Finance committee tables one funding request, denies three others

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Josue Zuniga, chair of the Finance Committee, leads the discussion in a meeting on Tuesday.

The ASWSU finance committee heard four proposals on Tuesday for Crimson and Gray funding.

The Crimson and Gray Fund was created last year to help finance events put on by Registered Student Organizations that do not directly receive funding from the Services and Activities committee (S&A).

In order for an organization to get funding from the Crimson and Gray Fund, students must submit an application to the finance committee explaining the event they hope to host, its educational or cultural merit and what exactly the funding will be pay for.

The first application came for an event called iHeartPullman that was requesting $7,000. This charity event is being hosted on March 3 and it is expected to raise around $24,000 to support Pullman Regional Hospital.

For the past several years an event called Dance-a-thon was held to support the hospital but because of low turnout, ASWSU executive members changed the event to attract more attendees.

The event would cost $20 for WSU students, which the senators thought was too much considering that the majority of funding already in place for the event was coming from the ASWSU executive budget, which is money from the S&A fee. Sen. Alyssa Norris said it was like students were paying twice to go to the event since their money was already being used to fund it.

The senators also argued this event did not seem like a valuable use of resources since it was planning to bring in less money for charity than it would cost to put on.

The committee denied the request because the senators realized it was against the policy for S&A money to be used to raise money for charity.

The other applications included one from the Black Student Union (BSU) for their Unity Banquet, one from the Students United for Progress for a Valentine’s Day Dance, and one from the WSU Chess Club for their event CHESS@WSU.

BSU’s request was tabled, due to the committee needing further clarification about whether the event is open to the public. BSU is requesting $3,000 to pay their keynote speaker fee. Norris said she believed this was a great event and she wanted to accept the application but needed the clarification that it was open to all WSU students.

The Valentine’s Day Dance application asking for $910 was denied because the committee was not clear on what made the event more educationally valuable than just a dance.

“Do we fund an event for an event’s sake,” Sen. Kevin Schilling said, “or because it’s educational or cultural?”

Schilling also expressed his opinion that WSU and ASWSU have failed to provide the campus with “fun late night events” for students under 21 years old.

WSU Chess Club’s event funding request was denied as well because the application was unclear about what the funding would pay for.

Finance Committee Chair Sen. Josue Zuniga said he was going to reach out to the organizations whose applications they had denied and let them know what they need to change in order for them to be able to re-submit their application and possibly still receive funding.