SGA members at the April 3rd meeting were surprised when the long-awaited SGA budget was finally released. In the previous meeting, the SGA executive board was still unsure of the budget due to delays from higher-ups, so the board announced that they would release an email when the budget was available.
However, come meeting time on the 3rd, the executive board announced the official budget, to the chagrin of the general board. The announced budget was $4,205.68, a far cry from the $30,000+ given as the last estimate. However, students attending the meeting were assured that having the budget be this low was a good thing, as it indicated that the clubs were using all of the funds allocated to SGA.
Following this, the Senior Week Committee came in front of the general board to request funding for their senior week cruise. Normally, $6,000 is automatically taken out of the SGA budget for the cruise. This year, the funds were not transferred automatically, forcing the Committee to come and manually request the money. Even though the SGA budget was only $4,000 before the request, it was explained that the SGA was allowed to take extra money from what is known as a “rainy day fund”, where leftover money from previous SGA budgets was left sitting in an account in case it was ever needed. This allowed the Senior Week Committee to request the full amount, with a secondary cheaper budget as a backup plan if they were unable to get the $6,000.
The vote for the Senior Week cruise passed, allowing the $6,000 to go towards the cruise and the transportation. The Senior Week Committee will be renting out The Spirit of Ethan Allen cruise ship, along with a coach bus to transport seniors and their guests to Burlington, where they will enjoy a dinner cruise on Lake Champlain alongside faculty. The event is scheduled for May 17th, which is the Friday immediately before commencement.
In other SGA news, the yearly budget meeting will no longer occur every fall semester. Now, the SGA budget will be divided among the clubs on an “as-needed” basis, where clubs will request funding for each needed line item prior to the event occurring, rather than having all money be given to all the clubs immediately as the year starts. Director of Student Life Matt Patry also announced that club officers may officially run for SGA executive board positions and that all elected SGA board members will be taken on a weekend-long leadership development retreat, in which members will learn advanced leadership techniques to improve their resumes and improve their leadership skills in their position on campus.