Student fee could skyrocket

The student fee could be raised by as much as 46 percent over the $167-per-term fee each student was charged for the 2006-07 school year.

Some Student Fee Committee (SFC) members were apprehensive about raising the student fee at all, which increased by 25 percent from the 2005-06 school year to this year after being stagnant for nearly three years. But because the Portland State student groups requested millions more than was allocated last year, the fee could skyrocket by as much as $78 for each term.

Student groups requested close to $12.4 million for the 2007-08 school year, nearly $3 million more than the $9.7 million that was allocated for this year. If the SFC approves the student group budgets as they stand, the fee would rise to $221 per term.

Pending a decision on the incidental costs-a cost that would charge between .01 and 12 percent of student groups’ budget for administrative work done by the Office of Business Affairs-the fee could climb even higher. If student groups were charged 12 percent of their budgets, the fee would raise by another $24 per term to $245, according to James Harris, a PSU budget analyst who presented fee information at a Tuesday night SFC meeting.

This would change Portland State from having the lowest student fee in the Oregon University System to the highest fee out of all seven state schools in one year. The increase in a student fee will depend on how much SFC members choose to divvy out to student groups over the next two weeks during budget deliberations.

SFC Chair Madeline Enos said she thinks an increase in the student fee would be reasonable. Harris said at Tuesday’s meeting that if student groups were funded as much as last year, then the fee would still increase by nine dollars because of a decrease in enrollment this year.

Enos said she would like to encourage growth in student groups and services on campus, and if they were to fund groups the same that would stifle their growth.

“I would love to see the growth and thriving of services on campus,” Enos said.

Rudy Soto, SFC member and possible student body president candidate, said he does not want to raise the student fee because it was raised considerably last year. He said an increase might be necessary with the future indirect cost fee.

“It’s hard but it’s necessary with the indirect cost looming over our heads,” Soto said.