The first Georgetown University Student Association Budget Summit was a real doozey, lasting from 10 a.m. all the way to 8 p.m. on Sunday. During the meeting, the advisory boards presented their budget proposals to the Finance and Appropriations Committee of the GUSA Senate, which has taken on the role of the Funding Board.

There wasn’t a whole lot of deliberation among senators since the meeting was mainly focused on presentations and actual allocation will take place later this week, but there were some interesting clues—particularly regarding SAC—about how budgets may look next year.

First came the proposals from the Georgetown Program Board and the Center for Social Justice for $45,000 and $64,000 respectively. Both proposals were well-received by the committee, but CSJ’s request for 46 percent more funding than last year faced opposition. Chairman of the Finance and Appropriations Committee Nick Troiano (COL ’11) made clear that since there was $55,000 more in requests this year than in available funds, some groups would not receive all the money they requested.

“We want to give [CSJ] more money, but I would doubt they’ll receive their full request,” Senator Colton Malkerson (COL ’13), who sits on the FinApp committee said.

The next budget proposal, $25,000 for the Performing Arts Advisory Council, did not go as smoothly. The FinApp Committee felt PAAC’s budget proposal lacked specifics and didn’t make clear how the requested money would be spent.

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Given the kind of concerned, accusatory letters some advisory board leaders sent in the last week, the town hall that the Georgetown University Student Association hosted last night to shed additional light on its proposed funding reforms was surprisingly quiet. A few students grudgingly observed that they didn’t think GUSA had enough knowledge about the various advisory boards to oversee the new club funding process they are proposing, and club representatives individually worried about how specific events their group holds will be affected by the potential funding changes. But for the most part, the town hall was uncontentious. It even ended early.

It kicked off with a half-hour presentation by members of GUSA’s Finance and Appropriations Committee detailing the reforms they intend to (or already have) passed in order to completely remake the current process by which student groups at Georgetown get funding, followed by a about an hour-and-a-half long question and answer session.

Standing below a large powerpoint presentation in a lecture hall in Reiss, members of the FinApp committee reiterated the now-familiar goals of funding reform, among them increasing transparency and efficiency in the funding process, and improving oversight of those involved in allocating the Student Activities Fee, the $50 that each student pays at the beginning of each semester. FinApp members also touched on some of the things they feel show that there their efforts have student consensus, like the Accountability and Reform Amendment—an amendment that students passed in 2006 giving GUSA the authority to the authority to audit the advisory boards and final say as to how much money is appropriated to each board.

Greg Laverriere (COL ‘12) walked the audience of about thirty students through the results of a club satisfaction survey GUSA conducted last semester (see the results here), and summed up student sentiment about the current funding process.

“Student clubs and organizations face an uphill climb to secure resources and receive reasonable control over their activities …. Student clubs and organizations are not getting the money they deserve and need,” he said, adding that the club funding process is bloated and opaque compared to the process at peer schools.

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On Thursday, Vox published a letter that Student Activities Commission Chair Ethel Amponsah (NHS ’11) had sent to student club leaders challenging the various funding reforms the Georgetown University Student Association is working to enact. In her e-mail, she referenced another letter she had sent to GUSA specifically addressing the six reforms GUSA had said all of the funding boards must achieve, or they would withhold student activity fees from the boards.

Vox has obtained the letter from Amponsah, which she sent on December 4. In her letter, she maintains that there is already an appeals process for clubs that go before SAC, SAC meetings are already open to the public, and that SAC is already in the process of creating a means for clubs to get lump sum funding. (Disclosure: Amponsah and I participated in an After School Kids group together our freshman year).

Readers have also sent Vox a letter that members of GUSA’s Finance and Appropriations Committee, including Chair Nick Troiano (COL ’11), sent to club leaders in response to Amponsah’s e-mail on Friday, January 29.

“We’d like to set the record straight,” it reads. “Our proposed reforms seek to make the student activities funding process more democratic, accountable and efficient. Let us be clear, our sole intention is to make the system work better for you.”

Finally, there’s a letter from the Center for Social Justice Advisory Board for Student Organizations to its student clubs in response to GUSA’s proposed reforms.

“If officially passed, this legislation would greatly hinder ABSO’s ability to represent, actively advocate, or secure funding for you,” the letter reads.

Read all three letters in full after the jump!

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