Last night the ASSU Undergraduate Senate met to vote on which student groups would be included on the spring ballot to receive special fees. While the majority of groups were approved, several sparked further discussion, including The Daily and Club Sports. All groups’ requests had previously been screened by the Senate’s finance committee.

Yet, immediately after Senate Chair Chris Nguyen, a junior, called the meeting to order, a motion was made to reconsider the bill regarding the listing of candidates’ endorsements on the election ballots. The bill, calling for the removal of such endorsements, was passed at last week’s joint session of the Senate and Graduate Student Council.

Because many of the undergraduate senators were absent from this last meeting due to personal conflicts, several felt the vote on the subject was unrepresentative. In light of these concerns, the Senate voted to reconsider the bill.

The meeting then shifted to the string of votes on which groups will be allowed to appear on the special-fees ballot. The entire student body will vote to grant special fees to these approved groups during the spring elections, to be held on April 12 and 13.

Most of the groups’ requests were quickly approved, though some involved lengthy debate.

Specifically, The Daily-which is requesting $49,000 in special fees this year-incited some controversy, as some senators said they were skeptical about whether or not the campus newspaper truly needs the funds to operate since it brings in income from advertisers.

Several senators, as well as GSC Member Adam Beberg, a graduate student in computer science, expressed their belief that The Daily would be able to support itself without the aid of special fees.

In rebuttal, Daily Chief Operating Officer Brendan Marten said that though the paper does bring in revenue by selling ads, it delivers its product to the student body for free. He added that The Daily’s financial situation is not always as steady in a randomly given year as many might perceive it to be, sometimes suffering losses in revenue amounting to as much as $200,000.

Despite Marten’s argument, the Senate still voted to approve the $31,000 limit on special fees for The Daily, which will petition for more funds as the election draws closer.

The special-fees request submitted by Club Sports was also approved, though only after modifications to pervious years’ budgets. Last year, the GSC expressed discontent that the graduate student population was forced to contribute as much to the athletic program as undergraduates, even though far less graduate students participate.

Last year, to remedy this situation, both the GSC and Senate approved a split fee that charged one-third of the contribution to Club Sports to graduate students, and two-thirds to the undergraduates. Both governing bodies agreed that this was a fair division of the costs.

However, not enough graduate students voted in the election, leaving the Club Sports program with insufficient funds to carry on their regular programming. This year, a proposed bill stipulates that if too few graduate students vote-which is likely-only sports predominantly played by graduate students will be impacted by the loss.

One of the major changes in this year’s ASSU financial policy for the approval of student groups’ budgets concerns meeting food. This year, meeting food is not being funded, eliciting complaints from several groups.

“We are happier and more productive if we have food, which helps our final product,” argued a representative from the Stanford Shakespeare Society.

While the senators agreed with this student, junior Senator Faris Mohiuddin, chair of the Appropriations Committee, said, “With a limited amount of money to give to student groups, we want to make sure we give students the most bang for the buck.”