Sections

· I am the VP for finance at Western. I want to talk to you all about some of the budget planning here at Western. When you were looking at colleges, did you look at private schools? How much more money was their tuition? About $35,000. How much does it cost here? $6000. Why is there a difference? Western is subsidized with state money. The role is to provide access and affordability for people to attend higher education. I’m sure you are aware of the country’s financial difficulties and the lowering of state budgets to help subsidize higher education. States across the country are expecting huge budget deficits. If you were to add all states’ budgets it would be about 102 billion dollars short. This translates to higher cost among taxpayers. Higher education gets squeezed first when it comes to budget cuts. In the state of Colorado there will be about a 257 million dollar budget deficit this year. There is a unique system in Colorado to amend the constitution. Amendment 23 passed recently which guaranteed funding for K-12 so the state cannot cut that. The Federal government provides money for education. 382 mil dollars was allocated last year. They are running out of money so they reduced the higher education funding by 60 million dollars. What will Colorado funding get next year? People wonder how it is going to work. How does this apply to WSC? Our budget is following the pattern of the state. We recently passed Senate Bill 3 which provides tuition flexibility. Because they have to lower higher education funding, they can’t put a cap on the tuition for state schools. This will be a 5 year deal. We need a financial accountability bill which will describe how the financial aid will be used to lower income students and how we will address student debt loan. We are trying to identify scenarios with tuition increases to save funding. A possibility is to increase tuition by 11.6% for in state and 5% increase for out of state. This is a cap; an insurance policy for the college. I am not saying this is what it will be, and we will be fighting for as much funding as we can. This is a process. Each scenario includes using 25% of additional tuition revenue for financial aid which will be primarily need based. The worst case scenario would be a 19.1% increase in resident tuition. We are working hard to ensure that all of this change does not fall on students. We are looking to change our costs and what we have in the reserves. The college will have a deficit of 700,000 dollars next year. We will look at ways to create efficiencies. We want to simultaneously lower costs. In the first 2 and 3 yrs college will have a lower revenue. We are looking for ways to lower our expenditures. There will be a more severe decline in the first year. This is not just WSC, but rather every state supported institution in Colorado. We are one of the lowest cost institution in the state. WSC will still be one of the lowest costing colleges in Colorado. We wanted to inform you with what the college will be facing. We also want to motivate you to talk to your local officials to find solutions to these budget cuts for higher education.

· Travis: What’s after year one?

· Brad: Tuition could increase 11% each year. This doesn’t mean we will, but we can.

· Grace: You will submit the plan next Friday?

· Brad: It is a 5 year plan, but we can advise it at any time. We have the opportunity with this first year that we can revise it right away.

· Devon: We had a guest speaker talk about new bills trying to be passed in Colorado (61, 62, and 101). Will these increase the deficit of higher education funding?

· Brad: Yes it will, and our plan is assuming they won’t pass. Basically these would mean no state support for higher education.

· Walker: What kinds of programs would you be cutting?

· Brad: We will look at the administrative work first; facilities, accounting, budget etc. The we would look at academic support or service areas before we get to the instructional areas.

V. Special Topics

- New club: Mana Nigame: It is a video games club. We wanted people to come to watch anime, play games, and hang out with people with similar interests. We are interested in doing competitions like a video game tournament. (semester long video game tournament where anyone is welcome.) We will provide all kinds of games such as fighting, sports, racing, and strategy.

- Lauren: Do you have a group of members interested?

- MJ: Yes. We also want to start a comic magazine on campus as a fundraiser. Also board games.

- Nick: Will you guys have weekly meetings?

- MJ: Yes.

- Contact me at: marijane.dau@western.edu

- Motion to vote: Devon

- Second: D’Andre

- Club passes

VI. Advisor Reports

· You guys did an amazing job during Homecoming! Convocation requests due October 1 at 5pm in my office. Progress reports for new students will be out October 4. Also, the new western online look will be coming out then. Coping seminar will be October 5 from 1:00-1:45 in the North Conference room. October 7 from 12:30 to 1:30 you can meet with advisors.

VII. Advisory Reports

· CCE: We had a great turn out for Buddy Wakefield. Quiggley was full.

· Intramurals: Open gym starts Monday and will be 4 days a week MW 7-10 pm and TR 7:30-10 pm.

· Program Council: October 3 will be the first day of yoga for WRAP. Wednesday October 6 they will show the movie Waiting and Still Waiting at 7 and 9 pm. Foosball and pool tournament will be October 6 at 9 pm. Sodexo and WRAP will be doing late night with Madjack October 8, 9, 22 and 23. Oct 27 is the Day of the Dead celebration partnering with Amigos. 8-9 pm will be a speaker talker about this holiday and from 9 to midnight is a dance. Our PC events during homecoming went really well. We have been getting a lot of applications for event help which shows students are involved. We need a committee to help decide which events we will sponsor. I think we could use 2 from SGA and 2 from PC. Anyone interested? Austin and Haleigh volunteer.

· Student affairs: October 5 is national depression awareness day so October 5 and 7 there will be screening and information from 11:00 am to 1:30 pm in the college center by the front desk.

· Treasurer: I need everyone’s receipts from homecoming by Friday!! There is a budget meeting Friday at 8 am in the SGA office. Don’t forget to do your office hours. We want to put together a homecoming “how to” binder so if you were a committee head please submit all your information and email to Molly. Include contacts and any good and bad things that happened so that they can be used as reference in the future.

· WP: We had intermediate rock climbing and that went really well. Next week we have a $15 day hike. Rentals are up and we are accommodating lots of new events and we are trying to sponsor as many as we can.

· Vice President of External: I receiver a card from Sandy Mark saying thank you and that we did a good job.

· President: Good job on homecoming! We need a senator to help Brandy. They are putting on an event at the skate park. I need a senator to write this bill. Ciera volunteers. Can a senator write a bill for the paintball club? Walker volunteers. Jay Helman said that he liked tha comedian and the concert. SENATORS put this on your board: political club is hosting a political debate October 4 at 7:30 pm in the ballroom.

· Vice President of Internal: We have another bill coming soon. Eric Haglen wants to have a longboard competition and is requesting money for prizes. Brian will be sponsoring that bill. Haleigh will have senators sign up for new committees at the next meeting. Senators need to be on at least 2 committees.

VIII. Senator Reports

· Brian- none

· Austin: What can we do about more bike racks?

· Shelley: All the information about how to apply for money for a sustainability project can be found on the western website.

· Ciera: I am curious about bill writing. There used to be an example of a bill.

· Molly will put up an example of a bill on the website and email to everyone.

· Devon: I was contacted by Hickenlooper. He knew I was a senator at WSC and wanted to bring a representative to speak at the college. He wants to give information about the laws and urge students to vote. He would come October 20 and 21. Do we want to do this? They don’t need any funding. They only need the ballroom and they also ask SGA to advertise this event.

· Grace: I thought we couldn’t have anyone because we are non-partisan.

· Shelley: We are educational and it is an equal opportunity so it’s ok.

· Lauren: Move forward and send him an email that we are interested.

· Haleigh: We will have a senate meeting again soon and we need to sign up for committees. Senators meet me at 7:00 pm before the next SGA meeting.

· Shelley: Convocation requests are due. This started with Gary Petersen who wanted to allocate funds for students who showed interest in putting on a program. We have 2000 dollars to allocate for the full year. I need one senator for this committee.

· Megan: none

· Rachel: none

· Richard: none

· Sam: none

· Walker: Students approached me with a proposal for a sustainability concert so be looking for that.

IX. Discussion Items

· Shirts: Sean’s design passes on back and WSC SGA on front

· D’Andre- What about the possibility to pay the senate chair?

· Grace: We have the money to do this with our excess. The senate chair does a lot of work and she is a part of the executive committee.

· Shelley: This position was paid last year.

· Ciera: Is there an estimate of how many hours you spend per week?

· Haleigh: Outside meetings and office hours about 2.

· Lauren: Every bill goes through her.

· Devon: Are you required to attend budget meetings?

· Lauren: Yes.

· Austin motions to move this vote to next week when senators know more information about position’s past pay

· passes

X. Action Items

· D’Andre adds-Inductions

· Nick Edwards: Senator. Grace Eggleston: Treasurer

XI. Remarks for the Good of the Order

· Ping pong balls: Who should supply that?

· Grace: We are trying to be very frugal with our money.

XII. Late Roll Call

· Sabret, Jamie (excused volleyball) D’Andre

XIII. Adjournment