Publicity Funds Cause Row on UC

A heated debate spilled over onto the UC general e-mail list just hours after Undergraduate Council President Andrea R. Flores ’10 cast the tie-breaking vote in favor of a contentious legislation to allocate $200 towards publicity for a for-profit student business, “Get Out of Cambridge.”

Former UC Vice President Randall S. Sarafa ’09, who first posted to the open-list about the issue, said in an interview that he did not believe there was a precedent for legislation like “Get Out of Cambridge.”

“There has, in the past five years, been no instance in which the UC has given money to a for-profit organization except when the UC has required their services rendered,” Sarafa wrote in an e-mail sent to the list at 2:23 a.m.

At yesterday’s general meeting the UC voted unanimously to endorse and publicize getoutofcambridge.com, a Web site designed to help students coordinate cheap transportation from Harvard.

But two clauses that were separated from bill generated considerable controversy at the meeting. They allocate $200 towards publicity efforts to promote the Web site and to entitle the UC to 15 percent of the profits earned during the remainder of the term of the current administration.

Dunster House Co-representative and finance committee member Mohindra Rupram ’10 said that the $200 sum amounted to only about three cents per student and the controversy was largely unwarranted.

“I don’t quite understand why it’s become such a hot button issue since the amount funded was small relative to other things that we’ve funded,” Rupram said in an interview yesterday.

The unanimous vote in favor of the legislation to endorse and publicize the enterprise is in keeping with a similar arrangement that the council had with CrimsonReading.org, a site devoted to helping undergraduates find cheaper, used textbooks. Although, when Crimson Reading was created in 2006 it was a non-profit site and the site’s profits were donated to a charity in Zambia.

“The UC can provide free publicity support,” said UC Secretary Douglas R. Lloyd ’09. “It’s not the amount of money that’s being spent, it’s the precedent that’s being set.”

The legislation could potentially produce income for the UC—though some members were skeptical that the business would be profitable.

Sarafa also said the resolution could mean the UC would have to pay taxes on the profits it might earn.

So far, nearly a hundred people have registered on the site, which depends on a large number of student participants for its taxi cab matching service to be effective. The site is expected to officially launch in the next few days, according to Zachary Z. Smith, co-founder of Get Out of Cambridge.

Publicity for the site, which the UC is funding, will cover some of the costs of postering, door dropping and Facebook ads.

Alyssa M. Aguilera ’08-’09 voted against the legislation and wrote in an e-mail to the open-list that she worried that some non-UC members’ voices were not being heard.

“We have these grand plans for the student relations committee but if we are not taking the time to digest the responses of our constituents and reflect on them in a meaningful way, then I think its all for nothing,” she wrote.

But representatives who voted for the passage of the legislation emphasized the advantages students would receive from the travel site.

“The UC is partnering with the students behind ‘Get Out of Cambridge’ because it will benefit students,” said Daniel V. Kroop ’10, co-chair of the Student Relations Committee. “It’s a fully functional Web site that can provide student services better than the UC could.”

—Staff writer Brittany M. Llewellyn can be reached at bllewell@fas.harvard.edu.
—Staff writer Eric P. Newcomer can be reached at newcomer@fas.harvard.edu.