Three of seven Contracted Independent Organizations who plan to contest their budget allocations from the student activities fund appealed for a second time before the student activities committee yesterday. The remaining four organizations will appeal again within the next two weeks.
Council Vice President for Organizations Kelly Polk and Council Appropriations Committee Chair Guru Raj represented the appropriations committee at the appellate meeting. Council will release funding decisions in the near future.
Phi Delta Phi, a graduate law organization, presented its appeal first, contesting the appropriations committee's decision to dock the organization $750.
Phi Delta Phi originally received a $1,510.03 stipend, but when a representative from the organization appealed to Council for more funds last week, the appropriations committee decided to subtract $750 the organization allotted for a new computer instead of adding funds to its budget.
The appropriations committee maintained all Law students are required to own a laptop computer, so Council need not cover the cost of computers. The committee did, however, allow Phi Delta Phi to keep money allotted for a printer.
Phi Delta Phi President Justin Hasford argued the organization never was informed Council would be able to decrease the budget the appropriations committee originally approved.
Council countered by arguing it has the prerogative to reexamine budgets and alter them.
"We have the ability to go into budgets and rethink them," Polk said.
In the second appeal, Sharaara Co-founder Aditi Dhakar and Treasurer Fatima Ravat represented the University's first South Asian dance team.
Sharaara received their budget a day late and failed to turn it in on time. If CIOs turn in budgets late, they are docked 2 percent of their funding for every minute it is late, Raj said. A signed copy of the budget was due to the appropriations committee by 4 p.m. April 7 -- a deadline Sharaara did not meet.
There was confusion over whether Polk and Raj agreed to accept the form when Sharaara asked them to accept it late.
Polk and Raj refused to accept the budget on the grounds that other organizations' budgets would not be taken late by the appropriations committee. Sharaara alleged that Polk and Raj agreed to accept the budget late.
"It wouldn't be fair to other groups who haven't come to appeals for turning in a budget late," Raj said.
The appropriations committee said they gave extra time to those who requested it.
"If a group requested extra time to deliberate over a budget because they received it late, it was granted," Raj said.
Students for a Free Tibet presented the last appeal yesterday to contest the decision to decrease their funding from last year, when it received $2,050 from Council and used less than $300 of the allocation. This year, the committee offered them $1,000 because they are an expanding organization.
SFT President Rich Felker and second-year College student Amy Costello argued they would need more funding this year in comparison to last year because they started this year off with a new group of members and next year they will have returning members.
CIO representatives said they cannot predict how the appeals will turn out.
"I was pleased with the way the committee handled and discussed stuff," Felker said. "It's hard to tell how it will go."
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