Correction appended
The USG Senate approved a $155,500 operating budget for the spring semester Sunday evening, setting aside additional funds for the Social Committee as Princeton prepares to celebrate the 100th anniversary of Lawnparties in May.
Though University administrators have been forced to make budget cuts in light of the economic crisis, the USG budget is funded entirely through student feeds and is unlikely to face similar cuts this year.
USG officials also predicted the fall semester’s budget will also be $155,500.
The spring 2009 semester budget has been restructured to include an extra $10,000 for the Social Committee, bringing the committee’s funding to $70,000, slightly more than 40 percent of the total budget. This change was made so the committee can plan a special celebration for Lawnparties, USG social chair Julia Jacobson ’10 said in an e-mail.
Though some of the $70,000 will also go toward other events, including Dean’s Date festivities, the $10,000 increase was made expressly to fund the Lawnparties centennial celebration, Jacobson noted.
“The budget increase is only for this semester so we can make Lawnparties bigger and better,” she said. “We are planning on making it more special with commemorative posters, T-shirts [and] more food.”
For the spring concert budget, the USG has allotted $60,000 — up from $40,000 last fall— for the headline act of the celebration, though Jacobson said the final amount may be less after plans have been finalized.
“We haven’t booked an artist for Lawnparties yet, so we don’t know how much of the budget is going to go to that one event,” she explained. “I’m currently working with [the Office of the Dean of Undergraduate Students] and other administrators to finalize our budget plans.”
Jacobson also said the USG made a bid this week for a particular artist, but declined to provide a name or the dollar amount offered.
To increase the Social Committee budget, USG officers were forced to cut funds for other committees. Though USG treasurer Trevor Martin ’11 said Tuesday that no single aspect of the USG budget was cut for the Lawnparties celebration, he noted, “Most likely the $10,000 [added to the social budget] would have gone to the Senate Pilot Program account.”
In the past, the Senate Pilot Program budget has been used to fund USG senators’ individual projects, such as installing hot water taps in Firestone Library or purchasing inventory for USG DVD. This semester, however, the USG will implement a “more efficient” system, Martin said.
“Instead of having each senator have their own individual pet projects, we’ve created under 10 working groups, each working on one issue really intensely,” he explained.
Martin said that he thinks focusing on a few large issues, such as sustainability, will be more effective and less costly than taking on a wider variety of smaller projects.
“We’re trying to focus on problems that benefit students’ lives but don’t cost the University money,” he explained.
This year, the USG will also try to avoid overestimating costs, Martin said.
“For the past two years, they just budgeted a nice whole number for everything,” Martin said. “This year, we’re trying to get the most out of our money.” For example, the actual cost of the fall Senate retreat, $323.55, was used for the spring 2009 budget instead of the inflated $500 budgeted last fall, he said.
Another source of extra funding for the budget is the elimination of the executive secretary’s $700 salary. Since the position should ideally be filled by someone who wants to help students and not just make money, the salary was removed, Martin said.
“We have [the position] still, but it’s not paid anymore,” Martin explained. “We thought it was kind of weird that the executive secretary was paid while the other members of [the USG Executive Committee (Ex-Com)] weren’t.”
The budget for events related to USG elections was also cut by $200 due to poor attendance, Martin added.
“ ‘Meet the Candidates’ study breaks have not been well attended in the past, even by the candidates themselves, so we felt that $300 was more than ample,” he said.
The USG has also allocated $1,700 this semester for renovations to the Ex-Com office in Frist Campus Center.
“The Ex-Com office has been rather abused over the years, and it’s in dire need of renovations,” Martin explained. “[The renovations are] just to make sure we have a working space that we can use day in and day out.”
Correction
An earlier version of this article quoted USG treasurer Trevor Martin ’11 as saying that the USG budget is funded through an endowment controlled by the University Board of Trustees. In fact, the budget is funded entirely through student fees, which are not endowed.
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