Student Council's three-month appropriations process officially began yesterday, with about 150 student groups attending mandatory meetings to demonstrate their interest in receiving funding from the Student Activity Fee - a decrease from the number of groups that requested funding last year.
Jamey Thompson, Council vice president for organizations, said that about 100 Contracted Independent Organizations attended the first meeting Friday afternoon.
Thompson estimated that about 50 CIOs were represented at the meeting yesterday afternoon.
He said it appears as if there will be "slightly fewer" CIOs applying for funding this year from last year.
The Appropriations Committee allocated $484,334 to 166 student groups last year. Initially, 189 CIOs demonstrated their interest by attending the mandatory meetings.
Appropriations Committee Co-Chairman Jay Cost agreed that it appeared fewer groups have demonstrated interest this year than in previous years.
But Brock T. Jolly, Council vice president for administration, said it seemed as if most of the groups requesting funds had attended one of the two meetings.
Cost, Thompson and Committee Co-Chairman Nick Holmes finalized the membership of the Committee after interviewing potential members last week.
Holmes said he is confident in the ability of the Committee to reach fair decisions.
The members are "a bunch of very capable people," he said.
Each of the 12 Committee members is assigned to about 13 CIOs, Cost said, though "some people have less and some have more."
Committee members help the CIOs stream-line their budgets.
After initially demonstrating interest, CIOs have until Feb. 11 to give copies of their budgets to the Committee.
The Committee then will hold five days of hearings with the groups, spread over two weekends.
After the hearings, the Committee will deliberate on each group's allocation and examine the submitted budgets.
Final allocation letters will be sent in mid-April.
Holmes said there is no reason to anticipate difficulties in the process, although he also said "things may come up - they always do."
The Student Activity Fee is a $39 charge included in each student's tuition and fees.
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