Money. No money. Wait… just less money.
In previous years, there has been a “general fund” from which student organizations could request extra money for special events. Senate is in charge of all aspects of student organizations and club spending, and moderating every club’s budget each year. The money in this general fund has always come from the $300 student activities fee paid yearly by each student. “The amount of money Senate can budget out is based solely on the number of estimated student enrollment,” explains Jill Burchell, Senate Treasurer.
In the past few years, the clubs and activities built up a debt from overspending, but this debt was not reflected in the statement given to the Community Senate. Therefore, Senate was unaware of the debt, and did not make efforts to curb overspending.

This year, the Business Office finally made Senate aware of the debt. They allowed them to ignore past debts, but could not provide an extra “general fund” for this academic year.

There were further problems with the budget. In the 1999-2000 year, lowered enrollment affected how much money was available for the fund. To compensate, the Senate adopted a new policy to deduct 8% from estimated funds to provide a cushion for possible under- enrollment and overspending.

However, this year, the estimated funds included fees from CCE students, from whom the Senate does not receive funds. Adding to the problem, enrollment was lower than predicted. To solve this dilemma, major cuts had to be made. Burchell said, “Anything that clubs overspent last year had to be taken out of the budget for this year to compensate.”

“In an effort to stop overspending, I’m being really strict about people spending their budget the way they set out to,” says Burchell. However, there are still problems with clubs going outside of their budget. She gives an example: “I am sitting on $170 worth of pizza receipts waiting for approval to be reimbursed that was not in that clubs’ budget.”
An old policy is being reinstated to prevent new debt. For most clubs and activities, if clubs do not spend any money at all by the end of this semester, then half of their budget will go back to the general fund.
Anything that clubs do not spend by the end of the academic year will also go back into the general fund. Budgets for upcoming years will be based on how much was spent and used from given funds for the previous year. If clubs overspend, then the next year’s budget (and therefore the next year’s organization) will suffer by how much was overspent.

Hopefully, increased enrollment and the student activities fees will increase the general fund in the future.

According to Jim Vroom, Associate Cheif Financial Officer and Transition Consultant, the amount of money available outside of club budgets is based solely on “how Student Senate chooses to allocate the funds… how much they distribute initially to clubs and how much they decide to ‘save for a rainy day.’” It is up to the Senate to develop policy and organize how they divide up the money they are given. Vroom explained, “The potential is there… [but] it will be a very tight [financial] year.”

Rebecca Saunders, Coordinator of Events Planning and Student Activities, explained, “In efforts to establish a well-thought-out budget, we had to start out new.” Many accounts were reorganized and zeroed out to determine how they were functional and what would work for the future.

So, every department on campus, including Student Senate and Student Activities, has been working with Vroom to rearrange their section of the budget to best reflect the actual spending and what is appropriate for different line-items and specifics.

Re-constructing a complex system is a tedious process and requires time to sort out all the bugs and mistakes and re-work them to better reflect the college.

Burchell and Saunders have been working with Vroom to sort out where special request money can come from, how much it is, how accessible it is, as well as all the other complicated budgeting matters of all the student organizations on campus.