The CU Student Government Legislative Council held an open public hearing on Thursday to hear students’ and faculties’ opinions and voted to pass a bill that would merge the Student Organization Finance Office (SOFO) and the Student Involvement Office.
The SOFO has long been an office focused on financing for student groups on campus and, due to necessity, has had to recently take on the advising of those student groups as well. The Student Involvement Office works with large student organizations on campus to provide programming and leadership development for students.
The proposed bill calls for merging of the two offices into one cost center that would reside in the UMC. If passed, the bill would call for the merging to occur in the beginning of the 2015 school year.
Far from being a decided bill, an open public hearing highlighted both the pros and cons of the bill with both sides being represented evenly.
Erin Dewese, a Student Involvement Office Coordinator, said that this merger would bring unity and a more holistic service for CU.
“Students need a one-stop shop student activities office,” Dewese said. “People don’t look at a finance office and think that they can learn about student groups there. Through three focus groups, we have found that this bill is wanted and needed by students on campus. This campus needs a change.”
The merger would come with an approximate added amount of $6-8 to student tuition.
Senior political science major Sarah Andrews, President of College Democrats on Campus, added that with a funding addendum, this bill has the potential to become a tool to get students to be more active on campus.
“The offices are running inefficiently now,” Andrews said. “We need to ask for funding and we need to get students involved more with campus affairs. We need to promote action in student groups by making our offices more accessible to students.”
The bill did not come without its critics, bringing forward both sides of the issue on this debate.
Charlie Huynh, a sophomore studying biological sciences and a Representative of Asian Unity and Vietnamese Student Association, said that the SOFO accessibility lies in what students put into utilizing it. He added that costs and space were elements of this bill that needed to be discussed.
“SOFO is open to students and has its priorities,” Huynh said. “SOFO attends student involvement fairs and many groups are always in constant contact with the office. Moreover, it is not costly or time-effective to merge the two offices. We sacrifice space in the UMC and we need to train more faculty members through this merger, all while nothing new is being added.”
Senior Chemical and Biological Engineer Chemist major Bin Cao, chair of CUSG’s funding board, echoed the criticism on funding for the bill.
“We need to be more fiscally responsible,” Cao said. “We can’t spend more than we get and sustain another fee to student tuition all at the same time. Students don’t want that. We don’t want that.”
Nearly 800 student organizations on campus will be affected by the merger, through finding and allocation, as well as with whom to turn to with issues and programs for those organizations.
After nearly three hours of listening to public opinion, Lora Roberts, a senior studying Communications and author of the merger bill, made one final plea to the CUSG Legislative Council. She summarized her statement with a few words to collapse the main argument for the bill’s passage.
“We can not let our emotions get in the way of our judgment. We have to look at who the bill is helping and who it is hurting. In the long run, it will benefit students in becoming more active on campus through a more accessible means and faculty in finding one place to work every day for students. Overall, we need to ask ourselves who this bill is hurting? Every staff worker will keep their jobs and salaries while students will be able to communicate with and effectively find organizations that represent their interests.”
While no budget has been approved for the bill as of yet, CU’s Legislative Council is waiting to hear about more on the bill and establish appropriations and implementation of the merger.
Contact CU Independent Staff Writer Rafi Rahman at Rafi.Rahman@colorado.edu.
