Kyle W. Niedzwiecki '98, co-chair of Harvard-Radcliffe Science Fiction Association (HRSFA), says that finance committee representatives were not helpful in helping his group find other sources of funding.

"I was not left with the impression that the council encourages organizations to raise money or find other sources of income," Niedzwiecki says.

However, council members argue that the Finance Committee is doing its best with limited human resources.

"There should be closer interactions with groups other than just the 20-minute interview," West says. "But the Finance Committee is really bogged down as it is."

The Welfare State?

The Finance Committee maintains the lowest profile on the council, usually keeping out of the sometimes vicious spats that characterize debates in Student Affairs and Campus Life, its more controversial siblings in the council structure.

But this year, discussion of the Finance Committee has become increasingly vocal, shifting the focus onto a committee whose grants process has been compared by some observers to a bad welfare program.

In particular, the council has been heavily criticized for its financial requirements that an organization's funds must be almost depleted for it to qualify for a grant.

Large ethnic groups, such as the BSA, the Asian American Association (AAA) and the Minority Students Association are among the loudest protesters.

"It's not fair that these ethnic groups which serve such a large portion of the student body see almost none of the money we pay in our term bill," says Sharon W. Gi '98, co-president of AAA.

Members of these groups say that the grants process encourages fiscal irresponsibility.

The BSA's Powe says that the group was penalized last fall for its shrewd financial planning.

"It was not even a question of our group being historically stable, but rather we had worked extra hard that semester to save some money," he says. "It seemed somewhat hypocritical and a disincentive to getting outside funding."

Weinberg denies that the current grants process encourages irresponsible spending.

"A U.C. grant is not worth enough that a group would purposefully empty its accounts just to get one of our grants," he says.