Representatives from a number of student groups and organizations, including the Animated Perspectives Club, Meteorology Club, Kumdo Club and Taiko Tides, gathered at the Undergraduate Student Government Senate meeting on Feb. 2 to appeal the loss of their line budget status.
According to the USG Financial Bylaws, “a line budget is the account given to a funded organization for the academic year to be expended by it in accordance with the laws of the USG.” With line budget status comes various privileges that include the ability for clubs to request grants for events and assets.
However, a club’s line budget status can be revoked for a number of reasons, such as the failure to host a minimum of one Student Activity Fee — funded on-campus event or failing to register with Student Union and Activities by the end of the first week of each academic year.
Jiyoon Kim, the vice president of Animated Perspectives, a student organization that caters to anime enthusiasts, was one of the club representatives who attended the meeting. Animated Perspectives’ line budget status was revoked because it failed to host an on-campus event last semester.
In Animated Perspectives’ written appeal to USG, Kim wrote that the club tried to host events in various spaces that were always occupied by other clubs. A screening of the 2009 animated film “Summer Wars” was to be conducted by Animated Perspectives in the Union Auditorium on Oct. 8, 2011, but the space was being used by the marching band at the time and the event was relocated to the Student Activity Center. Kim said he believes that his organization was not charged for booking the auditorium’s space because of the mistake.
In light of this, Animated Perspectives decided to use the majority of its budget to fund a trip for 30 of its members to attend Anime Boston over spring break, which, according to the written status appeal, would cost the club around $5,000 to $6,000 of its allocation.
“We need this appeal done by [Thursday], if possible,” Kim said. “We have to pay for the hotel, the transportation, and the convention tickets.” He also mentioned that the deadline for buying tickets is March 16.
USG Treasurer Thomas Kirnbauer presided over the appeal processes for the clubs, saying that he “tried to help the clubs while still enforcing the rules.”
“I went through all the clubs to see who was in violation of this rule,” Kirnbauer said. “Any club found in violation was allowed an appeal process.”
Some senators questioned the accessibility of the information contained in the bylaws to the clubs, with Sen. Lance Bertrand saying, “We didn’t pull this information out of the sky. Was it available to them?”
Kirnbauer said that the USG made a sincere effort to communicate by handing out folders containing the bylaws and by also putting them up on the USG website.
In the end, however, all the clubs that made appeals that night were reinstated into line budget status. The motion to reinstate Animated Perspectives was approved by a vote of 15 — 3.