On this year’s ballot, students will vote on whether a future Student Government should be forced to adhere to a balanced budget.
The bill is titled “Balanced Budget Act,” and if it is passed there will be a constitutional amendment that states that after the fiscal year 2020-2021, SG will need to rein in spending to eliminate any deficits.
When SG spends more money than it accounts for with its Activities and Service fee budget, they pull money out of their reserves, and that is called deficit spending. Currently, SG has been in a deficit for the past two years.
Jozef Gherman, former student body president, wrote the amendment and found sponsorship from acting Student President Laraine Ruiz.
The bill needs to be ratified by the student body before it can be added to the Constitution.
There is some criticism of the amendment. James Scott, active Senate president, said that he didn’t want to see the deficit given to a future SG.
“We shouldn’t be putting a timestamp in the constitution, it’s just kicking the can down the road for someone else,” Scott said. “This will be hindering SG and their ability to best utilize their capital reserves.”
He agrees that a balanced budget is a good idea, but thinks that SG should be concentrating on achieving that as soon as possible. Scott has been a long time SG member. He worked with the organization back in 2008 when the recession hit. At that point, he said there needed to be significant cuts to adapt.
The A&S fee budget is the single biggest responsibility for Senate members and determines the funding for a number of programs including Campus Recreation, the USC, organizations like the Harborside Activities Board, the Office of Multicultural Affairs and the Crow’s Nest.
In the 2016-2017 fiscal year, SG distributed a $3.4 million dollar A&S fee budget and mistakenly lost $93,511, effectively double taxing themselves in overhead administration fees.
Gherman, president when the mistake was made, is running for a seat in the Senate after a two-semester break. He said that a fundamental piece of his new platform is fiscal responsibility and that this amendment takes SG in the right direction.
“We have not been doing our due diligence of cutting events that are not working,” Gherman said. “We should be cutting programs that don’t work and funding the ones that do.”
To incorporate a balanced budget, SG will need to scale back the funding for many programs. This reduction could have a number of effects, like shortening gym hours or funding fewer campus events.
