By Staff

Imagine if every club that held an office on campus had to pay rent, electricity and telephone bills, or if any student organization that reserved a room in the Student Center was charged a fee for each of its weekly meetings. For most clubs, their budgets would be virtually wiped out by the middle of the fall semester if this was the case. However, if you are a member of Club Lacrosse or Club Baseball, or any other non-varsity sports team that uses the University’s facilities, this is not a hypothetical situation.

Some of these sports clubs are spending two-thirds of their annual budgets, money that is collected from every Hofstra student for the purpose of funding student activites, on paying for the use of the University’s athletic fields.

This issue was brought to the attention of the Student Government Association’s Senate, which passed a resolution this week, recommending that the University waive the fee for all athletic clubs.

The current policy states that sports club may use the James Shuart Stadium free of charge during the day and for eight nights. For each additional night that the team uses the field they must pay a $100 fee, which pays the salary for the union-employee that turns the stadium’s lights on and off. However, since most students are in classes during the day, like most clubs, these sports teams find that the evening is the only time that the majority of their members are available to meet for practices. Therefore, before long, they find themselves exceeding the the eight night mark, and thus, handing over money that could be used to cover hotel and travel expenses, and purchase sports equipment, uniforms and refreshments that could benefit the team. While $100 may not seem like an exorbitant amount of cash, this fees can quickly add up.

With the exception of teams such as ice hockey and roller hockey, which must pay hefty fees to reserve rink times at off-campus venues, most sports clubs are allocated anywhere from $500 – $4,000 for the entire year. However, hotels, buses and equipment can be very expensive, so most need to fundraise on top of the money they receive to make it through the entire season. It is absurd that these groups should have to pay to use the sports facilities on campus. The University’s budget far exceeds the amount of all SGA clubs’ budgets combined, and could easily absorb the costs that club sports are currently being subjected to.

Athletes on varsity sports teams never have to consider facility fees while practicing on the University’s fields, so why should student-athletes on club sports teams? They too, represent the school.

The University should be more supportive of club sports and one way of expressing their pride in non-varsity teams is to spare them of the financial entanglements currently associated with playing on some of the fields on campus.

Even if you are not a member of a club sports team, as a student, a portion of your tuituion is set aside each semester to fund campus clubs and activities. You should be outraged that a significant amount of it is being spent on paying someone to simply flick a few lights on and off, or to contribute to maintaining fields that are mostly used by the athletics program, which is not starving for money. With over 130 clubs to support, and more clubs created each year, SGA struggles to provide each one with adequate funding. The money that is currently being sucked from SGA’s overall contingency to cover the salary of an over-paid electrician and the upkeep of fields that are already being maintained by the athletics department, could instead be funding a few small clubs for the entire year or contribute to an event that the entire student body could participate in.

This week, SGA, which is supposed to be the voice of the student body, spoke up and almost unanimously agreed that this policy be amended for the sake of club sports and all students. It is now time for the administration to listen and in keeping with their new “Focus on Students” mantra, prove that it truly does place students first.

Andres Soto