Student Senate Budget Week 2021

The Student Senate budget committee met on both October 15, 2021 and from October 25-29, 2021 to conduct Budget Week and allocate funds 2022-2023 fiscal year. After organizations presented their requests for the fiscal year, the committee deliberated on October 29 and constructed the $14,615,441 draft of Bill 2022 that was then sent to the full Student Senate. The bill was passed by the Senate on November 15 and signed by the Vice President of Student Affairs, Dr. Amy Hecht, on November 23.

The Budget Week process, including the deliberation process, is described in detail in Torchlight’s coverage of Budget Week 2020. As with previous bills, the budget committee allocated funds towards 5 categories: Salary, OPS (Other Personal Services) Wages, Contractual Services, Food, Expense, and Clothing and Awards. However, a major change in Bill 2022 is the total number of funds allocated. Bill 2021 amounted to a total allocation of $13,790,000. Bill 2022 saw an increase of $825,441. A comparison of Bill 2021 and Bill 2022 given this increase can be found below.

The total amount of funds requested by all organizations for the 2022-23 fiscal year was $16,655,054.46. The gap of just over $2,000,000 between funds requested and the available funds means that the Student Senate’s budget committee had to determine the most appropriate allocation of funds given this gap during deliberations. It is worth noting that on November 10, 2021, the Student Senate passed Bill 68 to help meet its budget demands by allocating $285,000 from Central Reserves to the Union.

As was the case with Bill 2021, Campus Recreation and the Union both requested and received the largest amount of funds in Bill 2022. Together, these organizations make up just under 75 percent of total funding. The tables below show the amount of funds requested by each organization during Budget Week versus the total amount they were allocated in the final bill. The table also shows the percentage difference between what organizations requested and received. Because a significant amount of funds needed to be cut in order to prevent over-allocation, many organizations received less funding than they requested. Note that the tables below show only the numbers presented in the document for funds requested and the final bill. Those who wish to see special instructions on the allocation of the funds as well as the rationale behind the allocations can view the full bill or the budget committee's minutes from Budget Week 2021.

Total Requested Funds, all Organizations: $16,655,054.46

Total Allocated Funds, all Organizations: $14, 615,441.00

The table below attempts to compare Bill 2021 and Bill 2022. The table includes all organizations funded in Bill 2022, so some values in the table show up as “N/A.” For example, the Jewish Student Union was not funded under Bill 2021 but was funded in Bill 2022, so they have missing values for the Bill 2021 column and the percent change column. Any organization that received funds under one bill but not the other will receive a “N/A” for the % change column. Additionally, this table presents only the numbers that can be found in each bill. It contains no information on how the structure of funding changed for Bill 2022 relative to Bill 2021. The purpose of this table is to show how the allocations changed for Bill 2022 given the increase in total funds allocated.

Bill 2021-2022 Comparison:

Total funds allocated in Bill 2021: $13,790,000

Total funds allocated in Bill 2022: $14,615,441