The purpose of the Oct. 1 Town Hall meeting was not only to inform students on where their $45 activity fee goes, but also to discuss its future. Approximately 30 people showed up to the meeting, but only two came as representatives of a student organization.
Even though the student attendance at the meeting was poor, Financial Vice President Robert Moehle said that Student Government Association will make more attempts to find out what students are in favor of.
“We are going to try and look at other ways to get feedback,” Moehle said. At one point, he mentioned an online forum.
Moehle said that the activity fee is an important issue, one on which students should make themselves aware.
“There wasn’t enough funding last year to give all the groups what they needed to have a successful year,” he said.
At the meeting, Moehle presented three possible solutions to this lack of funding. The first option was to leave the situation as is. However, this would put a strain on the amount of money SGA can allocate.
“There will be a larger amount of groups asking for more money out of the same pot,” Moehle said.
According to Moehle, there were 150 student organizations at the start of the year and there are 15 upcoming organizations that will need to be chartered. Despite the increase in organizations, the activity fee is not increasing.
The second option was to change the way organizations are chartered.
“We have discussed chartering groups as funded or non-funded,” Moehle said.
These non-funded groups would not have access to money from the student activity fee.
SGA’s third option was to raise the student activity fee. According to Moehle, for this increase to happen it would have to be “ratified by a vote of the students.”
Freshman Caitlin Gahart disagrees with raising the fee. “One of the advantages of this campus is that there is something always going on,” Gahart said. “If we have to raise the cost, it takes away from the fun of it.”
Of the three solutions, Moehle said that a balance between the second and third options would be ideal. While he felt that the activity fee should to be increased, he also said the funding guidelines need to be reexamined.
“It’s not just about money, but also the principle about what the fee is used for,” Moehle said.
Though Moehle thinks the activity fee is an important facet of SLU, not all students hold it in such high regard.
Junior Laura Zwikelmaier is one of them.
“Not everybody is in an organization,” Zwikelmaier said. “It’s not a priority for some people.”
The money raised from the student activity fee goes toward annual funding, spot-funding and special projects funding.
Annual funding and spot-funding are only available to Chartered Student Organizations, whereas special projects funding is available to everyone. These funds are allocated by SGA.
