James Washinawatok, of the UW-Madison Indigenous Law Student Association, said that because his organization was rejected funding Oct. 1 by the Student Services Finance Committee, the group will have to resort to less definite ways to fund its February conference, 'Coming Together of the Peoples.'
Two other groups, the All-Greek Council and the State-Langdon Neighborhood Association, were also denied funding Sept. 30 and Oct. 1, respectively.
Although All-Greek adviser Dean Ed Mirecki said he was disappointed that the organization would not receive money from SSFC next year, he understands the difficulty SSFC faces when making funding decisions.
Its job, deciding which student organizations are worthy of a portion of the controversial student segregated fees, has changed significantly since last year, after UW-Madison implemented a new set of guidelines designed to ensure that all SSFC decisions are uninfluenced by committee members' private opinions.
This comes after the U.S. Supreme Court mandated in 2001 that university students have the right to decide how their segregated fees are spent, as long as their decision-making process is viewpoint neutral. Organizations can have a political leaning, but the students who decide their funding cannot. The university attempted to comply, but a second lawsuit last year required the administration to scrutinize the process more closely, resulting in a stricter process. Rejected in the spring, the university's new guidelines are on appeal; a decision is expected from a Chicago appeals court sometime before January.
Trying both to acknowledge and ignore the pressure of the pending court case, SSFC has attempted to proceed with its business, which includes learning enough about each prospective organization to make judgment calls about a group's educational benefit to the campus.
By offering a more structured set of criteria, the new neutrality guidelines have taken some of the vague subjectivity out of decisions, helping to streamline the process not only for committee members, but also for student organizers who have wanted a more tangible and understandable set of standards. Beyond an ongoing campus benefit, each organization must now be able to demonstrate achievable goals, a way in which to measure progress, a high level of organization, a budget justification and proof that their specific services aren't already available elsewhere on campus.
The evaluation process involves two separate hearings, one for eligibility and one for budget proposals. Before, the two hearings were fused together, adding pressure on the committee to make quicker, less thorough evaluations. The hope is that with new criteria, even if several committee members use personal bias against or for a specific organization, the process itself could still remain neutral.
Also, if a group doesn't qualify for funding, its organizers will ideally have a clear idea how to redirect its efforts.
As of now, both SSFC leadership and the UW-Madison administration have been pleased with the efficacy of the new guidelines. After learning of the three rejections, administration officials in charge of the pending court case met with SSFC Chair Lamont Smith to discuss the committee's findings.
Vice Chancellor Paul Barrows said he was satisfied.
'We think that [the SSFC members] have made an honest and straightforward effort to comply with the process as it is set up now,' he said.
Smith said he sees the new guidelines as a step toward maintaining credibility for the right of UW-Madison students to allocate seg-fee money.
'By de-politicizing the process, the pressure on the committee to fall back on personal biases about an organization is alleviated,' Smith said. 'We can instead focus on our job of determining what each organization needs to provide its service effectively.'
While Mirecki expressed disappointment about the All-Greek Council's rejection, he still credits the committee.
'I commend them that they [took] the time to ask questions to understand what we do,' he said.
