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The recent release of a document alleging unfair funding on the part of the undergraduate student government’s budget committee has raised concerns about the legitimacy of the funding allocation process.

The document, filed by a student councilmember, states that the base budget funding process created by the Undergraduate Students Association Council’s Budget Review Committee was politicized.

The document was filed in support of the Jewish Student Union as it appeals to the Judicial Board following a denial of the JSU’s petition requesting additional funds.

According to the document, groups supporting the Students First! slate received more funding than groups who supported the Students United for Reform and Equality slate.

Slates are coalitions of students with similar ideologies who help each other win seats on council during elections. This year’s council has a slate majority of SF!

This year, the two original S.U.R.E. councilmembers – General Representative Josh Lawson and Financial Supports Commissioner Erica Husse – received the lowest amount of funding. Lawson left the slate in October, and Husse remains the only member of S.U.R.E. on council.

Having received the most votes of the three general representatives last spring, Lawson is designated the first general representative; historically this designation has meant more base funding than the other two. But, this was the first in several years that this designation received the least funding of any of the general representatives.

Priscilla Chen, Finance Committee chairwoman and member of the Budget Review Committee, said the reason Lawson received less funding was because his budget proposal was not well done and included budget requests for items such as T-shirts, which USAC is not allowed to fund.

“I think we tried really hard to make the process fair,” Chen said.

The allocation of funds to student groups has also been called into question. Groups who endorsed SF! candidates during the spring elections received the most funding out of the 48 groups that applied.

Members of the BRC said decisions were based on the quality of the proposal and not on the group’s slate designation. Members also said politicization could not have occurred because they believe the committee is diverse in ideology.

But the composition of this year’s BRC is heavy with SF! affiliations. Two of the committee’s councilmembers are from SF!, and two members were appointed by USAC President Anica McKesey, a member of SF!. The remaining member has no slate designation, but has a voting record leaning toward SF!.

BRC members are supposed to remove themselves from voting for the groups they have affiliations with to prevent a conflict of interest.

But General Representative and BRC member, Linda Lam, and Chen both voted for the funding of the Asian Pacific Coalition, a group in which Lam was previously involved and in which Chen is still a member. Similarly, Facilities Commissioner and BRC member Tutram Nguyen voted in the funding of the Vietnamese Student Union, a group with which she is still involved.

“Those individuals were clearly looking out for their groups,” said Jewish Student Union President Gideon Baum.

Nguyen said because the base budget is used for day-to-day operations, such as telephone usage and not for programming, she did not see a conflict of interest. But the proposal for the base budget funding contains a section about programming for each group.

The question of unfair funding arose when Lawson submitted an amicus curiae – a “friend of the court” brief – last month to support JSU’s appeal.

Council denied JSU’s original appeal of USAC’s base budget funding during the summer. JSU has now brought its appeal to the Judicial Board, hoping to revamp the funding process and get more money.

Baum, the petitioner, said slate politicization of USAC, and especially the BRC, contributed to the low funding JSU received for the 2003-2004 year.

With base budget funding, the BRC allocated a total of $233,058.69 to 74 groups for 2003-2004.

To assign funding, the BRC gave each group a point value based on factors such as programming, retention, outreach and community service. The points determined which group was given priority in funding. Groups who received a high number of points received more money than groups with a low number of points.

According to Lawson’s brief, the total point value for the USAC sponsored groups that did not endorse SF! was 1260 while the total point value for USAC sponsored groups that endorsed SF! was 1223. Despite having fewer total points, the groups endorsing SF! received more than half of the funding given to USAC sponsored groups.

In his brief, Lawson also noted the amount of money given per point was not uniform. Thai Smakom received $39.89 per point, whereas Le Cercle Francophone (The French Club) received $4.79 per point. These clubs are both non-USAC sponsored organizations.

In response to Lawson’s complaint that different groups received different amounts of money per point, Lam said the points were not meant to be a direct representation of how much money the group received, but were instead a general starting basis for funding.

“It wouldn’t really make sense (to have each point correspond to a particular dollar amount) because we’re really looking at the needs of each organization,” Lam said.

This year’s disagreement over base budget funding is a recurring conflict with council, regardless of which slate is dominant. In 2002, a S.U.R.E.-controlled BRC implemented a base budget funding process that was heavily criticized by the opposing slate’s groups as being favorable toward S.U.R.E.-supporting groups.

Prior to this year, criticism regularly accompanied the process during the multi-year period in which SF!’s predecessors, Student Empowerment! and Praxis, controlled council.