This week saw a particularly contentious debate from the Student Government Association as legislators wrangled with a proposal to provide funding to MyMaryland.net, an in-development nonprofit website that connects state residents with their elected officials. Wednesday night, the SGA narrowly approved the resolution, but President Kaiyi Xie was among the opponents and is considering a veto – a rare move that would probably kill the bill for the rest of this academic year.
The proposal calls for MyMaryland.net to create a tab on the MyUM portal, providing a space for university students to engage with state and university officials in return for $2,500 apportioned from the SGA account funded by the mandatory student activities fee – money generally allotted for student groups.
The resolution was proposed by letters and sciences legislator Zane Adoum and co-sponsored by 12 of the body’s legislators. Ben Simon, a former SGA presidential candidate (and former Diamondback columnist), is the website’s founder. As many may remember, Simon ran against Xie last year as a member of the Love Party and ultimately lost, though 18 members of the party remain part of SGA. The resolution passed 13-10, so it’s hard to tell whether legislators support Simon – or the resolution.
Xie’s opposition hinges primarily on the precedent the proposal could set for future SGA actions – MyMaryland.net isn’t expected to be running for another month or two, so any money from the SGA would, in a sense, be startup funding for an unproven product. The venture recently won a $1,000 grant through the business school’s Pitch Dingman Competition.
Many opponents of the measure – Xie included – seem to support the idea of Simon’s project, just not the SGA’s involvement. Even if MyMaryland.net is a good idea and could possibly (even probably) provide a useful service to students, is it appropriate for the SGA to fund the proposal with money that would otherwise go to student groups? This editorial board doesn’t think so.
It’s important to consider the resolution in light of last year’s SGA student group funding fiasco. Last April, many student groups received far less money from the SGA than in years past; higher student activities fees are in effect for this year, but the additional money is unlikely to cover funding requests from student groups. The website isn’t even active yet – the SGA should not be in the business of funding unproven student ventures, even if they might someday be beneficial to students.
Furthermore, the University System of Maryland already has a similar system in place – Capwiz is an electronic software package used by groups across the country to build grassroots support and interact with elected officials. Administrators activated the software in March to help lobby lawmakers in Annapolis on the university system budget, and it must be somewhat effective; SGA Director of Governmental Affairs Zach Cohen said more than 22,000 people from across the state, primarily students, called and emailed lawmakers asking them to push for the lowest possible tuition hikes this legislative session. If students want to interact with administrators at this university, meanwhile, university President Wallace Loh’s email address and Twitter handle are pretty easy to remember – president@umd.edu and @presidentloh, respectively.
We believe the MyMaryland.net concept is one with potential, and Simon’s efforts to put together a program that could benefit students and officials at this university should not go unrecognized. But a good premise doesn’t warrant SGA funding. If the organization funds one student’s idea, what stops it from funding more? At this point, there’s no telling how beneficial it could be – and it would be detrimental for the SGA to set a precedent of helping one student’s plan with money allotted for helping many different student groups.
That said, we hope Simon continues working on this idea – if system officials are willing to pay CQ Roll Call for use of the Capwiz software, perhaps they can be convinced to pay MyMaryland.net, a student-founded, nonprofit organization, to do a similar job. Simon claims the number of advocates – 22 people appearing before the SGA out of the about 35,000 students at this university – is evidence of substantial student support. We’re not so sure. If a truly significant number of students indicate demand for such a service, the SGA can revisit the issue next year when the website is up and running. Until then, Xie should veto the resolution.
