Training seminar kicks off UCSU budget season
The UCSU budget process is approaching and student legislators are educating themselves on the specifics of the complicated budgeting procedure that allocates over $30 million.
Members of UCSU, including the staff of Legislative Council, are preparing for the new budget season following a training seminar Friday afternoon at the UMC.
Senior Boyce Postma, Legislative Council president, said there is a need for new members in the student government to be well informed on the budget process.
“We do have a lot of new representatives and senators,” Postma said. “The budget process decides how much money (students) have to pay each semester.”
UCSU 2008 Budget Schedule
Feb. 5 – First reading to UCSU finance board from “the Big 3”
Feb. 9 – First reading to UCSU finance board from all other cost centers
Feb. 12 – Second reading to finance board from “Big 3”
Feb. 19 – Second reading to finance board from all other cost centers
Feb. 28 – Finance board makes presentation to UCSU legislative council
Mar. 5 – Big 3 opportunity to approach legislative council with issues regarding budget
Mar. 6 – All other cost centers approach legislative council, and first reading of budget package
Mar. 13 – Second reading of final budget package
The seminar began with an explanation of how cost centers settle on their annual budget. The “Big 3” cost centers include the UMC, the Rec Center and Wardenburg.
Postma presented the sequence of events where the budget begins with the cost centers, is approved by UCSU’s Finance Board and Legislative Council and finishes with the Student Organizations Finance Office, which creates the final budget package.
If the budget for any cost center is raised, Postma said that student fees would increase as well. Otherwise, to keep fees lower, budgets for certain groups need to be cut.
All cost centers on campus rely on student fees to operate.
“You just have to look through it . . . and debate it out, based on your values,” he said of budget evaluation.
Another purpose of the seminar was to inform new UCSU members how to read and interpret budget requests.
Carlos Garcia, director of the UMC, offered explanations on how to identify a cost center’s overall budget, revenue and expenses.
Garcia said expenses can come from a cost center’s salaries, utilities, operational repairs and travel needs. Some of these expenses, such as salary and utilities, UCSU has no control over. These expenses are classified as “unduckables.”
Unduckables come with a price, Garcia said, even for successful cost centers.
“In the UMC, the more people enter the building, the more the doors are open, and heating is lost,” Garcia said. “Cooling is lost and utilities go up.”
Rising unduckables translate to rising student fees or a cut in the cost center’s budget, Postma said.
“How much money we feel the cost centers receive is equal to the quality of experience at CU,” he said, based on the services provided to students from each center.
Still, he said, the goal of UCSU’s Finance Board and Legislative Council last year was to keep student fees at an absolute minimum. This resulted in budget cuts for the UMC art museum as well as programming at Wardenburg.
Some students support the decision to keep student fees as low as possible. Senior John Kane, a 21-year-old political science major, said that he would rather see certain groups and cost centers fend for themselves based on their merit.
“If they weren’t receiving their money through student fees, then they’d have to work to advertise for support,” he said. “They would have to attract students to their cause rather than depend on money from students who don’t support them.”
Other students said they don’t mind paying a little bit extra for student groups and cost centers, like 21-year-old senior Lauren Gamache, an international affairs major.
“Even if I’m not interested in a particular group, their presence makes CU a better place for learning,” she said.
Contact Campus Press Staff Writer George Plaven at George.Plaven@colorado.edu.
