By Staff

Almost seven hours after Tuesday night’s Student Government Association senate meeting commenced, the weekly meeting was brought to an end, but club budgets for the 2007-08 school year and the entire appropriations process had changed drastically. Legislation, co-sponsored by senators Joshua Lanier and Carlos Cruz, calling for the senate meeting regarding club budgets to be opened to the public, was finally voted on only minutes before the group discussed next year’s annual budgets. The proposal passed, reluctantly, with some senators who had chosen to abstain from voting questioning the rules, saying that their votes should have prevented the legislation from passing.

To these senators’ dismay, students, particularly club members, were finally able to see how SGA decides how the $600,000 appropriated to them through the Student Activity Fee included in undergraduate tuition bills, is allocated. Even more important, they were given the opportunity to speak on behalf of their clubs – pleading for more money, clearing up an misconceptions, questioning members of the Appropriations Committee and learning how to improve their budget proposals in the future – before the numbers were finalized.

Many club members did not attend the meeting, or wandered in hours later, as SGA did not publicize the fact that club budgets were on its agenda and there was the potential that students would be allowed to watch and get involved. (There wasn’t even a message on SGA’s “Change Hofstra” group at Facebook.com, which seems to be a popular means of communication for the organization – sometimes its only means.) They put little energy into publicizing the fact that budgets were due on April 19 and that there was a call for candidates for this week’s presidential and vice presidential elections, so it was not shocking that they failed yet again to communicate to students. This is something that future SGA’s should work on improving.

Now as for the meeting, itself, despite the chaos of senators trying to sneak out early or just failing to remain in their seats, the complaining by impatient members of the gallery as another hour passed and they had yet to be heard, the night was a success. Take into consideration this was the first time that the meeting has been conducted in this manner.

While six hours may seem long compared to the usual SGA senate meetings, which wrap up around 8 p.m., usually because members leave and the group doesn’t have enough of its representatives to conduct business, club budgets deserve this amount of time for scrutiny and debate. These numbers, for the most part, determine whether a club will exist in the sense that they will be able to fulfill their purpose on campus. A club’s budget often defines its potential and its limitations – basically, its future. For this reason, SGA should consider in the future giving annual club budget appropriations its own senate meeting, free of the usual business such as committee reports and legislation that tie up a considerable length of time.

SGA elections span two days, recognizing the fact that students are busy and have other priorities, so why not adopt a similar approach to the senate budget meeting. By dividing this meeting in two, the senate would only have to look at 60 of the 120 club budgets on one day and the rest on another. This would ensure that the clubs that appear at the end of the alphabetical order are not shortchanged, because SGA is tired, overworked and itching to leave. If club members had a better idea of when there proposal was going to be heard, they could coordinate their schedule so they can be present at that time, which would eliminate the problem some clubs ran into when they walked in after the chance to talk about their budget has passed.

Although any clubs that missed their opportunity to dispute their budget should take notice that until the senate passes its minutes from Tuesday night’s meeting, a procedure that will take place at the beginning of next Tuesday’s meeting, there is still a chance to convince SGA to adjust the amount that was allocated. If you find yourself in this position, make sure you are on time to next week’s meeting, which begins at 6 p.m. in the Greenhouse, bring documentation to show why you need the money and be respectful when addressing the group. (They tend to put up a wall if they feel they are being attacked.)

While SGA is working to improve the efficiency of how it will conduct these meetings in the future, why not re-examine the issue where it starts – when clubs are crafting their proposals. Yes, the group did hold a meeting on how to write a proposal and they do offer one-on-one coaching for those who asked, but as one senator mentioned Tuesday night, that meeting (held on a Friday when most students do not have to be on campus) was not very informative and unless clubs think they are doing something wrong, they won’t know to ask for help. Often, the only thing preventing a club from receiving the amount of money it needs from SGA is a missing price quote, a mis-worded sentence or a poorly-crafted budget proposal.

To save SGA and clubs time and energy, the appropriations committee should create a detailed survey that all clubs could fill out to explain their financial needs and submit, along with a cover letter and any other material they wish to include. Such a document could indicate SGA policies on funding certain items such as trophies, disc jockeys and video game systems, and instruct club members when and where to include price quotes. This would make every club’s budget more organized and informative, and leave out a lot of the guess-work and misunderstandings that have left many clubs in a fiscal crisis in the past.

SGA, like many aspects of this campus, is far from being perfect, but Tuesday night they took a leap (though not the most graceful and coordinated one) in the right direction. The meeting was messy, but it’s a good start. Hopefully, this change will set a precedent for future SGAs, encouraging more transparency, more communication with students and a willingness to break away from a tradition that promoted secrecy and silenced the voices of the thousands of other members of the student body.

by Andres Soto