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USAC General Representative Josh Lawson, front, and JSU President Gideon Baum listen to USAC

The five-month-long case about the Jewish Student Union’s appeal for additional funding from the undergraduate student government concluded Monday night when a hearing resulted in the student government coming out victorious.

In a 6-0 vote, members of the Judicial Board rejected JSU’s claim that the organization had suffered severe budget cuts due to the alleged politicization of the funding allocation process established by the Undergraduate Students Association Council. An opinion outlining the reasoning behind the decision is scheduled to be released in 14 days.

“If I had not made the decision to run for (USAC) internal vice president, JSU would be in a different position today,” said JSU President Gideon Baum during the opening arguments.

Baum ran under the Students United for Reform and Equality slate during last spring’s election. This year’s council and Budget Review Committee has a slate majority of Students First!.

In the petition for a hearing, JSU said the organization was inadvertently discriminated against and that the criteria used to evaluate the proposal for the base budget, such as retention and outreach, were too narrow, causing the organization to receive a low number of points and low amount of funding.

External Vice President Matt Kaczmarek, the counsel for USAC, said the priorities used in evaluating the proposal were unanimously passed by council, and that groups had ample time to review the criteria.

“For the first time in history, we made the categorization more available to groups,” Kaczmarek said.

Dissatisfied with their allocation, JSU appealed the BRC’s decision to council last quarter but was denied.

“If JSU wanted to, they could’ve questioned us earlier (about the criteria), but chose to do so after,” Kaczmarek said.

JSU said because of the low amount of funding they received, they had to cut back on programming.

Kaczmarek said the organization had canceled two scheduled events – a trip to the Los Angeles County Museum of Art and a magic show. Kaczmarek said only approximately $840 dollars have been spent by the organization out of the $3240.05 allocated.

Because of the low amount of money spent thus far, Kaczmarek said he questioned JSU’s real reason behind the appeal, wondering if it was because of financial burden, or because of some other motive.

Baum primarily focused his argument on the alleged politicization of the funding process, shifting away from the original argument stated on the petition regarding funding criteria.

When cross-examining President Anica McKesey, one of USAC’s witnesses, Baum made an assertion that McKesey may have appointed members to the BRC based on her grievances with the budget review process last year when she was chair of the African Student Union.

McKesey said she was dissatisfied with the ASU’s budget, but said she appointed members to the BRC based on their qualifications.

“There were several discrepancies in the process last year, but we chose not to appeal because we felt it was not the most appropriate use of council’s time,” McKesey said.

The president is responsible for appointing the budget review director and finance committee chairperson who automatically sit on BRC by virtue of their position. The president fills the remaining three seats on the committee with councilmembers.

For the first time since 2000, a hearing of this magnitude was opened to the public. In 2000, the Interfraternity Council brought a similar suit against USAC concerning funding allocations.

The legitimacy of the base budget funding allocation process became a concern when a “friend of the court brief” was filed by General Representative Josh Lawson in support of JSU. The brief made allegations that the process was politicized, with student groups supporting the dominant Students First! slate receiving more money than groups that do not.

Both council and the BRC have a slate majority of Students First! members. Slates are coalitions of students with similar ideologies that help each other win seats on council.

BRC has repeatedly said allocations were not made on slate lines and the reason why certain groups received more money was because of the quality of their proposal and hearing.

Baum said though JSU lost the case, he still feels the effort JSU made was worthwhile.

“While we’re not vindicated by the J-board, it’s still important to bring forth the issue of politicization and to take a hard look at what and who makes decisions on funding,” Baum said.