After an audit from the Audit and Finance Committee (AFC), the Student Senate voted nearly unanimously to revert $500 from the Newman Club’s spring budget to the Senate’s general fund. This reversion, according to the Audit Report of the AFC, was taken “…based on a disregard for AFC and Student Senate rules and policies with the Newman Club’s inappropriate and unapproved expenditures.” The AFC generated the report after a meeting with the president and treasurer of the club.
“This isn’t a vendetta against the Newman Club in any way,” said Senate Treasurer Ross McKinney ’09, “it just happened to happen to them.”
The AFC conducted their audit after certain expenditures were flagged by the Wabash business office as being peculiar in nature. On the club’s spring budget there was $1,600 apportioned for joint events with a sister club at Marian College. These “events” were initially described to the AFC as including activities such as bowling, euchre games and coffee.
However, funds appropriated to the joint events with Marian were spent on activities characterized by McKinney as “unapproved” – like restaurant bills for a joint dinner with Marian College. Those receipts of the “unapproved” activities totaled $781.67. Another receipt from Buca di Beppo restaurant was then turned in totaling $439.52 from another joint restaurant dinner with Marian.
In light of this information, McKinney, acting on his authority as Senate Treasurer, froze the Newman Club accounts on February 23. After the AFC met, it recommended to the Senate that the $1,600 initially set aside for “events with Marian College” be reverted from the total club budget, as some of the funds earmarked for those events had already been spent on the unapproved activities. The Senate approved this recommendation and an audit of the finances of the Newman Club was ordered.
On Monday, the AFC conducted the audit along with Newman club President Michael Karam ’08 and Treasurer Sam Borrelli ’07. Both club officers agreed to work with the AFC to revise their budget and agreed to work with the stipulations put forth by the committee.
Karam accepts responsibility for the club’s indiscretions.
“The audit came about as a result of laziness on the part of myself and our treasurer to not read up on the AFC's budget rules,” he said. “We were granted money for social events with our sister club at Marian, and we were not aware that that money should not have gone towards dinners.”
Karam points out that although they have a large budget for this semester, about $5,000.00, the majority of their remaining money is going towards a campus wide speaker co-sponsored by the Wabash Christian Men. $2,500 of their budget was spent sending 12 members of the club to attend a leadership conference in Washington DC. With the reversion of $1,600 and the additional $500 passed by the Senate on Tuesday, the non-appropriated funds of the club are now much smaller.
Along with the reversion of funds, the AFC also applied stipulations for the future operating budget of the club. The club’s finances are frozen until it submits a new budget that reflects the loss of the $2,100. As their campus wide speaker is coming soon, the $5,000 earmarked for that event will remain unfrozen. If the Newman Club has any “further indiscretions” with Senate fiscal policy, their budget will be suspended “regardless of intention.”
Overall, senators felt the punishment was appropriate.
“I think clubs should be responsible with their use of money,” said senate member Nick Gregory ’07. “Students should know if people are misusing their funds.”
Student Body Vice-President Robert Boarman ’08 believes that it is important for clubs to understand the gravity that the Senate takes its job as the steward of the Student Body’s money.
“I think that clubs assume that Senate will automatically give them money before they even get it approved,” he said. “It’s important that more awareness gets out that [the Senate] is taking this seriously.”