5 minute read

DC President Mistake

Next Article
The Black Box

The Black Box

{campus opinon}

DC President Makes Mistake in Vetoing Service Project

Advertisement

El'ad Nichols-Kaufman

As a member of the DC (Delegate Council) this year, I’ve had a chance to learn how one of the most important duties listed in our constitution is carried out: “the management of funds available to the Student Polity.” I’ve seen first hand how all campus clubs and events are funded, from Reality parties, to KWP plays, to the Gadfly’s publication. Most of the time, this process is relatively uncontentious, as it should be. There is a certain amount of money that the Board Games Club needs for new games, or the Storytellers’ Guild needs for cookies, and the DC approves those necessary expenses. Even budgets that lie beyond these small sums, like swords for fencing or food for waltz parties, are almost always approved, even if the approval comes after lengthy debate. The only times that funds are denied is when the amount is too astronomical even for the DC’s extensive resources, or the project that they would go to is seriously problematic.

Because of this precedent, I was caught by surprise by the recent presidential veto on the decision to fund a service project for the Orthodox Catholic Fellowship. The club had requested $300, which they later reduced to $100, for a project in which they would buy food and supplies for unhoused people in Annapolis, make kits with the supplies and distribute them to Annapolitans who need them. Relative to other budgets approved the same day, such as $4,800 for Prank, this was a small amount, and seemed to be for a good cause. However, DC President Tom Ni raised objections to it because of its nature as a charity project. He argued on constitutional grounds that the DC cannot fund projects that go to benefit people outside the campus. After extensive debate, the proposal went up for a vote, and passed with overwhelming support of the majority of the DC. However, Mr. Ni immediately turned around and vetoed this budget item, claiming that funding the project would set a bad precedent.

I greatly admire Mr. Ni in his role as president, for bringing new energy and ideas onto the Delegate Council, but I think in this case he has made a serious mistake. First, there is no constitutional basis for objecting to service projects. The constitution gives the DC great discretion in what money is spent on, and article IV. Section II. 8.a explicitly allows the DC to authorize spending that is not accessible to the entire polity. Of course, funding items directly for people outside the polity can be seen as problematic, but the items were to be part of a project of a campus group. The Orthodox Catholic Fellowship would have used the assembly of these kits as a club activity, which the DC certainly can fund. It doesn’t matter that they would be given away at the end, the fact it is a club activity to assemble them already makes it something worth funding, and something that benefits the polity.

More important than any of these small squabbles, however, is the kind of message the DC sends by refusing to fund this project. We are fully willing to spend tens of thousands of dollars on parties, but unwilling to even give a hundredth of the sum to a cause that would benefit our wider community. Are we, as Johnnies, really so selfish as to deny even the possibility that service projects can benefit the entire polity? I would hope that with all the reading about virtue we do here, we would have some understanding that one of the most valuable things that people like us, students with a source of food and shelter, can do is to help support those who don’t even have these basic necessities. The DC should be able to see that funds that allow students to virtuously engage in the wider community are as much, or more valuable to the experience of students here than any loud party.

I do not mean to insinuate that anyone involved in this process had any malicious intention. As I have stated earlier, I think Mr. Ni really does try to work towards the best of the polity’s interests. However, the use of a veto, the extreme executive action overruling the decision of a majority of the polity’s representatives was uncalled for here, especially because the item vetoed would be good for both the college and the wider community. Sometimes, a good leader has to learn to listen to others, and to realize that he cannot lead a body fully isolated from the wider community. I hope that the polity as a whole learn from this mistake, and that in the future, we are able to look past our narrow Johnnie bubble and realize we can benefit by engaging with the wider community, and that college money spent for a noble project that extends beyond the Johnnie Bubble is money well spent.

This article is from: