Last night Student Council heard three CIOs appeal their fall appropriations funding allocations.
The first two groups, Off the Lawn and Students Promoting Free Trade, both were denied their appeals and thus were allocated zero dollars by Council.
Council Appropriations Committee Co-Chair Conor Fee said both groups had estimated that they would make more money fundraising than they would spend throughout the course of the year.
"They're making more money than they are using," Fee said. "We can't fund groups that aren't actually asking for money."
Council Vice President for Organizations Eli Dejarnette also told Council at the beginning of the meeting that if they allotted any more money to the three appellants, all of the other groups would have to take a cut to accommodate the additional allocations.
Originally, $31,826.60 was allocated to the 36 groups who applied for funds in the preliminary fall allocations.
"All groups had their budgets cut to modest levels and even after that there was not enough money," Dejarnette said.
In order to get down to the $20,000 fall appropriations budget, the appropriations committee made a progressive cut. The groups with the largest allocations were cut by 45 percent and the groups asking for the least only were cut by 10 percent.
Officers of both the Off the Lawn and Fair Trade groups claimed their budgets should be reconsidered because of errors they made after their initial appropriations hearing.
Council Chief of Staff Noah Sullivan argued in favor of granting the appeals.
"If we have the chance to fix something that was wrong, then let's do it," Sullivan said. "It seems asinine to not."
College Rep. Curtis Ofori, who is also the President of the Off the Lawn, argued in favor of the first two appeals -- presenting a unique conflict of interest situation.
"If we're going to turn everyone down, why are we even having appeals?" Ofori said.
Many Council members said they were concerned about the conflict of interest Ofori presented because, unlike other appellants who only had a 30-minute appeal, Ofori could join in Council's debate.
Law School Rep. Charles Alm opposed the appeals of both organizations.
"These people had a month and a half to get it right," Alm said. "They are asking us to fix a mistake they made by taking money away from all of the groups that didn't make a mistake."
The Law School Mock Trial treasurer Matt Janson appealed on a different basis in the third case of the night. Janson argued against the progressive cut and made the assertion that Law School Mock Trial was worth $366.45 more to the University as a whole.
"I'm here because I believe in our organization and I believe in the importance of our organization to the Law school and the University," Janson said. "While the amount is moderate, it will have a direct effect on our viability as an organization."
The Off the Lawn appeal was defeated by a vote of 14 to 2 while the Fair Trade appeal was narrowly defeated by a vote of 11 to 10.
Council Vice President for Administration Will Sowers presided over the proceedings and cast the tie-breaking vote in favor of upholding the appropriations committee's decision.
The appeal made by the Law School Mock Trial team was denied by a vote of 14-5.
Council finally approved the final fall appropriations of $19,997.94 for the 36 organizations that underwent the full fall appropriations process.
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