Fee increase heads to board

By Rachel Kramer

A proposed student fee increase will be going before the district board Wednesday, 7 p.m. in the Town and Gown Room.

Since the 2000 – 2001 academic year, there have been two tuition increases without an increase in student fees. The student fees fund both athletics and co-curricular programs, such as ASG, Student Activities Board, Perceptions and Forensics.

According to ASG President Stephen Emery, if the increase is not approved, four years from now, programs, not line items, will have to be cut.

For the upcoming 2006-2007 student fee budget, estimates show a difference of almost $65,000 in total expenditures, a decrease of approximatly 14 percent. Athletic programs, which received $206,625 for the 2005-2006 budget, may receive only $162,425 for the 2006-2007 budget, a decrease of 21 percent. Co-curricular programs, however, which received $45,125, may receive $45,845, an increase of $720. These extra funds are for Forensics and KDOX.

SAB, which received $48,960, may only receive $40,960, a decrease of 16 percent. ASG Administration, which received $83,964, may only receive $69,414, a decrease of 17 percent. Leadership Programs and ASMHCC Senate will receive the same amounts.

Director for Finance Marci Husby was director for finance during the 2004-2005 academic year.
“We had a 7 percent decrease in revenue that year,” Husby said. “We had to go back to the 2003-2004 funding levels.”
According to Husby, the finance council had to do the same thing this year, with the exception of Forensics and KMHC, who received additional funding.

“That was when we decided to talk about [the fee increase],” Husby said.
Husby proposed the fee increase to the finance council, who approved and recommended it to the ASG executive council. The executive council reviewed it for three weeks.
“We talked a lot about it,” Husby said. “We went back and forth a lot, but in the end, we knew it was time.”

The executive council passed the fee increase proposal unanimously.
“I never had qualms about it,” Stephen Floyd, ASG director of communications, said.
The proposal then went to ASG Senate, which passed it with a majority vote.
On Monday, Emery, Husby, Executive Dean of Student Development Rob Nielson and Director for Student Organizations Amy Bohanon met with Chief Operating Officer Gary Murph and MHCC President Robert Silverman to request to go before the board and to get placed on the agenda.

According to Husby, they also went to try to convince Silverman of the necessity of a student fee increase and to discuss what details the board would want to know to make an informed decision.
“[Silverman] is concerned with students being priced out of an education,” Emery said.
According to Emery, the effect the fee will have on athletics is their strongest argument.
“If we get the [$1 increase], athletics will be fully funded,” he said. “They will not need to use district funding.”

In order for athletics to be fully funded, according to Emery, the board, which can select any monetary amount, must go no lower than 75 cents.
According to Emery, the dollar increase would add an estimated $200,000 to the student fee budget. After contingency and fixed costs are factored in, that would leave co-curricular and athletics with an estimated $130,000 each.
Emery wants the extra co-curricular funds to go to SAB, co-curricular groups and clubs, not ASG. “We (ASG) can live without it,” he said.

According to Husby, they want to enhance programs, not the ASG budget.
Everyone involved, Emery said, supports the fee increase. “Those who haven’t been involved ask, ‘Why increase tuition,’ but those who have been involved know it is a great idea.”
Emery’s main wish is to have a large student presence at the board meeting, no matter what their view.
“I would like to fill the board room,” he said. “Everyone should come March 8.”