This is tough to write and even more difficult to wade through but the circus that has embroiled the recent fee referenda threatens to destroy one of the most positive opportunities Student Government has provided the student body in recent years. The referendum was highlighted by a passionate campaign led by students in support of a fee and an incredibly high turnout by student voters. The referendum was well run and successful by most measurements.
The tough question is: what do the results of the referendum actually say? On the surface it’s easy to see students don’t want any sort of fee increase. That’s natural; students don’t want to pay more money. Only the fee increase to support educational technology received strong positive support in the referenda. I’m sure there’s some sort of academic explanation for the anomaly, but I’m going to stick that in the same category as the past health center fee requests that got support.
I always like to look at the referenda as a barometer of student feelings toward certain services on campus. It was tougher to do in the past because rather than seeing which ones received support and which ones didn’t, I had to look at which fees were the least unpopular and go from there. Student Government took a good step forward this time and asked a second question to go along with general fee voting. It asked whether or not the students felt a change was needed in funding. This allowed for a better measure on how students were feeling. When we look at this, it paints another broad picture that should signal where students see a need for funding increases. Students said they wanted an increase in transportation, educational technology and Talley funding; but except for the technology fee, students didn’t want to pay for these increases.
So here’s the conundrum with Talley: students want to see an increase in funding but they don’t want to pay for it — a gray area. That leaves room for the symbolic decision by Student Government — does it recommend moving forward with what students want and support the project or recommend moving forward with what students want and not support the fee, damaging the project’s prospects as it moves up to the Board of Trustees and Board of Governors level? It’s a catch-22 because you’re damned if you do and damned if you don’t.
Student leaders need to heed students’ desires in the referendums but they also need to evolve the way they present their recommendation. Unfortunately, the situation has turned into a casus belli in what should otherwise be seen as a positive evolution of the fee referendum because it digs deeper into what students want rather than a reaction to an increase in fees. It’s a tough call either way and I don’t fault their decision because it’s not as black and white as people make it out to be. At the same time I hope the Student Senate takes a look at the entire fee process so that it falls in line with the changing questions in the referendum. Did the Student Senate pass a recommendation to the letter of the law on Talley? No. But they didn’t exactly betray the students either.