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Editor:
After reading the story about Bobcats and funding ("ASUA funding raises questions of fairness," Nov. 8), I feel that the Wildcat misrepresented the events, constitutionality issue, and personal factors involved in the Central Coordinating Council's decision to approve the funding for Bobcats.
The first glaring error is Todd Hardy's claim that the funding for Bobcats is one-eighth of the total club funding budget. Two paragraphs later, Hardy quotes the total allocation as $74,200. This breaks down to less than one-thirteenth of the budget.
Hardy mentions several times that the funding is going to a club of only 13 members. Hardy forgot to mention that Bobcats is responsible for coordinating and conducting all the activities for a week full of events for Homecoming. I didn't quite understand why a comparison was made with KAMP radio, but as a former Appropriations Board member, I can personally vouch for the fact that KAMP repeatedly appears before the board asking for funds. The reason they were not fully funded is because the board knew they would appear again, and we chose to partially fund all of their activities, rather than fully funding one.
Hardy also never mentioned Bobcats' total budget. The story was slanted to appear as if the $5,555.95 was the total cost of Homecoming activities. In fact, an additional $8,000 is necessary to fully fund Homecoming.
But perhaps Hardy most obviously misrepresented the purpose of CCC's approval of the Appropriation Board's current agenda. The members of CCC may only vote against an item on the consent agenda if it is unconstitutional. It is not a place for subjective opinion - those decisions are made by the Appropriations Board. The CCC is an objective decision maker and their decision is whether this event follows the rules of the constitutions. The CCC had no choice but to vote in favor of the item.
And finally, the Wildcat, wrote an entire story about Sen. Maile Weigele's indirect relation to Bobcats. However, Sen. Ryan Anderson, the only dissenting voter, has the same relationship as Sen. Weigele. He is a candidate for Homecoming King. Why does he not have a relationship as well.
As a member of the CCC, I feel that Hardy represented a biased and, at parts, blatantly wrong opinion. Unfortunately, unlike student government, the Wildcat has no watchdog.
Hilla Yaniv
ASUA treasurer
accounting senior
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