Ask five members of Polity how they feel about losing their ability to allocatethe student activity fee and four of them will swear to all things holy thatFred Preston is riding an unchecked power trip. While the act itself is withinthe scope of his authority, placing the organization in receivership devaluesits main function.

Preston’#146;s detractors ignore that one of his main responsibilities is toadminister the activity fee. It is a task the University, via Preston, bestowsupon student government. Polity has no rights and stakes no claims to the multi-milliondollar account collected by the mandatory sum each undergraduate student paysevery semester. Ultimately, Preston can give and take as he pleases.

In this case he was prompted by election scandals, budget allocation inaccuraciesand several failures to meet deadlines to distribute the funds.

Few would argue that Polity has done much of anything to earn respect or garnertrust when it comes to the student activity fee. Numerous opinion pieces appearingin the Statesman and other campus publications reflect major factions and rivalrieswithin Polity. And so the VP demanded that the organization mend contradictoryparts of its constitution, in hopes of abating the tide of errors.

Yet Preston’#146;s move seems short-sighted. There is no evidence that themove will spur Polity to come to a consensus on the constitution during theFall semester. If they fail, and Polity is dissolved, the new student body Prestonforms in the wake of the disbanding will likely attract the same students, orstudents of a similar disposition, who are just as likely to develop organizationalproblems of their own.

That is not a criticism of politicians nor of the SBU population. It is a testamentto the fact that as students, members of government are prone to mistakes. Thatbeing the case, let the current body work their issues out internally.