Tuesday night, 19 Contracted Independent Organizations appealed to Student Council, requesting additional funds above those initially allocated by the appropriations committee.
The requests, which lasted 10 hours, resulted in Council granting 11 appeals and allocating around $13,000.
Council Executive Vice President Ronnie Mayhew said he thought each group was given a fair amount of consideration, despite the long proceedings.
"I think that the representative body showed their dedication to giving a fair hearing to all of the groups, given the fact that they stayed there until 5:30 in the morning and continued to ask an ample amount of questions to each organization," Mayhew said.
Groups were permitted to appeal under five arguments: an alleged mistake of the appropriations committee, a failure on Council's part to complete the appropriations process, a progressive cut and appeals regarding line by line decisions of the appropriations committee.
Two organizations, the Virginia Volleyball Club and Sharaara dance club, were denied their appeals because they failed to turn their budgets in by the 5 p.m. deadline on Monday.
"It sets a very hairy precedent if we make exceptions for the rules and grant these groups money," Appropriations Chair Guru Raj said.
An additional 24 CIOs who did not appeal also failed to turn in the necessary materials by the 5 p.m. deadline and were denied their allocated funds.
Council Vice President of Organizations Kelly Polk said that, although it was unfortunate that these organizations lost their appropriations for next year, their mistake provided Council with some "wiggle room" for granting money on appeals: a total of about $37,000. If all CIOs had turned in budgets on time, no funds would have remained for appeal allocation, she said.
Initially, 22 CIOs were to appeal, but the Vietnamese Student Association and the Black Business Student Forum at Darden withdrew their appeals of their own accord. The March of Dimes Collegiate Council was absent at the time their appeal was called around 4 a.m. and their argument was dismissed.
Polk said the groups were aware that it was their responsibility to be present at the time of their appeal.
According to Polk, 20 groups were penalized for financial irresponsibility. Four appealed and three were granted some of the money they requested.
"The groups that appealed did so because they believe that this year's leadership [in their organization] is more capable of handling the group's finances," Polk said. "They really have to care about their organization to appeal."
Five Law groups presented appeals. Four of those five received funding, while Phi Delta Phi, a law ethics society, had their allocation reduced by about $100.
Keturah Corell, appropriations committee member, was in charge of most of the Law group appropriations.
"The Law groups had requested way more than what they contribute to the Student Activities Fund through $39 per student," Corell said.
Before the progressive cut, the appropriations committee attempted to save money by asking some of the Law and Darden groups to raise an additional 10 percent of Council's allocation.
"We did this just to make everything equitable so undergrads don't bear the burden of the Law journals, for instance," Corell said.
Overall, Polk said she was satisfied with the night's appeals proceedings.
"I think it's good that groups can have the opportunity to appeal to a higher body and also have their concerns heard in front of a larger group than the appropriations committee," she said.
Any group whose appeal was denied has seven days to re-appeal to the Student Activities Council.
Eli Dejarnette, Vice President-elect for Organizations, said both he and Council are dedicated to helping organizations, which were denied funding find the money necessary to survive next year.
Commerce Representative Mark Straub agreed.
"Our goal is not to punish them through draconian measures," he said. "We don't want to see any of these organizations fail next year."
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