’s publicity for the remainder of the semester and suggested they resubmit the request to the summer session.

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