After three days of voting, the three SAFE referendum proposals have passed by wide margins, according to the GUSA Election Commission. The success of the referendum means that GUSA will allocate $1.25 million to the Social Innovation and Public Service fund, $250,000 to Georgetown Energy, and $2.04 million to enhancements to the New South Student Center.

GUSA President Mike Meaney (SFS ’12) said in a press release, “On behalf of GUSA, I would like to thank the student body for showing its resounding support for the SAFE referenda. The projects we’re funding all contribute unique benefits to the university, and we can’t wait to start in on them.”

In the same release, Vice President Greg Laverriere (COL ’12) said, “We’re excited to see this finally come to a close. From the Endowment Commission to all the students who put together all the great proposals to the volunteers who knocked on doors all week to build up support, this was a team effort. The passage of these proposals completes a three-year reform of student funding.”

Steering committees will guide each proposal toward formal launches in the coming months.

In this week’s feature, Rachel Calvert reveals how the University transformed student enthusiasm for the Healy Pub into funds for its own project: the New South Student Center.

After months of negotiations, in September, DeGioia effectively declared the Healy Pub proposal dead. “We’ll try to accommodate that [need for flexibility] but I think it’d a bridge too far to get to the Healy Pub,” he said in an interview with campus media.

“I think the University did roll us on that,” Malkerson said, reflecting on the discussion process.

The Editorial Board recommends the Georgetown University Student Association adopt direct, public strategies in future negotiations with the administration to hold the University accountable.

In News, Soo Chae interviews new Corp CEO Mike West (COL ’13) as he considers the responsibilities of his new position.

For Sports, Daniel Kellner previews the Hoyas’ road clash with the Pittsburgh Panthers this Saturday.

In the Leisure section, Julia Lloyd-George reviews Anna Leibovitz’s latest ingenious exhibition, Pilgrimage, which is on display at the Smithsonian’s Museum of American Art through May 20.

On Page 13, the return of the Corp Time Machine brings us a comical glimpse into Burleith’s terrible future under the SNAP regime. May it be a light for you in dark places, when all other lights go out.

And in Voices, Kellner does double duty to discuss the unholy alliance of American television programming and American advertisements.

Roughly one day into voting, the three measures on the Student Activities Fee referendum have all crossed the GUSA-established threshold of 2000 votes that will make valid any of the measures that pass. As of  7:57 p.m., the SIPS Fund has received 2028 yes or no votes, Georgetown Energy has received 2021 votes and the New South Student Center has received 2053 votes, according to the GUSA Election Commission. While these numbers give no indication of how these measures are faring, student leaders are nevertheless optimistic that each measure will pass.

FinApp committee chair Colton Malkerson (COL ’13) wrote to Vox today:

I’m very confident all three proposals will pass by a wide margin. A lot of students have invested a great deal of time and energy into these proposals. The large voter turnout reflects this. Each proposal will benefit Georgetown in different and meaningful ways.

Addressing the swiftness with which the measures reached the threshold, GUSA Vice President Greg Laverriere (COL ’12) wrote to Vox:

We are ahead of last year’s SAFE Reform pace which is really exciting. The polling places in Leo’s should help maintain a steady turnout and reach students who normally don’t vote. Myself and others involved with GUSA will keep encouraging people to vote until the polls close at the end of Thursday. Students have been actively participating in the process and spreading the word about the vote which has made reaching the 2000 vote threshold so much easier.

Vox‘s guide to the referendum is available here. In addition to the online voting option, a physical voting booth with computers has been set up in Leo’s, and will be in place today through Thursday from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. The referendum will conclude at the end of the day on Thursday.

Yesterday’s weekly meeting of the Georgetown University Student Association was short and sweet.

One topic of discussion was the approval of the GUSA Fund’s allocation package, including a few requests by the Philodemic society. Every semester, Philodemic doesn’t receive enough money from SAC to rent the fancy chairs that the Office of Special Events makes them rent for their weekly debates. So every semester, Philodemic asks the GUSA Fund to make up the difference.

Well, this semester, Vice Speaker Nate Tisa (SFS ’14) would have none of this. From his point of view, SAC should give them enough money to rent their chairs–or better yet just buy them chairs and be done with it. So in addition to giving them the money, the GUSA Fund vowed to get to the bottom of this.

The other major part of the meeting was an address by Finapp chair Colton Malkerson (COL ’13), who announced that the university had agreed to put on paper their agreement to use the SAFE funds appropriately.

“This is a good step forward for GUSA and university relations,” Malkerson said. “[One of the reasons] why we’re in this is because a $3 million promise by the university was never fulfilled.” From now on, Malkerson continued, all agreements with the university will be put on paper and signed. Vox will have another post about the upcoming SAFE referendum later this afternoon.

Just like last year, Vox is helping you get on top of “news you can use” with an excessively comprehensive review of last year’s important news stories. You’ve already heard of foolish things former freshman have done. Now, we cover the other on-campus issues that made headlines; Healy Pub, Uribe, and unions come after the jump.

Cash rules everything around me

The Georgetown University Student Association is your undergraduate student government.

Between a president, vice president, cabinet, and 25-member Senate (elected at-large and from dorms), the student association funds initiatives such as Summer Fellows, subsidized LSAT courses, free newspapers, and weekend GUTS busses.

Despite cleaning up its act in recent years, GUSA is also a source of endless entertainment: botched elections, interpersonal bickering, toothless resolutions, and campaign silliness.

Most importantly, though, GUSA allocates the student activities fee that students pay every semester.

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The SAFE commission voted last night to allocate nearly all of its $3.4 million endowment to the creation of the Healy Student Space as part of its primary recommendation to GUSA’s Finance and Appropriations committee.

The commission also designated a “secondary” slate of projects to consider in the event that the Healy project proves unfeasible, with money potentially going towards a new student space in New South, the SIPS social entrepreneurship fund, and an omnibus grant for improvements to existing student spaces.

In total, the SAFE commission voted to recommend $3,230,000 be allocated towards the Healy Pub, with the remaining $170,000 going towards the construction of energy-saving solar panels on university townhouses.

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The GUSA Endowment Commission held a town hall meeting on Saturday afternoon to address how to spend the $3.4 million made available by the SAFE reform passed this December.

The commission’s chair, Andrew Curtis (MSB ’11), described to a group of around 20 students the process that governs the use of these funds so that they have a positive and lasting impact on all Georgetown undergraduates.

Though proposals can include various components, the Commission will choose no more than five submissions from both current students and alumni.  The Commission also hopes that alumni additions to the $3.4 million will expand the impact of student-directed improvements to the University.

GUSA Finance and Appropriations Committee Chair Colton Malkerson (COL ’13) stressed that students submitting proposals should become fully aware of the feasibility of projects by contacting appropriate offices on campus.

Though some proposals have suggested efforts at beautification or improvements of athletic facilities, Curtis said that the most common theme throughout the approximately 20 submissions the commission has already received has been the desire for more student space on campus.  Despite not yet having formally been presented to the commission, the reestablishment of a pub in the basement of Healy Hall to provide an informal space for students to socialize has received particular attention.

The next step in the process of deciding how to spend the funds is a second town hall meeting on Saturday, April 9.  After all proposals have been submitted by April 10, the FinApp body will review them over the summer.  The final step, a student referendum, is expected to take place next winter.

In an email sent to the SAFE Reform Endowment Commission this morning, a number of current students and alumni, led by Matt Stoller (COL ’08), submitted a proposal to bring back the Healy Pub.

The effort requests that the $3.4 million from the recently passed Student Activities Fee Endowment Reform be used to reopen the pub, which opened in 1974 and closed in the 1994-1995 academic year after relocating itself to the Leavey Center earlier that decade.

In an 11-page proposal, the group lays out why it believes that reopening the pub would be beneficial to the campus community. Under the plan, the pub would not close to students under 21 during the late night, unlike The Tombs, which the group believes would alleviate some neighbor concerns about students being off campus. It also includes an example of a successful currently operating student pub: The Cambridge Queen’s Head Pub at Harvard University.

The proposal also suggests that offices currently located in the Healy basement, the former home of the pub, be relocated to other spaces on campus such as opened up by the creation of the Hariri Building and the science center that is currently under construction.

Find out more information about the proposal at BringBackHealyPub.com, on Twitter at @HealyPub, or on the group’s Facebook page.

Read the full proposal and a letter from former employees and patrons of the Healy Pub after the jump.

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This morning, GUSA’s Finance and Appropriations Committee released its student activities budget for the 2012 fiscal year. Clubs requested more than $1.6 million in funding and received $800,000, as per the plan established in last semester’s Student Activities Fee Endowment reform.

“Although we had more money to give out this year, we were faced with much larger funding requests than last year,” the report reads. “Student organizations realized that SAFE Reform meant more money was available, and they responded by requesting more money to meet the needs of their groups.”

The highlights of the budget include $14,000 for the oft-underfunded College Readership Program, which was suspended last semester, as well as $150,000 for the Center for Social Justice’s Advisory Board for Student Organizations. According to the report, Fin App allocated the money to restore CSJ ABSO’s reserves, expand ABSO groups, sponsor Alternative Spring Break trips, and purchase vans. $12,500 was allocated to CollegiateLink Software, a student organization management tool.

Despite not receiving its total request of $125,500, the Student Activities Commission saw its funding increase by the largest magnitude from the previous fiscal year — it received $90,000, more than triple the amount it received in 2011. (Earlier this week, SAC voted use its reserve money to cover a potential budget shortfall in the event that GUSA reduced its funding.) The report explained that the money will cover approximately 85 percent of funding requests — if the numbers include outside funding sources.

“Because of the very large requests from advisory boards this year, unfortunately we were not able to give anyone their full request. We are confident, however, that this drastic increase in SAC’s allocation will allow it to fund clubs at a much higher rate than past years,” the report reads.

The Advisory Board for Club Sports received $250,000, the largest share allocated from the budget. The money will be used to subsidize club sports teams and fees.

Groups that requested funding now have a week to appeal their amount of allocated fund. Then, Fin App will vote on the budget. If it passes out of the committee, the GUSA Senate will vote on the budget no sooner than a week later.

[Editor's Note: Due to an error in the FinApp report, an earlier version of this post reported that SAC requested $225,500, not $125,500 — the actual amount requested.]

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The Georgetown University Student Association announced the final composition of the Commission on Student Activities Endowment Reform this past weekend.

The commission will be tasked with determining the allocation of the additional funds that are able to be used for student programming following the vote this past semester to approve the SAFE reforms.

The commission is made up of representatives of each of the funding boards, along with members of GUSA, the Corp, and GUASFCU. Four students-at-large, including commission Chairman Andrew Curtis (MSB ’11), will also be a part of the committee.

After the jump see the list of all the commission members and the commission’s guiding document.

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