The Michigan Review

Anatomy of an MSA Budget

by C.J. Carnacchio

At their September 22, 1998 meeting, the Michigan Student Assembly (MSA) approved its 1998-1999 budget in less than an hour. The MSA’s total external budget for the 1998-1999 fiscal year is $550,000. This total was derived from three major sources of revenue: 1) $540,000 generated by the annual student fee ($5.69 per student per semester) and the surplus revenue from the 1997-1998 fiscal year; 2) $3,000 worth of interest income; 3) $7,000 generated by department activity. The $550,000 pool was distributed in the following manner: 1) $73,000 to the child care program; 2) $33,000 to the general reserves; 3) $16,600 to the capital goods reserve; 4) $110 to the Community Service Van Reserve; 5) $25,000 to the Ann Arbor Tenants Union (AATU).

The AATU’s allocation represented an increase of $5,000 compared to last year. MSA President Trent Thompson commented on the necessity of this increase saying, “They became much more active last year, and this year they are planning to hire more staff and mount a publicity drive. Also, AATU is working with MSA this year to create an off-campus student housing survey.” A $2,000 portion of the AATU's funding increase will be funneled into this major publicity drive which will include increased residence hall programs, a widespread distribution of AATU literature, Diag boards, and banners.

After these expenditures, MSA was left with a grand total of $401,990 for its internal budget. Of that total, $90,000 will be spent running the MSA itself. MSA’s payroll received $62,000, the same amount as last year’s allocation. The other $28,000 was budgeted for operations expenses. This represented a $5, 250 increase compared to last year. The 1997-1998 budget had actually resulted in a $2,250 decrease in operational spending compared to the 1996-1997 budget. That decrease was the result of the Students Party’s pledge to cut operations spending by $2,000 through budget cuts and waste reduction. This year’s operations spending increase not only offsets last year’s cut, it also represents a net increase of $3,000.

Thompson explains the operations spending increase saying, “The administration mandates that MSA has a full-time Administrative Coordinator. Early last year, our old coordinator left for another job, and we spent much of the year recruiting a new one. We hired one late last year. The coordinator is paid salary out of the payroll budget line, and the office supplies and resources that she uses are paid out of the operations line. The operations line is up particularly because the new coordinator needed a computer.”

After the payroll and operations expenses, MSA had $311, 990 left over to be distributed among 25 committees and commissions and the Committee Reserves. In examining the winners and losers of the MSA budget game it appears that the Budget and Priorities Committee (BPC), which is responsible for funding student groups, was the biggest winner of all with an increase of $28,000 in funding. BPC has a total of $168,000 in their coffers this year to be allocated to various student organizations upon request. BPC Chairman David Burden accounted for this increase: “It was decided that all funds that went unclaimed from the Community Service Fund last year should remain in that fund, in addition to the new funds generated from the $1 community service fee. I was opposed to this, but once it became clear that the Assembly was not, I requested that all the unclaimed BPC funds from last year roll over as well. The extra $28,000 this year are simply funds that were allocated to groups last winter that were never claimed.”

The External Relations Committee (ERC), which is in charge of the MSA's lobbying efforts in the Michigan State Legislature and Congress, suffered a significant decrease in funding, receiving $4,860 compared with last year’s $8,500. In past years, the ERC has been a constant source of controversy and debate during MSA budget meetings. Critics have often questioned the value of the trips and conferences which the ERC funds and MSA representatives attend. Critics have argued that these excursions are of no real value to the student body and are essentially self-serving perks to MSA representatives.

ERC Chairman Andy Coulouris responded to such criticisms, saying, “The ABTS conference is the only conference to which the MSA is sending delegates this year. In my opinion the association does an extraordinary job of fostering networks between the student governments of the Big Ten ... we understand that our absence would not only hurt our cause, but would undermine the potential of the organization ... The association is currently furthering its efforts to coordinate federal lobbying efforts in order to more effectively impact legislation pertinent to students; collaboration also works to save the individual schools money, as the effect becomes more collective.”

By ending the MSA’s association with the North American Students for Higher Education (NASHE), a low-cost variant of the United States Students Association that solely focuses on educational issues, the ERC was able to downsize its budget considerably. Last year’s two NASHE conferences cost the ERC a combined total of $1800. NASHE membership dues cost the ERC an additional $900. Coulouris explains the reasons behind the MSA’s split with NASHE: “The decision to dissolve our ties with NASHE came last year. This year that decision was simply reiterated. In contrast to the ABTS, the NASHE was poorly administered and its effects on Washington were negligible to say the least.”

The most dramatic decrease in funding involved the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender (LGBT) Students Commission. This year the commission received a total allocation of $50, which was a $1,950 decrease from last year. LGBT Commission Chairman Jen Trudell explained this significant shift in funds: “The previous chair of the LGBT Commission resigned before budget applications were submitted. The position was not filled until last week, when I was appointed chair. The $50 in the account is what was left over from last year’s budget ... Next year I will try to get a larger budget so you’ll have something more exciting to write about.” Trudell will likely request more money from the Committee Reserves for LGBT events.

Receiving a healthy $2,000 allocation to organize upcoming events was the new kid on the MSA committee/commission block, the Super-Fan Task Force. Thompson explained the Task Force’s purpose: “Jeff ‘Superfan’ Holzhausen, last year’s School of Public Health Representative, proposed a task force to work on projects bringing students and athletes closer together. He envisioned events where athletes from high and low profile sports could reach out to students, a higher profile for homecoming , and more organized support for sports which don’t maintain the profile of, say, football or hockey. MSA Rep. Damian DeGoa took over the committee, and he has started scheduling such events.”

A hefty $3,000 increase in funding was allocated to the Women’s Issues Commission (WIC), bringing its budget up to $4,000 for this coming year. Thompson defended this increase, stating, “They ran Affirmative Action 101 last year, a large and somewhat expensive event, and had to draw funds from the Committee Reserves even though a few MSA representatives and lots of WIC representatives were involved in its planning. They are planning another high profile event this year, focusing on eating disorders, and we wanted to fix the funding problems experienced last year.”

The Student Regent Task Force (SRTF) suffered a $900 decrease, bringing its total funding down to only $100. Thompson explained this shift in funding as a matter of fiscal efficiency and changing priorities: “The Student Regent drive is going to be an assembly-wide issue this year. We expect most of the business addressed by the SRTF last year to be addressed by the MSA as a whole this year. That makes the Committee Reserves a more efficient budget line to use, because the whole assembly has access to the line, instead of the SRTF line which only the co-chairs have access to.”

The Environmental Issues Commission (EIC) dropped $3,000 in funding compared to last year. This was largely because the EIC needed greater funding last year as a result of its participation in the organizing and coordinating of the Environmental Theme Semester. Some critics argue that the EIC is an unnecessary appropriation of MSA funds since it has nothing to do with governing the campus or representing students’ interests. They argue that dealing with environmental issues is not the proper function of a student government.

EIC Chairman Kris Genovese responds to such criticisms: “The commission (EIC) has everything in the world to do with campus issues and governance. As you may know, the world’s population has just surpassed the six billion mark, the last eight months were the hottest recorded in human history, and each year the people of Ann Arbor fill up Michigan Stadium with trash ten times. So recognizing these pressing issues in the world today, what can we do about it? Well my answer is that if you’re not part of the solution, you’re part of the problem. We have a duty, beginning with our own community, to live within the earth’s resources; it’s one of my missions at this University and it’s also one of President Lee Bollinger’s.” MR

This article was published in the 7 October 1998 edition of The Michigan Review (Volume 17, Number 2).
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