SFC Budget Finalized
by Alyson Dame

This week the Student Finance Committee announced the year’s final budgets to student organizations. SFC distributes the money collected through student’s activity fees to over 150 chartered organizations. Budgets were announced last spring, but many organizations appealed their initial budget this fall, and those decisions have just been announced.

“We had approximately $450,000 this year to distribute between allocations, appeals and ad-hocs. We allocated almost $360,000 last spring, and a little under $40,000 this year for appeals, that leaves us with about $50,000 for ad-hocs,” senior Student Treasurer Jessica Marish said.
Many treasurers were disappointed by their final budget, there was a feeling that the goals of groups were impossible with the budgets given. Oberlin Action Against Prisons had planned to bring speaker Angela Davis to campus during their seventh annual conference in November. “From our point of view, I don’t think it was fair,” sophomore treasurer and co-chair Alex Braunstein said. OAAP requested $34,000. “That was always a ridiculous number, but they allotted us $1,931. With that amount of money, it seems not only are they not interested in bringing Angela Davis, but they’re not interested in continuing our conference,” he said.
Oberlin Film Series will not be able to fulfill its charter with the money it was allotted. “It’s in our charter that we’re supposed to show 100 films,” senior OFS co-chair Peter Prows said. Prows said that SFC recommended OFS show 65 films, but that their budget will not even cover that. Admission prices have been raised for some movies, and about 50 movies will be shown this year. OFS receives the largest budget of any group on campus. This year, it requested $34,000 and received, after appeals, about $21,300.

“We believe we provide an important service to the Oberlin community. We’re essentially the only film group on campus,” Prows said.
Sophomore Lauren Haynes is President of her Class Council, which was allotted $831.99 of the $3061 they requested. “Honestly, for what we are supposed to do which is class-building activities for the sophomore class, I don’t think that is enough,” she said.

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