Several WSU programs received a reduction in their allocation from the WSU Services and Activities (S&A) Fees for the 2012-13 year.
The allocations for the ASWSU-Administration/Executives, the WSU Wellbeing program and the WSU Children’s Center are reduced in comparison to their respective 2011-12 amounts. The ASWSU-Administration/Executives’ allocation is reduced by $54,709, the Children’s Center allocation by $29,162 and the Wellbeing program by $117,132.
ASWSU-Administration/Executives
Jake Mayson, the ASWSU director of finance, said despite the allocation reduction, the ASWSU-Administration/Executives’ budget will not sustain a real cut because of saved money, a salary shift and other monetary infusions. He said their expenditures for the 2012-13 year will be the same, and purchasing will be down about 2 percent.
“We have savings that we are carrying forward for next year,” Mayson said. “We underspent that budget and we commissioned the S&A committee to hold on to that money.”
The ASWSU executive staff have decided to present a zero-percent increase budget request to the S&A Fees committee for the last few years, Mayson said. They do not want to burden the students because as students themselves, they understand money constraints, he said.
“We don’t want to take more money from students is what it comes down to,” Mayson said. “The idea is that we can present services and ideas while keeping our operation costs low.”
Mayson said the program coordinator salary is moving out of the ASWSU budget to help balance cost increases. He said ASWSU also receives $60,000 from the Bookie Students Book Corporation, which helps with costs like event insurance.
“If the student body is clearly in need of some kind of service that we can’t provide for them on our budget, we would consider proposing an increase,” Mayson said.
Children’s Center
Mina Smith, the director of the Children’s Center, said the allocation reduction for the Children’s Center will not affect the operations. Though the center was allocated less student fees this year compared to last year, they also requested less for extra costs such as equipment and software.
Smith said the center received a one-time allocation of $35,000 from the S&A Committee last year for computer equipment and software on top of their base allocation. This year the center requested a 2.9 percent increase of about $10,000 on their base allocation, which did not include any extra requests, and the committee approved it, she said.
“Overall, it appears to be a $25,000 reduction in funding, but actually it was an increase on our base allocation,” Smith said. “We are very grateful for the S&A Committee’s commitment to support the Children’s Center.”
If the S&A Committee reduced the base allocation for the Children’s Center, it would come out of subsidies for student family tuition.
“If they decrease the amount of allocation, it is the student family that has to pay more to bring their children to the center,” Smith said. “It does not affect our business, but it will put a hardship on the families for that out-of-pocket increase.”
Smith said the families will continue to be supported by a 37.9 percent subsidy for child care tuition.
University Recreation Wellbeing
Joanne Greene, the University Recreation and Wellbeing programming director, said the Wellbeing program received the same amount of funds as last year. What appears to be a reduction in the S&A fees allocation actually comes out of the money the Green Bike program received for equipment last year, she said.
“We would have loved to receive funding for more bikes for students, but we also understand there are only so many funds in the S&A pot,” Greene said. “We are happy we received our allocation and are going to do everything we can to maintain the level of programming that we have.”
The S&A Committee asked the programs to submit a zero percent increase budget request and an actual budget request, Greene said. The Wellbeing program received the zero percent increase budget.
“We were asking for a slight increase in order to help with some program growth and the increased enrollment that we’ve experienced over the past year,” Greene said. “It’s really important for us to respond to the needs and requests of students, and in order to do that we would need some additional resources.”
