After hearing the Multicultural Center and Women’s Center share thoughts on transferring over to the Department Finance Committee budgeting process, the ASUO Senate voted to keep both groups in the Program Finance Committee for the time being.

Both centers were reluctant to move over to the DFC being as they saw nothing wrong with the PFC budgeting process. The centers were also concerned that the administration would be more in control of the centers if they were to make that transition.

“The MCC and Women’s Center made it very clear that we do not want to be moved at this point,” said Marah Sanchez, a representative for the MCC. “We’ve made our decision clear to you. Whether or not you respect it is up to you.”

ASUO President Sam Dotters-Katz’s recommendation was to transition the centers, but he wasn’t concerned with when the transition should happen.

“The Women’s Center and the Multicultural Center should be moved to the DFC, but we don’t request a specific timeline for that transfer,” Dotters-Katz said.

Both centers were voted to stay in their current committee by the senate. Senate did, however, transfer the Student Sustainability Coalition over to the EMU Board from the PFC, but members of the SSC were in support of the transition.

During the public forum, an audience member brought up her dissatisfaction with the Twitter profile @ASUOGG, an account which wrote racist and offensive tweets about ASUO members. According to the individual who mentioned the account, she suggests that the creator of it was someone within the ASUO, being as many of the tweets were specific to a recent retreat that only ASUO members were allowed to be part of.

The only student group surplus special request came from UO Active Minds, who requested $7,500 to help cover traveling expenses for a conference they were invited to go to in Washington D.C. Although the majority of senate showed strong support for the group, most were hesitant to fund the full amount requested.

“I really care about this group and they do amazing work on campus but I am not comfortable with the cost,” Sen. Amy Jones said. The group found out about its invitation to the conference on Oct. 24, a little less than three weeks until the event, making the majority of senate uncomfortable with giving the group so much money in such a small timeframe.

Sen. Lexie Olson made a motion to give Active Minds $5,069, but the motion did not pass. Olson then made a motion for $2,535, which did pass.

“I think it’s a great opportunity for you all. However, as a senate we set precedence for items like this,” Sen. Josh Losner said.

The precedent that Losner is referring to is the rule that senate came up with earlier in the year, which is to allow only funding student groups up to 50 percent of the money they need for an out-of-state conference, with the group funding the rest. Active Minds was the first large conference request to be tested with this rule.

“We’re familiar with this rule, and we understand it, but at the same time the exceptions they’re making seem to be inconsistent and unfair if they’re approaching it like that group by group,” Co-President of Active Minds Juan Rivera said after the meeting. “I am happy that we were at least able to get some money for our trip.”

With the request from Active Minds and the ASUO Executive, the current surplus is at $294,250.

Follow Craig Garcia on Twitter @CraiGarcia.

Live coverage of Wednesday night’s ASUO Senate meeting:

ASUO Senate Agenda

ASUO Senate Speakers list

Instantly recognizable by his array of suits, ASUO Senator Josh Losner dons the fancy attire regularly to show respect to the people he’s representing.

That, and he just loves a good suit.

“I love dressing in suits. I save up for them,” Losner said. “I’m actually trying to save up for a slim fit suit right now. It’s going to look classy.”

It’s important to Losner to present himself at his best to his peers not for vanity’s sake, but because he feels a personal obligation to his heritage to take full advantage of every moment and opportunity he finds himself in.

“My Judaism is one of the most important things to me,” Losner said. “In fact, I’d say that my connection to Judaism lays the foundation down for my entire life.”

One of his motivations to get into politics came from when he spent a month in Israel and the concentration camps in Poland. For Losner, the trip set his primary political focus, which is strengthening the relationship between Israel and the US.

“To go to such a horrifying place and then to Israel was one of the greatest experiences in my life,” Losner said. “I felt at home.”

If he gets free time in his busy schedule, he goes to the Oregon Hillel on Friday nights for Shabbat, a time for Jewish community prayer and dinner. He also loves playing intramural soccer and walking down the city streets at night to help him unwind. He’s also a little bit of a movie buff, with some of his favorites being “Forrest Gump” and “American Gangster.”

“Oh, and ‘The Notebook.’ I can’t get enough of that movie,” Losner said.

When Losner talks about his favorite soccer team, Tottenham Hotspur, you hear hints of his London-born accent come out as he talks more about the sport. While he considers himself British, he calls San Diego, Calif., home.

“I love San Diego,” Losner said. “Eugene’s not bad either, but San Diego is home for me.”

Losner doesn’t have  plans to move back home once he’s finished up with college this year, though. Instead, he’s looking to move to Washington D.C. and to work in the private sector in politics. But Losner’s up for any opportunity that comes his way — no matter how peculiar it may be.

“I did some acting in high school,” Losner said. “If an acting opportunity came along I might even go for that. All of us have so many things we can do whether it’d be on a large or small scale. I don’t want to cancel anything out.”

There’s a phrase in the Hebrew language that says “tikkun olam” which means to repair the world. That’s what Losner has in mind. Whether it would come in the form of lobbying, fundraising, or maybe even running for office, politics will be his outlet for reparation.

“Whatever happens after I graduate, I’ll be looking forward to it,” Losner said. “I’m excited to dive into the beginning of the rest of my life.”

Student groups and programs will have to be even more fiscally responsible come next year as the ASUO begins to plan out how it will allocate the incidental fee — the primary fee that funds more than 140 student groups on campus.

In correlation with the UO independent governing board’s legislation for a 3.5 percent cap on rising tuition, the ASUO has decided that for the next school year it will put the same cap on increasing the incidental fee, meaning student groups and programs will get less allocated to them.

“Roughly speaking, if the fee is currently at $208 (per student) now it can’t go over about $215 per term next year,” member of the EMU board and Senator Miles Sisk said.

The Athletic Committee and Finance Committee, Department Finance Committee, Program Finance Committee and the EMU board deal directly with supplying students services and are primarily funded through the incidental fee.

The ACFC is in charge of funding student tickets, as well as having a contract with the Lane Transit District bus system that lets students ride the bus for free. The DFC deals with funding departments such as the UO marching band, and the EMU Board deals with everything that is in the EMU, as well as making sure that the building gets the proper maintenance and repairs it needs.

“Now that we’re very limited to how the budgets can increase, we’re going to be limited to the point that we can really only provide the current service level to them,” Sisk said. “We can’t really increase the services for one group unless we cut from another.”

In prior years, the incidental fee cap was at 7 percent, which was more than enough fiscal legroom for the ASUO to allocate funds for programs and departments to not just meet the current service level, but to also expand on their student services. According to ASUO External Vice President Greg Mills, though, the ASUO wants to show more financial responsibility in order to compare with the recent legislation.

“Whether it’d be 3.5 or 30 percent, we could throw out any percentage we want,” Mills said. “But at the end of the day, the administration gets the final say and signature on our budget. It’s in order to make a system of agreements and compromises with the administration.”

Mills said it would be hypocritical for the ASUO to talk about lowering tuition costs but not making any effort to lower costs.

“It’s not going to cut anybody’s budget, but if a group would like to see an increase to their budget, it’s going to be a lot more unlikely that will happen,” Sisk said.

According to Senate Treasurer Marita Maffit, the legislation said that the 3.5 percent cap for the rise of tuition will be in place for two years. The ASUO plans on keeping the cap for the next two years, as well.

Whether or not group and programs will adjust to the new change will be seen over time, but Maffit said that the groups that will probably be the most affected by this are the smaller student groups in the PFC.

“It’ll be interesting to see how we allocate this,” Maffit said.

ASUO President Sam Dotters-Katz spoke to the University of Oregon Police Department on Tuesday night to report that someone had placed marijuana inside his desk at the ASUO office.

“Within a minute or two of unpacking my stuff I opened up one of the drawers and there was an aspirin bottle,” Dotters-Katz said. “I looked at it and saw that it wasn’t mine, and then when I opened it up I saw that there was weed inside.”

Once Dotters-Katz discovered the paraphernalia, he went into the private conference room with UO Campus Organizer Yasmin Ibarra, who was the most senior person in the office at the time.

“He definitely did disclose what he found to me, and I told him to report it to the police,” Ibarra said. Ibarra was in the office for a few hours before Dotters-Katz arrived, and according to her there were 5-8 people in the office at any given time, but nothing came off as suspicious while she was there.

“I also sent a text message to (Vice President of Student Affairs) Robin Holmes,” Dotters-Katz said. “She called me and told me that I should go ahead and contact UOPD too.”

Dotters-Katz made the report at 8:45 p.m. according to UOPD spokesman Kelly McIver.

“An officer was dispatched to the ASUO offices, and a suspected controlled substance was impounded,” McIver wrote in an email. “The case remains open at this time, but no suspects have been identified.”

Dotters-Katz plans on speaking to all ASUO members during their next staff meeting  about the incident.

“There’s no single piece of evidence that points to any individual, so our message will be uniform to everybody,” Dotters-Katz said. “My priority is to communicate that this is unacceptable and that this can’t and won’t happen again.”

The Women’s Center and Multicultural Center shared concerns during Wednesday’s ASUO Senate meeting of having less student autonomy and more University of Oregon administrative control if the groups were to leave the Programs Finance Committee, the current budget process.

The Women’s Center and Multicultural Center are currently part of the PFC, along with 140 other student groups. The two centers are the largest in the committee, so it was suggested by last year’s ASUO executive branch and the UO administration to move the budgeting process over to the Departments Finance Committee, a committee that currently deals with only 11 groups.

On Oct. 16, Vice President of Student Affairs Robin Holmes transitioned both of the centers away from the ASUO Controllers Office, meaning that all of the professional staffers in those centers now report to the administration, but the centers as a whole don’t, and they’re looking to keep it that way.

“We need to have these conversations about these centers and them remaining under the control of students,” Michael King said, a member of the Multicultural Center. “What is the long-term plan? We can’t just be thinking about right now, we need to be thinking about five years down the road.”

The two centers are content with staying in the PFC, even if it means less flexibility with their budgets. The possibility of the administration having more control is not worth the incentives that the DFC has to offer, according to representatives who spoke during the senate meeting.

“Flexibility with a budget doesn’t necessarily mean more student autonomy,” Senator Helena Schlegel said.

Senators Ryan Fritsen and Taylor Allison disagreed with Schlegel, saying that switching over to the DFC doesn’t mean that the administration is keeping a closer eye on the groups.

“From my experience, groups experienced more autonomy when they come from PFC to DFC,” Fritsen said, who is on the DFC board. “It just makes sense from our perspective concerning the services that you’re providing. It’s not going to affect those services at all.”

Allison, who is on the PFC board, agreed with Fritsen’s remarks, adding that the DFC can give much more flexibility to the centers’ budgets.

“The DFC is able to give higher percentage increases in budgets,” Allison said. “That proof is in the past budgets.”

According to Senate President Matthew Miyamoto, a vote will be held next week on what to do with the centers, but that could change. With an idea from Sen. Miles Sisk, there’s a possibility that the senate could hold off on voting on the transition this year.

“I don’t doubt that the DFC will work better than the PFC. I just think it would be premature to make this decision this year before we figure what the impact will be,” Sisk said. “We just want to make sure they’re not getting into a decision that’s any worse.”

The Student Sustainability Coalition is also to set to move from the PFC, but its transition will be to the EMU Board. The coalition representatives were in support of the possible transition.

The Women’s Center and Multicultural Center shared concerns during Wednesday’s ASUO Senate meeting of having less student autonomy and more University of Oregon administrative control if the groups were to leave the Programs Finance Committee, the current budget process.

The Women’s Center and Multicultural Center are currently part of the PFC, along with 140 other student groups. The two centers are the largest in the committee, so it was suggested by last year’s ASUO executive branch and the UO administration to move the budgeting process over to the Departments Finance Committee, a committee that currently deals with only 11 groups.

On Oct. 16, Vice President of Student Affairs Robin Holmes transitioned both of the centers away from the ASUO Controllers Office, meaning that all of the professional staffers in those centers now report to the administration, but the centers as a whole don’t, and they’re looking to keep it that way.

“We need to have these conversations about these centers and them remaining under the control of students,” Michael King said, a member of the Multicultural Center. “What is the long-term plan? We can’t just be thinking about right now, we need to be thinking about five years down the road.”

The two centers are content with staying in the PFC, even if it means less flexibility with their budgets. The possibility of the administration having more control is not worth the incentives that the DFC has to offer, according to representatives who spoke during the senate meeting.

“Flexibility with a budget doesn’t necessarily mean more student autonomy,” Senator Helena Schlegel said.

Senators Ryan Fritsen and Taylor Allison disagreed with Schlegel, saying that switching over to the DFC doesn’t mean that the administration is keeping a closer eye on the groups.

“From my experience, groups experienced more autonomy when they come from PFC to DFC,” Fritsen said, who is on the DFC board. “It just makes sense from our perspective concerning the services that you’re providing. It’s not going to affect those services at all.”

Allison, who is on the PFC board, agreed with Fritsen’s remarks, adding that the DFC can give much more flexibility to the centers’ budgets.

“The DFC is able to give higher percentage increases in budgets,” Allison said. “That proof is in the past budgets.”

According to Senate President Matthew Miyamoto, a vote will be held next week on what to do with the centers, but that could change. With an idea from Sen. Miles Sisk, there’s a possibility that the senate could hold off on voting on the transition this year.

“I don’t doubt that the DFC will work better than the PFC. I just think it would be premature to make this decision this year before we figure what the impact will be,” Sisk said. “We just want to make sure they’re not getting into a decision that’s any worse.”

The Student Sustainability Coalition is also to set to move from the PFC, but its transition will be to the EMU Board. The coalition representatives were in support of the possible transition.

Live coverage of Wednesday night’s ASUO Senate meeting:

Senate Agenda

ASUO Senate speakers list

ASUO Senate vote tracker

The ASUO senate will be giving the floor to the three biggest centers in the Program Finance Committee to see how the body wants to handle its budgetary future.

In place of its regularly scheduled Wednesday meeting, senate will be hosting a town hall meeting for the Women’s Center, Multicultural Center and Student Sustainability Center to discuss if they want to stay with the PFC’s budgeting process or if they want to move the Departments Finance Committee.

According to ASUO External Vice President Greg Mills, if the three groups are left in the PFC budgeting process they’ll be the largest programs in the PFC but they’ll still be subject to all the regulations that the 140 much smaller student programs have to abide by. If senate decides to move the centers to the DFC, then they’ll be one of only 12 other departments that are being governed by the committee.

The town hall meeting was also supposed to talk about the possibility of the centers transitioning away from the ASUO Controllers Office, but during senate’s Oct. 17 meeting, Mills, Internal Vice President Azia Calderhead and Accounting Coordinator Lindsey Cotner announced that Vice President of Student Affairs Robin Holmes went ahead and transitioned the centers away from the Controllers Office, without any recommendation from the ASUO.

“The executive’s position on this was to not make a decision until we heard from senate what their stance was,” Mills said during the Oct. 17 meeting.

“Personally, I felt very cheated,” Women’s Center staff member and student Anna Bird said in regards to Holmes going ahead with the transition. “The amount of work and time we put in didn’t feel appreciated by upper administration.”

Although the Women’s Center might have more financial leg room with the new transition, Bird hopes that the center will still be able to help students in the same way that they’ve been able to in the past, without having too much interference from the administration.

“What a lot of us are hoping is that the administration won’t have more influence on us and what we do and who we are,” Bird said.

Senate President Matthew Miyamoto says that the administration’s latest decision won’t interfere with what they have planned for the town hall meeting.

“This meeting is going to mostly be a forum for what the groups are thinking about,” Miyamoto said. “We’re looking just to get more information and feedback from them.”

The meeting will be in the Walnut Room in the EMU at 7 p.m. Miyamoto said that the groups haven’t decided whether they want the meeting to be just a discussion on the possible move, or if they want the senate to vote on the matter during that time also.

“Our goal this week has been to talk to senators and to prepare for the town hall meeting so that we can voice our opinions. We want to make sure we have a voice in this matter,” Bird said. “I’m just hoping for us to get the best funding possible so that we can serve the students to the best of our abilities.”

Credit cards and student loans are the two primary sources of debt in America. Soon enough, envelopes for both of those bills may be stamped with the Oregon “O.”

The university has made a deal with Visa to create a credit aptly named “The Duck Card,” which displays the UO logo prominently on the front of the card. But if you’re a student, that’s the only benefit.

Here’s a quick crash course in economics: Among the 20 million Americans that go to college, 60 percent borrow annually to cover their tuition, according to a study from the Chronicle of Higher Education. That statistic isn’t all that shocking, but according to Sallie Mae, 92 percent of undergraduates are currently using credit cards to pay for their education. 

A prominent contributor to the uptick in credit card debt is the more than 900 partnerships with colleges and banks or universities. Banks and credit card companies offer students exclusive credit cards, which usually offer nothing special except for the school logo and high interest rates.

According to CreditCards.com, the average annual percentage rate for a credit card is 14.96 percent for 2013. Once the 12 months of adding no annual percentage rate concludes, the APR goes up to 18.99 percent. The APR is the annual rate that you have to pay on top of the purchases on your card.

“I’ll be honest, credit cards kind of freak me out,” said former UO student Jake Faust, who dropped out of the university to attend Lane Community College to save money. He will return to UO once he earns his associate degree.

“I understand they’re needed to build up credit, but I’ve been duped over before with all of the hidden fees that are attached to cards. I have one, but I don’t even think it’s activated yet.” While at UO, Faust was offered dozens of credit cards until he accepted one from MasterCard. Faust stopped using the card once he was blindsided by the high interest rates.

Students at Portland State and Southern Oregon universities were also blindsided by their universities’ partnership with MasterCard, which eventually led to student protests in 2004. MasterCard was charging students 50 cents every time they swiped a MasterCard credit card. On top of that, MasterCard would only have the debit option available for its cards, making students consent to having a third party know their personal identification and banking numbers.

Outside of the UO’s partnership with Visa, the university doesn’t have any relationships with outside banks or other credit card companies. The closest debit card that the UO offers to students is campus cash, a prepaid card used for campus stores such as the Duck Store or campus coffee shops.

“The card is set up that way so that students aren’t stuck with overspending on campus,” UO Card Office Manager Joel Woodruff said. “Along with Campus Cash and this program we have called Live Like a Duck, we’re really shooting to make students more financially literate.”

More information about Live Like a Duck is available on the UO’s Financial Aid and Scholarships website. Woodruff wants the program to get students better acquainted with budgets, which is becoming more crucial every day. According to the Center for Responsible Lending, people ages 18-24 spend nearly 30 percent of their monthly income on debt repayments.