Is the U.C. Fee Hike Worth the Price? A Perspective From the Inside

The benefits of the proposed Undergraduate Council fee hike are being obscured by poor representation.

Ten dollars. Pending Faculty Council approval, that's the amount the Undergraduate Council is planning to add to your annual term bill fee. Ten dollars.

For those of you, like me, who have a hard time dealing with abstract things like numbers, let me translate; $10 is what you'll pay for a pitcher of Foster's (including tip) at the Crimson Sports Grille. It's also what you'll pay Pizza Ring some evening when you and your suite-mates decide you can't live without the Super Price Blaster Special, or what you'll shell out for a ticket to a movie at Loews and a large bucket of buttered popcorn.

In terms of purchasing power, we're not talking about a lot of money. Most of us would agree that it's hard to go out in this tourist trap known as Cambridge without throwing away at least $10.

Then why is it that a majority of the campus (according to a Crimson poll conducted this week) takes issue with the council's proposed term bill increase? After all, isn't this the campus that, just a week ago, raised $25,000 in two days through $10 donations?

I would argue that, for most students, the problem with the increase is not its amount, but rather its perceived justification (or lack thereof); the question students are asking themselves is not, "Can I afford to pay another $10?" but rather, "Does the Undergraduate Council deserve another $10?" This is an appropriate and understandable query, and if your knowledge of the council and its activities is limited to what you read in The Crimson, it wouldn't be surprising or unreasonable if your response is "No."

Clearly there are a number of people on this campus who despise the Undergraduate Council: certain Crimson editorialists, Salient staff writers and former council members come to mind. There are also some people who think the council is great; granted, most of them are council representatives, but that's beside the point. Even if you were to combine these groups, however, they would account for a fairly small minority of the student body.

Most Harvard students don't care much one way or another. According to this week's Crimson survey, a majority of undergraduates can't name even two things the council has done in the past year. Apparently, there is a breakdown in the communication channels between representatives and the represented. As a result, many students are still not sure exactly how they feel about the proposed fee hike and many of those who think they know are basing their opinions on misleading information Legitimate reasons for both opposition and support exist.

You shouldn't support the council's term bill increase because the council is complaining that it has less money than the student governments at every other school in the greater Boston area. To an extent, these differences can be explained by disparities in size and responsibility.

More important, however, is the fact that the motivation to increase student term bill fees at Harvard should not be based on the amount of money the student governments collect at Boston College, Boston University, Tufts or MIT. "Need" should be defined in real rather than relative terms. What maters isn't how much money the council has, but what it's doing with what it's got.

You probably shouldn't support an increase in the council term bill fee if you can't name at least one of your House or Yard representatives, or if you can't name at least tow things the council has accomplished in the past year.

You also probably shouldn't support it if you can think of those things, but you think they were a waste of money, or if think the council should limit it self to serving as a liaison between the student body and faculty and forget about silly things like concerts and shuttle buses.

And for those of you in the classes of '94 and '95 who still cannot dissociate the term "Undergraduate Council" from the three syllables "De La Soul," it's a safe bet that you should not support a term bill increase.

An informed decision to support the council's term bill increase should be based on two criteria: what the council is doing with the funds it already has, and what the council proposes to do with the hypothetical $60,000 in new revenue generated by a term bill hike.

Currently, the term bill fee is $20 and the council's annual budget is in the neighborhood of $120,000. A portion of this goes to operational costs (office supplies, space rental, phone and fax lines, maintenance and upkeep of equipment, etc.);$80,000 goes to student grants and the remaining amount--about $30,000--goes to fund council activities.

This past year, some of this money was or is being used for things such as free shuttle buses to Logan Airport at Thanksgiving, Christmas and Spring Break; free comedy shows that the council has been hosting about once every other month in the Science Center; concerts and activities such as last month's Machinery Hall show, the April 9th Heretix performance, the April 28th They Might Be Giants concert and the late April "Yardfest;" and community recognition prizes such as the Levenson Award for excellence in teaching and the Julio Delvale prize for worthy community service. I could go on, but you get the idea.

As The Crimson noted in an article earlier this months, the council certainly has a problem with "deadweight;" a few of our members do very little. But the fact is, those on the council who are committed are very committed and, in their efforts to serve the student body, they make the most of the funds available.

That said, the single most important consideration in deciding whether or not to support a term bill increase should involve what the council plans on doing with the new revenue the increase would generate. Unfortunately, on this point, the council is divided. The collective sentiment seems to be, "Get the cash now and we'll figure out exactly what to do with it later."

Some council members argue that more money would allow the council to coordinate more events. I disagree. In terms of expansion, the council is constrained by a number of institutional and systemic factors. There is the obvious issue of human resources (the council is not a huge organization and the level of commitment varies widely among members).

More significant, however, are the hidden difficulties. The activities which any one group can coordinate at Harvard are inherently limited by the fact that we have a large number of organizations (more than 400) competing for a relatively small number of facilities, performance spaces and audience members.

The academic calendar imposes further constraints on the number of activities conducted. Experience teaches that midterm week, the period when most senior these are due, the second week of reading-period and so on are not good times to hold social events--even if you can draw a crowd, the person coordinating the event usually finds him or her self busy with academic responsibilities.

Rather than increasing quantity, perhaps more funds could be used to help the council increase the quality of its events. Another $60,000 in the councils' budget would mean that it could invite, say, Pearl Jam rather than Machinery Hall, Eric Clapton rather than They Might Be Giants.

It's great having Saturday Night Live's David Spade, but how about replacing him with Robin Williams or Billy Crystal? Those are the sorts of changes that you could realistically expect to see if the council had another $60,000 at its disposal. Maybe that makes it worth paying another $10. Maybe it doesn't.

An alternative idea is taking the money generated by a term bill increase and putting it into grants for student organizations. A weekend conference for student leaders at the Institute of Politics brought to light the concern that, while Harvard provides a number of sources of funding for new organizations seeking self-sufficiency, more established organizations interested in acquiring funds for a one-time project have nowhere to turn.

One amendment defeated during the council meeting at which the term increase was approved would have assigned the bulk of the revenue generated by a term bill increase to the grants program. Adding $60,000 to the council's already substantial grants process would allow the council to specifically target grants at House committees and other established student organizations.

If you support any of these possibilities, you should support the idea of a term bill increase.

I support an increase in the term bill in principle but I voted against the package for two reasons: the council as a whole refused to specify what would be done with the new revenue (other than to reduce the percentage of total council funds going to grants); and the council refused to put the final authority for any increase in the hands of the students body through a campus-wide referendum.

The term bill imbroglio points to a fundamental failure of representation on the Undergraduate Council. In regard to both the term bill increase and calendar reform, former council Chair Michael P. Beys has observed that the council is a representative body and hence has no need to refer anything to student referendum.

In theory, I agree with him. In practice, however, Beys is wrong. The council should be a representative body. But this representation has failed in the case of the term bill increase. It has failed, by definition, when 75 percent of the council votes in favor of a measure which a majority of the student body does not support. Given this disparity, the council has forfeited any claims it might have had to "representation" as a defense against a student referendum.

If the council as a whole refuses to reflect the opinion of the students or to make a legitimate attempt to explain its position (Campus Life Co-Chair John Mann's letter to The Crimson earlier this week stands as a notable exception), then the student body must force the council to hear its voice.

David V. Bonfili '96 represents Dunster House on the Undergraduate Council.