I pride myself on having a good relationship with The Daily Campus, but a recent article about the Student Senate finance committee published above the fold on Monday went too far with its inaccuracies and the credibility it gave to sources that were largely misinformed.
Much of this misguided editorializing could have been cleared up if either of the reporters had bothered to contact either the president or the vice-president of the organization in question, both of whom have served on finance committee extensively.
Before I offer my opinion on the views expressed in the piece, I would like to clarify several factual errors present in the article:
1. Budgets are not reviewed in the order they are received, with late submissions receiving the tail end of consideration - they are processed alphabetically.
2. Budget meetings are not held at the “start” of each semester as the article stated twice – budget meetings for an upcoming semester occur in the middle of the preceding semester.
3. Per the comptroller’s office, the “$775,000” in discretionary funds that the authors refer to is actually closer to $577,000 after the necessary salaries, Hughes-Trigg contract fees and Student Media Co. contract expenses are removed.
4. While the article stated that students “purchased” tickets for the Gavin DeGraw concert, those tickets were actually free.
Furthermore, Michael Graves, the president of the Religious Studies Club whose experience was detailed in the article, aired several objections. In a Facebook comment on The Daily Campus’ fan page, he wrote that his position was “misrepresented in [the] article,” explaining that the authors gave the wrong impression about his club’s experience, and indicated that the Finance Committee gave his organization a full explanation of why they did not receive the funding they’d asked for.
But that wasn’t the only problem the authors had with sources.
While the authors may have assumed that the information they gleaned from interviews with the student body secretary was accurate, responsible reporters would have realized that this source has no affiliation or direct experience on finance committee and therefore has no direct evidence to support the assertions she made.
Furthermore, while I certainly believe that The Daily Campus should run corrections for all four of these glaring errors, factual mistakes are not my only concern with this article.
This most recent article advocated the conclusion that the finance committee is a wholly secretive organization, responsible to no one, that doles out funds on a whim and fancy. This message, which from my perspective seemed compelled by the experience of a single, spurned organization’s representative, could not be further from the truth.
The ability to charter and finance SMU organizations is one of the greatest powers that has been delegated to the Student Senate.
Accepting that power, Senate has implemented crucial checks on the power of the finance committee that ensure its balance and accountability.
Firstly, no decision of the finance committee is final under any circumstances. The Student Senate is structured such that no official business is approved or disapproved at the committee level, but must be brought back to the chamber as a whole. In this setting, grievances can be aired and complaints from relevant organizations can be heard over a two-week process.
None of this was mentioned in the article.
Secondly, the decisions of the finance committee are by no means “arbitrary” but instead are dictated by an extensive list of rules – all of which are made public on the Senate’s website.
Furthermore, while reasons for funding levels are not included in the initial reporting to organizations, these student groups can easily seek a comprehensive explanation through the complaint process.
In my four years in Student Senate, I have seen numerous organizations complain about their allocated funding, and many of these objections have been rectified. Communication is a two-way street, and if organizations require greater explanation of why they were funded x or y, they need only ask.
Thirdly, it is crucial for a responsible funding body to be able to bring in as much information as possible to make its decisions. One of the most essential considerations is the potential success of the event in question. In this regard, the article unfairly targeted Program Council, framing it as a metaphorical funding vampire that sucks money away from organizations.
But compared to every other student organization with the possible exception of Student Foundation, Program Council has had the greatest success at organizing and supplying events that students actually attend (see Sing Song, Ke$ha, Guster, Gavin DeGraw). Then, compare
Program Council to the Political Science Symposium – the organization the authors used repeatedly as an example – which has not put on a heavily attended event in my four years at SMU.
Condemning Program Council’s budget size without understanding their relative contribution to student activities created the grounds for many of the blind accusations made in this article.
I enjoy and agree with many of the investigative pieces The Daily Campus has published in the past. Articles on the board of trustees, the salaries of SMU employees and even articles on Senate itself have been helpful and informative.
However, investigative reporting must be done in a responsible way. The manner in which the authors chose to go about reporting in this article was not only careless and haphazard but also unfortunately casts doubt on the rest of the fine work this paper does.
Alex is a senior majoring in political science, economics and public policy. He is the student body vice-president.
Cosigned by:
Austin Prentice
Student Body President
Jeff Whelan
Assistant Comptroller
Rachel Fox
Finance Committee Chair
Alex Mace
Student Body President Elect
Katherine Ladner
Student Body Secretary Elect
Chad Cohen
3-year Member of Finance Committee
Ted Belden
Student Senate Speaker
