The fee bills presented to the Associated Students of Oregon State University’s Senate from the Student Fee Committee that passed Feb. 21 are now on ASOSU President Carissa O’Donnell’s desk to approve or veto.
Depending on her decisions, the bill will either go back to the ASOSU Senate or it will move on to President Murthy for approval. After that, it’ll be sent to the OSU Board of Trustees.
The original meeting was rescheduled due to online threats. No further information is known.
At the Board of Trustees April 4 meeting, the university budget will be reviewed for approval.
Deliberations to amend the student fee bills to add a wage increase to $16.65 were ultimately “tabled indefinitely.”
This includes all components of the performing arts decision package, which will allow funding for student tickets from $50 to $5, student engagement activities with the professional artists who perform at Patricia Valian Reser Center for the Creative Arts and free student entry to the PRAx art gallery.
The ASOSU Senate also passed the decision to fund a curator to manage the Memorial Union art collection. Part of their responsibility will be to bring in an arts and crafts fair at the end of fall term, according to SFC Vice Chair Sophia Nowers.
The decision to increase club funding for the 2024-2025 year was also passed by the ASOSU Senate.
“That’ll be an extra $166,000 in funding for clubs next year,” Nowers said.
The ASOSU Senate decided to pass SFC’s historic recommendation to remove the athletics unit from the eight units sponsored by student fees. This means the number of student tickets available will be managed by ASOSU, while athletics will continue to handle ticket purchasing.
“We’ve begun communications with athletic directors so that we can figure out what our process will be moving forward,” O’Donnell said.
In addition to the passing of these bills, some senators introduced a bill to amend student wages that would install a $16.65 minimum wage for each fee-funded unit. This is not to be confused with the SFC’s Living Wage bill, which did not receive a recommendation from the SFC.
“SFC did not add it to their recommendation, which meant that if it wanted to be revisited, it would have to then be reintroduced by the (ASOSU) Senate,” O’Donnell said. “And that did happen.”
The ASOSU Senate made the decision to table the bill indefinitely, meaning it will not be brought up again. This decision came from the guidance of OSU lawyers and the ASOSU Judicial Committee.
“We received guidance on understanding what the implications of introducing this bill at this time to our fee setting process would be,” O’Donnell said. “How would we take the essence of that bill and actually do it in a way that adheres to our process.”
The ASOSU Judicial Committee gave similar guidance after considering the amendment in reference to the ASOSU Constitution and the processes laid out in their official documents.
“Our judicial council looked at it and said, ‘Hey, guys, probably as best practice we shouldn’t just introduce this and amend things on the floor based on it,’” Nowers said.
Therefore, the bill did not pass and was not amended.
Student fees will increase in the upcoming year with the approval of all SFC bills by the ASOSU Senate. The amount it will increase by is not yet known.
According to O’Donnell, these fee increases will support clubs and organizations that have garnered a growing interest, especially post-pandemic and as the student body increases. Part of the decisions made were how best to support these clubs and opportunities for student involvement.
“It’s the idea of growing with the scale that the university is also growing at,” O’Donnell said.
