COLUMN: "Big Ol' SAC of Money"

From Zelig Kurland's "Bacon for Breakfast," Spring '92 The Student Activities Council, believe it or not, is managed pretty well. Unfortunately, there's a multitude of University-recognized leech organizations robbing us all blind. In the real world, you're supposed to make good decisions, run efficiently or pay the deficit out of your own pocket. In contrast, the goal of running a SAC-funded organization -- for some -- is to take as much money as you can get your hands on, whether you really need it or not. A perfect example of fiscal waste is the misuse of funds by "community service" group Circle K for their baked goods sale during Fling. First and foremost, they tooled home to Main Line to bake brownies. Will they try billing SAC for it? Only time will tell. Second and foremost, Circle K bought a colossal ad in the Daily Pennsylvanian proclaiming, "Do one moral thing during Fling . . . the Circle K baked goods sale." The President of Circle K says, "It was free. They [SAC] give you a free ad as the standard." In other words, that ad will cost SAC $106. Third and foremost, Circle K's other expenses -- ingredients and the booth in Upper Quad -- exceeded their take by $30. Tally in the DP ad, and you get a deficit of $136. Says Circle K President: "No comment." Says I: "Retard." What's up with that "Do something moral" holier-than-thou advertising campaign when they've just ripped off SAC? Wouldn't it be better philantrophy just to have SAC give money directly to charity? How might Circle K cover their costs? Maybe they'll get some old receipts and turn them into SAC. Fraud? Bin-go! Maybe SAC will boot the losers. "Circle K" is supposed to be the name of a convenience store anyway. I brainstormed over dinner with some friends, and in five minutes we came up with a better way to make money than having a bake sale: Go to Springfield, buy some Blatz for $6 a case, and sell it in the Quad during Fling for $5 a six-pack. A 400 percent profit, just like that. Of course, $136 isn't an insane amount in comparison to the $500,000-plus SAC budgets each year. But Circle K is typical of the attitude of many SAC funded organizations: "We can, so we might as well take it." Circle K was budgeted $1310 last year. I hope we got at least five bake sales out of that. It could as easily have been five or six thousand. Speaking of five or six thousand dollars, why not print half -- or a quarter -- as many Highball's and Punch Bowl's? Does it really help to put them under everybody's doors? Does that help make people who aren't really into penis jokes read them? And why are they laminated? Why did Off the Beat need $3035 last year while Penny Loafers only got $642? What's up with that? Bigger cast parties? With well over a hundred student groups, it's impossible for SAC to weed out leech organizations like Circle K. The problem is that the leeches think that the money is theirs for the taking. SAC meetings are revealing if you're willing to sit through one. There's nothing I dig more than a full-on SAC meeting -- a meeting of SAC committees and representatives from every SAC-funded organization on campus. There's always that one tool who just loves to hear himself talk. The idiot who stands up and debates anything, just because he hasn't been out of the house since the last month's SAC meeting. What's up with that? The best part about the last SAC meeting was a cameo appearance by Mitch Winston. Now you'd think, given how many people joke about his continuing insistence that the "UA is directly responsible" for this year's astonishingly low tuition increase, that he wouldn't brag about it. Well, he did. Some folks never learn. What's up with that? SAC regulations forbid funding activities that are purely social. Nonetheless, SAC reps overwhelmingly approved giving the Class of 1992 over $4000 to subsidize the Senior formal. Granted, I'll be a senior too and maybe I'll even go to the prom, but I'd feel better paying for it myself rather than know that the people who weren't going were helping pay for it. What's the difference between a $30 ticket and a $35 ticket anyway? Another interesting waste of money was the majority approval of $500 two months ago for the Penn Taiwanese Society to rent McClelland Hall for a dinner. A dinner? What's up with that? And what's up with the Social Planning and Events Committee? I still spend many a night writhing in bed, sweating like a pig, thinking "Air bands, air bands, air bands . . . why? why? why? What's up with that?" I've come up with a really dandy idea: The Penn Rock Coalition. That's right, all of Penn's oppressed and suppressed rock acts bonding together to snag as much University money as possible -- getting subsidized senseless just like everyone else. What's wrong with that? · A farewell note: I lied about that whole Darlina thing. She's really twelve. "Light of my life, fire of my loins. My sin, my soul. Lo-lee-ta . . . " Zelig Kurland is a sophomore cradle robber who moonlights as an ecdysiast. He is also an English major -- who can't write -- from Charleston, West Virginia. "Bacon for Breakfast" appeared alternate Tuesdays.