Treasurer may just be the most important Student Association executive board position.
It’s the position that deals most directly with SA’s budget and finances of student funds, and SA is really all about dispersing student funds, collected through the mandatory student activity fee, back to students in the best way possible.
Therefore a treasurer must be someone who is smart, experienced, professional and responsible, and that person is Dan Emmons of the Progress Party.
We commend fellow treasurer candidates Carl Ross and Aaron Hussain. They are both passionate to serve students and understand the issues plaguing clubs, but we overall felt Emmons has more experience and more effectively articulated how he would actually go about improving SA.
Emmons has worked directly as a bookkeeper in SA’s finance department and is a business administration major and can articulate his realistic and sound goals effectively. While we could not give his party’s president and vice president the same endorsement, we felt Emmons stood out from his running mates. It’s a good thing treasurers are elected separately.
He was not vague, and instead brought up realistic and sound goals, like making club orientation more specific to individual clubs, moving the FAQ sheet to the front of the finance handbook so clubs don’t lose it and working with Sub Board I, Inc. to accept some paper receipts, as well making sure clubs get their rollover budget more often.
Ross gave a passionate and wide-ranging talk about the issues in SA and revamping the organization. He wants clubs to have more money and overall bring more “fun to SA.”
But some of his answers, that gave us insight to what his potential spending habits would be, gave us pause.
Although he called himself “frugal,” Ross discussed getting more clubs more money through rollover and lessening fines for late penalties, as well as adding more SA staff and activities for students. During a one-on-one interview, he began to say SA will always be financially stable no matter what, before catching himself and rephrasing.
He did not seem to have spoken much with SA higher-ups to make sure his changes are doable, only noting he’s talked to clubs who agree with him. His rollover and new system for fines also did not seem as fleshed out as they could have been.
Ross, who is on his second undergraduate degree at UB, has extensive knowledge and experience relating to SA, and he’d probably be a more than qualified and passionate treasurer, but because of the aforementioned issues, we feel Emmons is the better pick.
Hussain is also a passionate candidate who seems to genuinely want to make things better for clubs. We like his ideas for a weekly club events packet and a suggestion box solely for the e-board, but his major proposals, like a 4-4-4 rollover program, also seemed less than fleshed out.
We liked that he has taken steps to speak with current Treasurer Joe Pace on how SA finances work, but his only real SA experience as treasurer of Student for Justice in Palestine may not be enough to prepare him for such an important role.
Also, his admission that he is independent because he learned of SA elections too late in the process to team up with another party is cause for concern. A candidate should prepare and think hard about the position for a good amount of time, and his admission showed he might have rushed into the running, even if it was with good intentions.
We as an editorial board feel Emmons is the most responsible choice for SA treasurer, based on his credentials, experiences, preparedness and realistic policy reforms. Although we did not feel confident enough to do the same for his running mates, Emmons gets our endorsement to be the next SA treasurer.
The editorial board can be reached at eic@ubspectrum.com.
