Jenna Crowe
Staff Writer
ASISU is being forced to make more budget cuts according to ASISU President Makayla Muir.
Small cuts have been made to the budget in the past, but cuts upwards of $100,000 are to be expected in fiscal year 2018.
“Our deficit is $120,000, so we have to make that up,” Muir said. “When enrollment goes down, we have to adjust our budget accordingly because we don’t get funding from anywhere else.”
This process started when ASISU began making cuts to the senate with a new bill written by Muir dropping senator numbers from 20 to 13. The ASISU Chief of Staff position was also cut, along with a lobbyist position. These duties will either be shifted to other ASISU staff or be absorbed into other jobs.
Senators are also looking at a pay cut of $200 per semester, but nothing is finalized.
“A rise in enrollment will lead to an increase in funding and student representatives to the former level,” Muir said. “With the expected enrollment drop, we have to look at our budget very critically and make much larger cuts than we previously have.”
Muir went on to say the majority of the cuts will be from student organizations that are monetarily funded by ASISU. Organizations include the International Affairs Council, Idaho State Civic Symphony, KISU FM radio 91.1, the Bengal Theatre, the Student Activities Board at all ISU branches, The Bengal Student Newspaper and Theatre ISU.
Because of its large amount of funding, a majority of the cuts will most likely come from the Student Activities Board here in Pocatello, according to Muir, but nothing has yet been finalized.
Organization heads were asked by ASISU to prepare theoretical three to six percent cuts to the budget for a budget hearing the evening of February 15.
These theoretical cuts help ASISU see where realistic cuts to individual budgets can be made and see what needs more funding.
Even organizations that don’t receive a large amount of funding from ASISU, such as the Idaho State Civic Symphony, can be majorly affected by budget cuts.
“We get about one percent of our funding from ASISU and it goes into our general fund,” said Heather Clarke, the executive officer for Idaho State Civic Symphony. “The general fund pays for our summer camp, free tickets for ISU students and scholarships.”
With budget cuts, Clarke explains that there will be a decrease in available scholarships as well as a decrease in free tickets offered for ISU students.
“We’re hoping to not have to cut a lot of our line items very far; with KISU especially we don’t want to cut them to where they lose their grant funding and force them to close their doors,” Muir said when asked about rumored cuts to KISU being as high as 15 percent. “We haven’t started actual discussions yet, but we’re trying to minimize cuts in the best way possible.”
