Despite rumors, the Student Government Association at Simpson isnot cutting budgets for organizations on campus, according to MikeSchrodt, SGA treasurer.

For the 2003-04 academic year, students actually had to pay a$189 student government fee; which was $15 more than last year. TheBrenton Student Center’s fund takes $15 from each student, while$20 goes to student reading programs. The SGA budget committeekeeps the rest.

“We [the committee] must keep in mind how much money we haveavailable before granting it to an organization,” said Schrodt. “Wedon’t want to run out of money.”

This years’ increase in fees allowed the SGA budget committee towork with $201,740 for campus organizations.

If a campus organization wishes to request money, theorganization must first be registered with Simpson. To decide ifthe request will be granted, the budget committee takes intoconsideration the amount requested, how the money will be spent andhow the college will benefit from the activity as a whole.

When the budget request is approved, the organization must usethe money for what it was intended for.

“Any organization can request money from [the budgetcommittee],” said Schrodt. “Some request an annual budget, whileothers make requests to fund special activities.”

The latest budget request was made by the LGBTQA to increasetheir funds due to increased activities this year.

Organizations such as KSTM, Campus Activities Board, ReligiousLife Council and The Zenith are given special “line item status.”This status is granted for these groups because they do the mostactivities for the student body.

This year CAB received the most money from the SGA Senate with$97,853 devoted to the group. The Zenith and RLC came in secondwith $25,252 given to each one.

Sophomore Susan Birchen is planning to create a French club oncampus, and hopes she will be able to obtain money from theSGA.

“We’ll probably ask for money, though we won’t rely on it,” saidBirchen. “We already have some ideas for fundraising that we thinkwill work well.”