2.26.17 SFC Ad Hoc

Members Present: Austen, Vince, Natalia, Hassan, Josh, Sulan
Time Start: 1pm
Time End: 5pm

Students in Solidarity w/ Guatemala
Clara: I’m here to ask for money for Sergio. We need to ad hoc because we didn’t know that this event was happening so we couldn’t put it into our budget. They’re from Guatemala so we would need to pay for transportation. We’re asking that they stay in the bed and breakfast, and we have a relationship with them and it’s important that we support them. The gas is only $35, we’re having them eat at co-ops so they don’t have to pay for food.
Natalia: How much money left in your budget?
Clara: $400. We’re planning a banquet and publishing some zines.
Josh: Have you talked through location with your org? I know you have a date which is great, so any location?
Clara: We have a poster with a location, I think it’s 106.
Josh: Which is the biggest room.
Natalia: Can you make a case for how this isn’t additional programming, and him being on tour doesn’t fully make the case.
Clara: It’s pretty important that the speaker comes because he’s very important to our group. We couldn’t do the other things we want to do if we don’t get funding. He can’t come later because he’s going back to Mexico soon.
Elijah: You can actually fly him in from Mexico.
Clara: Okay, great. I’m not sure I understand the additional programming vs unforeseen costs difference.
Natalia: Say your antenna breaks, that would be unforeseen.
Josh: There are some less clear cut situations, like if an organization is deep in planning and the old speaker’s visa gets denied and they need more to cover that costs, say if it were $1,000 before and $1,500 later.
Natalia: I actually might disagree with you on that.
Josh: Yeah, the past precedent of the committee matters too.

Discussion:
Vince: I think that it’s pretty clear cut additional programming. But she made a case that there’s no way they could’ve foreseen it.
Sulan: I’m not sure, we’re not always consistent with that policy.
Vince: Sometimes the quality of the event supersedes breaking the rule.
Sulan: Last week for friendship circle, I spoke to the girl who was running it and the book was about something very important like Iran, and it sounded great and I kind of wish we funded it.
Natalia: It’s okay to feel bad, some students are very passionate about it, and you can’t put it on yourself to get every bit of information.
Vince: We do have five minutes to ask questions.
Josh: I feel that this is something that forum board can handle, especially since it’s around $600 without the speaker staying two nights. But, the way Vince explained unexplained costs is different than the way we’ve funded so far this year.
Proposal to fund in full.
0-4-1
Proposal does not pass.

Ana and Abby (Individual Ad Hoc):
Abby: Basically the project we started is a collaborative art book, so there’s submissions of visual arts, photography, prose, from survivors of rape. We started collection for summer to the end of last summer and we’re trying to get money to publish the books.
Ana: We’re actually done with putting it together, and plan on putting it online, but the idea is printing it so as many Oberlin students can see it as possible
Abby: Yeah, we’re planning on printing 300, to show people the ways in which writing can be good for healing and such, so people can see about the value of reading this work.
Ana: We found from our friends on campus that this is a huge issue. Right now we’re working with an outside printing company.
Abby: Her name is Sue and she’s great.
Ana: We received $400 from Wilder voice, we’re asking for around $1,100 to cover the rest.
Josh: This project looks really, really cool. You said 300 copies, I’m wondering if you’re trying to do a wilder voice or grape kind of thing to distribute around campus or if you’re trying to hold into them and offer them on request.
Ana: We want everyone who contributed to receive a copy, and we wanted to have an event to release the book.
Abby: We wanted to place many content warnings, we’re also posting on facebook (i.e. class pages) to advertise to students about it.
Austen: Have you tried reaching out to some art groups for this funding, like Art students committee, Oberlin students art group?
Ana: No but we’re considering going to co-ops for funding.
Josh: In addition to distributing, because of the work put into this project, I was wondering if you had a plan to document and keep one on record.
Ana: We could do the SIC or the Archives.
Abby: We could do online too. Also, it’s anonymous online, which could be great.
Ana: There’s also an organization running that could help it run even after this.
Sulan: Will it look like something like the Synapse? I’m just wondering what the form will look like.
Abby: It’ll look like a paperback, like the senior submissions. It’ll be around 8X11 in size.
Proposal to fund in full:
5-0-0
Proposal passes.

Austen: So, it’s not our fault, but Mark downplayed the loss in money from students not returning in the spring. But, it’s $70,000 while it’s usually around $35,000. I calculated it, and there’s some left. I knew what was in ad hoc before, but I have to add in the numbers from the previous Sunday.
Vince: I’m hearing this wrong, shouldn’t we be in debt?
Josh: No, because we still have capital investment.
Austen: Yeah, it’s about $33,000 in capital investment and $20,000 left in ad hoc.

Senior Council
Lyric: We’re trying to fund for an event for seniors and we’re reaching out to alumni to give students tips and tricks, and we’re also looking for people to help with tips for housing and such. Also, we’re bringing someone in to find out when a potential employer is shorting applicants for health care and such. We’re also asking for some money for people looking to offer food from Aladdin’s or pizza for people who come in late.
Josh: What’s the money in your account left for?
Lyric: The $6,000 we had was set aside for events, so we’re asking for $800.
Natalia: Does this go against our policy for funding departments?
Austen: Every class except for the senior class gets money from us, actually.
Hassan: Basically this money is just for providing food there.
Lyric: Yes.
Josh: It’s just for food so I don’t know. My initial thought is just that you can reallocate funds from the $6,000 for food.
Austen: The $6,000 was not explained too well, that $6,000 is actually gone already.
Hassan: It’s not just food, they’re also bringing alumni and stuff.
Natalia: I feel like it’s additional programming however I also feel like the class councils don’t really get to plan, so I feel it’s a class council trying to go above and beyond what they’re supposed to do, so I want to reward that. But I’m not sure if it’s additional programming, because they don’t submit a budget.
Austen: I don’t think it is, because that’s the money they’re given, not ask for.
Sulan: So every class has a council?
Austen: Yeah but the senior class is not in the allocation spreadsheet and they’re the only one. I don’t know if it’s only funding through us or if there’s supplemental funding for the groups’ events.
Hassan: I don’t know if they’re given a certain amount only for the senior week event.
Natalia: I’m in favor of this.
Josh: When Mobilizing came in and asked for money, and gave a great explanation for why they need food, and they didn’t get any.
Hassan: I think that’s a great point.
Vince: I think that their argument was a universal argument that can’t fly for every group.
Austen: But this is really important event.
Natalia: You could argue that everyone should protest.
Josh: I’m torn because they had $1,000 they could’ve used. And if any other group didn’t know, we wouldn’t fund them for it.
Austen: It’s different because they can’t check their funding through the OST.
Josh: But if they spend $1,000 and had $7,000 they should know how much they have left.
Natalia: They didn’t write their budget though, they’re just given one
Natalia: I’m in favor of funding it because they don’t submit a budget, they’re responsible for fulfilling school functions.
Josh: I thought they were trying to make an argument that it had never been explained to them that they’re only supposed to spend on this single event. They didn’t know how it was supposed to be allocated.
Hassan: Isn’t it their fault for not asking?
Josh: If this money were from us I would say so but I don’t know how clear the dean of student’s office operates.
Sulan: I’m always confused about food costs whenever they come up.
Josh: Org’s ask for lots of food money but then don’t allocate much toward food so that’s strange.
Josh: I know they didn’t know they were given so much money for this, but the only thing is that even if they didn’t know, they knew how much they originally had is how much they spent. Like, if they didn’t know they had $7,000 that would be the difference.
Natalia: I think it’s okay that they’re asking for food because it’s a pre-planned event with faculty and students.
Josh: I think that cost is okay, but why didn’t they reallocate the other $6,000?
Natalia: Because that $6,000 is pre-allocated, toward things like Cedar Point and Senior Sco night, stuff like that.
Josh: This sounds like this food is for an already existing event.
Natalia: I’m saying that this event is only happening because they want to put it on.
Josh: If the money they have is pre-allocated, and they said that the dean is reserving money for senior week…
Natalia: I don’t think it’s just senior week, it’s for other events.
Josh: Then they should know how much they have.
Hassan: The event was funded for the event, just not the food, right?
Josh: How come they only need money for food in March? How are they gonna rent the root room, fund the speaker series, etc.
Natalia: How do we know other institutions aren’t doing that?
Josh: Because they didn’t tell us.
Natalia & Austen: We think that’s a fair assumption.
Hassan: The events themselves aren’t under particular departments according to the budget.
Josh: Proposal to fund at $694.00 by cutting desert trays for Aladdin’s and pizza.
5-0-0
Proposal Passes.

OUI
Jesus: I’ve been asked to ad hoc a little more money for a citizenship exam class. I’ve been one of the people putting this together, and I’ve seen a lot of demand for something like this. I’m asking for really a lot of supplies and gas, because usually when we’re going to Lorain, we’re targeting the low income population, and many people come with no supplies at all. The binders seem extraneous, but we’ve seen a need for it. Usually, volunteers pay for markers and gas out of their own pockets, and we want to alleviate that costs. So that’s mainly what I’m here for, it’s fairly straight forward. I’m also here to ad hoc for an allyship workshop. I listed the numbers based off the pricing guide, and we have the list. We have 17 people signed up, before that, we had 11 and before that it was 7 so it’s really growing. I think what’s changed is that people, for political reasons, are trying to be able to vote. The citizenship test has 100 possible questions in which 10 are picked, then a reading section, then a test for English competency, so we try to run interviews to simulate that.  I don’t know off the top of my head how many success stories came, but there’s tons. One woman was able to take the test and pass after 85 years, even though she came when she was 50. The classes are really helping people out, one person got 100 questions right after getting 97 right the first time. There’s a lot of tedious changes being made to the process. The lawyers can handle this stuff, but it’s expensive.
Natalia: Do you have a budget?
Jesus: Yes, we provided about $48 for gas expenses only.
Hassan: Can you talk about the benefits to students?
Jesus: Yeah, students are signing up at increasing rates, it’s about a half-hour drive 9:30 on Saturday, and makes students vey energized and happy to have contributed. We’re getting to know these people and their life experiences, and what’s it’s like to be an immigrant, which is really enriching. Everyone’s very dedicated, some are taking new leadership positions, and one is even offering English classes. The numbers are a little off from the pricing guide, and we tried to accommodate them to realistic numbers. The gas is also a little off because we couldn’t find the numbers.
Vince: The numbers aren’t accurate.
Josh: The total is $138.68, with the correct math and printing.
5-0-0
Students women and sexual victims ad hoc.
Natalia: They put a lot of work into it and I was very moved.
Austen: I’m worried that all the art groups never spend money on this stuff.
Hassan: Also you’re putting the burden on the groups to getting money.
Natalia: Proposal to fund in full.
4-0-1
Proposal Passes.

Chess : Walker & Terrence
Walker: So the chess club has had very interesting history of funding in that every year we’ve been competing in the pan am’s, which is the largest, and we win the small college tournament every year. Which means we’re the best smallest college in the Western hemisphere. I think that chess club doesn’t receive too much funding because there’s a perception that we bring little to campus. We’re trying to bring Egerton who can provide interesting perspective to business and chess. This is unexpected, because, first of all, we did budget for speakers, but our commitment was to the tournament. So we’re almost out of funding. We’re doing community events and stuff that have really depleted our budget.
Terrence: I know in treasurer training it’s appreciated that everything is itemized. This is also an unforeseen costs because we didn’t plan for him to come but he offered. We’re also reaching out to econ, financial departments.
Walker: His honorarium is pretty modest, his flight is pretty cheap, but I imagine it’s possible to find an even cheaper one. We want him to stay two nights, for a total of three days, which would give him a lot of time to talk to students.
Hassan: Can you talk more about the signing costs?
Walker: What he wants to do as a businessmen is talk about his book, we thought it would be good to give his books out.
Sulan: What are your plans to reach out past the college?
Walker: Posters, advertising, I’d love to get people in the town to support this.
Hassan: Why ad hoc now?
Walker: We just found out he was willing and available.
Vince: This sounds like additional funding right?
Everyone: Yeah.
Josh: If the issue is underfunding we can handle that in ad hoc.
Sulan: Definitely seems like a worthwhile event though, and I think there’s a lot to it, but it’s additional programming.
Austen: Fund in full?
0-5-0
Proposal does not pass.

Tanwir
Rashad: We are reactivating the charter for Tanwir which is the Middle East Studies Association, which is basically a program made to supplement the Middle East minor and get people involved in that. This semester we have three plans: organize the group, make it visible, and strengthen the minor. The department fails to prioritize it.
Bella: We want them to see it as more than just an elective. We’re seeking to achieve preliminary steps.
Rashad: We want to get to know if people are interested in the event mainly. Our first item on the budget is a tabling event, to inform people about it, so we’re asking for printing materials. Moving forward, we want to set up a newsletter. We’re trying to just generate interest in middle east studies events, which I would not even know about if I weren’t in the classes running them. Our last item is for a film screening at the Apollo, which would be a great way to expand the event past academics. We spoke with Swank, which is in charge of licensing, which would allow us to show Arabic cinema to the campus, which would be not only be great for people interested in middle eastern studies but also the event.
Josh: Have you reached out to any faculty within the concentration for funds?
Bella: There aren’t any.
Rashad: And Zaynb had to apply for an external grant to bring a speaker.
Natalia: What compelled you all to wait until now?
Bella: We’ve been planning for a while but I didn’t have the organization and Rashad was gone last semester. Most people interested in taking over are seniors already.
Hassan: Other than the MENA minor what are you trying to provide?
Bella: The minor is all about academics, this has a much more cultural focus.
Rashad: For instance, there’s a Palestinian rapper based in London we could bring.
Hassan: Have you talked to the Apollo about the event?
Rashad: They had me speak to a staff member, but if we had this charter we could do it independently.
Josh: I think this cost is for the main theater (Rashad agrees), and for attendance purposes, thinking about turnout is important.

Austen: I think it fell apart after Natalia and Hassan’s question. The organization isn’t there. I’d do general interest and tabling.
Josh: I don’t think they’ve demonstrated they’re ready for big funding.
Hassan: I think this is something that Oberlin has extremely undervalued. Rashad is very involved, and his father is Palestinian and I think they have it now, because he’ll be here for this. I think that if we have this now, it’ll make a big difference.
Natalia: I don’t think this club has any better organization than QFR, just a better budget.
Hassan: I want to keep candy.
Josh: Just the general interest meeting $60, $.40 banner, $7 course listings, and $6 color copies: $73.40 and Hassan’s $81.78.
$81.78 vote 5-0-0
Proposal passes.

Casino Night
Hyacinth: We are ad hocing for a casino event, we want it to be for this Friday, and it can’t happen at a later time. We have the space booked for the root room, we have a budget for about $900, but the problem is that facilities and catering were charging us about $1000 so we decided to do our own food. But because of overtime, they have to charge us extra, about $300, which is about a third of our budget. We have most of it covered, but we need a little more for pretzels, mocktails and such. This covers a good need for events like Solarity for people who aren’t as comfortable in that space.
Josh: I’ve heard a little about this from Gabe, but where’s this being hosted?
Hyacinth: The root room, which can hold 700, then with tables about 500, and we’re shooting for about 300.
Josh: Austen, can dorms transfer to other org’s?
Austen: Yes.
Josh: I’m thinking that since lots of halls have money left they can give.
Natalia: They’ve fundraised about $1,000 from hall councils.
Josh: Okay, then never mind.
Austen: The controller’s office told me they’re a month behind. But that just means they get it later. But also April is a busy month so I don’t know.
Vince: Is this not a department?
Austen: It kind of is.
Josh: I am concerned about institutional funding. We used to give $30,000 for fall fest, but this is like a lower cost alternative which I like, and I’m not sure if this should be coming from us. They did a lot to get funding from dorms. They’ve collected over $1,000 from res ed funding, which is us. I think this is a low cost because they put the work in. While I’m impressed by how much they raised, I’m wondering who got contacted, my hall was never asked for this.
Natalia: They asked village housing because they’re a village housing organization.
Hassan: I think this food will make this a better event and I really want it to happen.
Josh: I’m concerned that it’s an institutional group and they get funded.
Natalia: How’s it an organization?
Austen: They get $5,000 though.
Natalia: I hate when we ask if they asked for other sources of funding because they’re asking us for money.
Austen: Yeah, but you have to look at it this particular case.
Hassan: Can we get feedback by Friday, Josh?
Josh: Yeah, but they won’t get the money by then. I think the mocktails are more important of what the event is, and since they’re asking us for less than the real unforeseen cost, I’m more in favor of funding it.
Natalia: I think that if there weren’t an overtime unexpected cost, they wouldn’t be asking for it.
Josh: My two proposals are the full costs or just the mock-tails. The only difference is that the mock-tails are more crucial to the event.
Hassan: One person’s vision for the event shouldn’t be the group’s vision.
In full: 3-1-1
Proposal passes.
 
Queer and Formal Reasoning, Isabel and Eydon

Isabel: Just so you guys know, we are very new, we had our first meeting a week ago and realized that we can’t do anything in terms of a formal budget for this semester. But we had huge turnout (30 people). Pretty simple, we want to throw a picnic, sandwiches and soda, and we expect a lot of people to show up based off of the turnout for our event and we expected that event size to show up to the picnic if we advertise correctly. It’s about $300 for food and drinks. We’d ideally like to host another event, but we want to do another event and we’ll come up with the specifics next week.
Austen: When and where for the picnic?
Eydon: We don’t have a date, but we could do it soon because of the weather. We were thinking late March or April, in front of the science center.
Hassan: Can you talk about the misc. plans?
Isabel: Depending on how much you want to give us, we can do more advertising or event spending like decorations.
Josh: Can you talk more about the group mission?
Eydon: It’s intended to offer a community space for queer and trans people in the science community, which is almost never discussed, which is important because sometimes we worry will professors expect pronouns and many other things. The meetings are discussion based and really open-ended. We’re starting to create a safe space for homework sessions on Tuesdays, since everything is due on Wednesdays.
Isabel: We also want to use this as an opportunity to engage with professors and know how they think and react, which I’ve had problems with.
Eydon: We were also thinking about offering handbooks to professors and joining OSTEM, a national org for this.
Natalia: Consider the spring budget, and you should know that we don’t fund un-itemized costs like the extra event.
Josh: I think we should give general interest.
Natalia: I appreciate what they’re trying to do but I don’t think they’re quite ready.
Josh: I don’t think anyone disagrees that this is a bad event, but they’re lack of organization and structure warrants $60, which is less than they deserve in the long run but for now it’s fair. Proposal for $60:
5-0-0
Proposal Passes.
 
Individual Ad Hoc
Danilo: Generally, we receive a lot of supplemental funding from other student org’s like TIMARA and OJS, but they haven’t been particularly helpful this year. They mostly paid more for promotion, not operational costs. We have to pay way more money than usual for the flight and the total expense was $1,400. We have two or three big shows a year and it’s usually not more than $1,000. We’re usually supplemented better but not in this case. I’m trying to pay a dope artist more than we can offer, she’s planning on coming, but we’re trying to fund these musicians more, since they usually make little. Women and POC in the scene typically don’t make much money, so I’m trying to do what we can to offset that disparity.
Josh: What’s the general honorarium?
Danilo: She asked for $600, we can offer about $320.
Josh: Are other costs included in honorarium?
Danilo: It depends on what we receive, then we’ll work out those details.
Josh: Where’s the $320 from?
Danilo: The remaining money in the budget.
Hassan: You said this is unexpected because the flight cost? How?
Danilo: We usually don’t pay that much, it’s not usually accounted for, and we were cut by the three other funding sources.
Austen: When were you expecting the funds, do they usually give funds earlier in the semester?
Danilo: Usually they’re more receptive to needs, this is an exception.
Natalia: I don’t understand your argument for unforeseen costs? Is it unexpected because of the flight?
Danilo: *Repeats the earlier argument*
Hassan: This person is willing to come and you just want to offer more?
Danilo: Yeah, I just wanted to give her more money
Natalia: Where?
Danilo: Fairchild chapel, we cover sound.
Josh: Off the top of my head: having to pay round trip flights of $750 from Oakland and Puerto Rico is pretty cheap. We budget $400 for Oakland and Puerto Rico is more expensive. We know it’s more expensive.
Austen: Also, the argument about them not getting enough funding isn’t good enough.
Josh: You think they subtracted $320 from the total already?
Hassan: Yeah.
Fund in full:
0-5-0
Proposal does not pass.

Senate
Thoebeka: As you’ve seen in the proposal, it’s a play and then a conversation. The performer is based in the San Francisco, and she talks about the experiences of sexual assault survivors in prison. Basically, she found that over 400,000 rape kits were thrown out, and it’s up to the individual police department regardless of its characteristics on whether or not to investigate the report. I think it’s appropriate for sexual assault violence activism and practically to Oberlin students. We have received $500 from the Cat since the proposal. So in the proposal I said I we needed $4,019 but only need around $3,200 now.
Vince: Can you talk about how it’s unexpected.
Thobeka: As a group we had no programming planned, and the idea didn’t come up until very recently so we had no time to plan it until now.
Josh: Why did you come as a member as student senate?
Thobeka: Because we believe this is important for the entire student body, and that it would be appropriate for the student senate would fund it.
Natalia: Staying one night and from where is she flying?
Thobeka: One night and from San Francisco.
Hassan: Are the flight and housing costs included, because it’s un-itemized so can you confirm that?
Thobeka: It’s mainly an honorarium.
Vince: I don’t think this is fair to consider as a group project.
Josh: The money included doesn’t count pending transactions, so they have a lot less than the ad hoc budget says.
Natalia: So you don’t have money in the senate account, you’re saying.
Hassan: I’m thinking about funding in full with the deducted costs.
Natalia: I’m going to propose at $3,269.
4-0-1
​Proposal Passes.