LSU System President William Jenkins gave his approval for three fee increases at last week’s Board of Supervisor’s meeting without bringing them to a vote by the student body.
Students should have been given a vote on the increases because they are the ones affected by them.
With this most recent decision, the University has ignored its true clients.
Without student approval, full-time student fees will increase by $30.20 next semester and continue to be raised for another two years until reaching $47.20 – more than this semester’s total.
The fee increases will cover rising operating costs of the Union, updated technology for the Student Health Center and preventing campus transit cutbacks within the Office of Parking, Traffic and Transportation.
Though the increases are small, their approval without student consent is massive.
Students have voted on fee increases in the past. But recently fees – such as the utility fee increase in December 2005 – have passed without student input or approval.
But because of the time constraints, Jenkins found it necessary to skip over the students.
“I determine I have such authority in this instance under the unique circumstance presented at this late date,” Jenkins said in a letter to O’Keefe.
In a memo sent to Jenkins from O’Keefe, the chancellor said students had been sufficiently informed about the fees because The Daily Reveille had covered them in a three part series. Communication, however, was only allowed to go in one direction. Students were not given an avenue to voice their thoughts on the information they learned by reading The Daily Reveille’s coverage.
The fee increases have been in the works for months now, so why were they presented to Jenkins so late with little student input?
A newly formed University group, the Student Required Fee Committee, recommended the increases to the administration. While this committee includes students, it is likely they are influenced by the group’s administrative members.
Committee member and Student Government Senator Donald Hodge told The Daily Reveille he didn’t approve of the committee. If one of its own members doesn’t approve of this committee, why should the University and students approve of its recommendations?
The Student Senate suggested in September that the fee increase proposals be placed on a campuswide ballot. The Senate is specifically elected to serve as a unified voice of students to the University in matters such as these. Why can’t the University listen to its students?
The students should be included in the approval process, and administrators should have little to worry about by including them in the process. Students have rarely voted down fee increases in the past.
More importantly, if the adminstration is worried fee increases won’t pass, maybe they shouldn’t.
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