Religious student organizations will be eligible for funding from the Student Activities Fund for some of their activities, Student Council announced Tuesday night.
Student Council informed religious organizations in late January of a Board of Visitors rule that prohibits them from receiving appropriations. Council did not enforce this rule in previous years.
However, William W. Harmon, vice president for student affairs, recently advised Council that a clause in the Board of Visitors appropriations guidelines allows the Council Appropriations Committee to provide funding for certain non-religious activities of religious contracted independent organizations.
"We will now be able to provide funding for religious organizations, and we're very happy about it," Council President Joe Bilby said.
The Board's directive placed Council in the delicate position of having to deny funds to longstanding CIO's.
"We were extremely distressed when we read the guidelines," prohibiting funding for religious groups, Council Vice President for Organizations Kelly Harris said.
Council asked University General Counsel Paul Forch for clarification of the rules after they were issued by the Board, she said.
Council encouraged religious groups still to apply for funding in case they were later found eligible, because the rule deeming them ineligible was still being interpreted.
After meeting with Forch, Harmon pointed out a clause in the appropriations guidelines that states "no student news, information, opinion, entertainment, or academic communications media group shall be deemed ineligible for funding" because the group espouses religious or political beliefs.
This clause addresses religious and political groups. Because of a separate rule in the guidelines, the Council considered political groups eligible for funding before Harmon's interpretation of the clause, Harris said.
The Board of Visitors adopted the policy of providing some funding to religious and political groups after Wide Awake, a Christian magazine, won a 1995 Supreme Court victory against the University. The Court ruled in a 5-4 decision that denying funds to the magazine based on its religious content was a violation of the First Amendment's guarantee of free speech.
"We can't, from a religious perspective, fund worship services or proselytizing or, from a political standpoint, support balloting or any activity that puts forward a candidate," Harmon said.
Religious groups will be able to receive money for other things, such as guest speakers and office supplies, that are not necessarily religious in nature, Harris said.
Black Voices, the Orthodox Christian Fellowship and the University Christian Fellowship all will now be eligible for funds, Harris said.
"I've had the same opinion all along, that we should receive funding just like any other student group," University Christian Fellowship President Christian Cox said. "It's fantastic."
"We should fund organizations to the fullest extent possible that's legal," Harmon said.
University students who object to some CIOs' activities do not have to help support these groups. Students can request that a partial return of their student activities fee from the University Bursar's office.
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