Deaton to decide Hearnes Center fee
Roughly $1 million remains in an endowment fund.
March 6, 2007
Due to a death in the family, Chancellor Brady Deaton has been unable to issue a ruling about the possible direction of roughly $1 million leftover funds allocated from the Hearnes Center fee that had been collected since the 1960s.
The Hearnes Center Committee, a standing committee to the chancellor, is in control of the funds.
The fee was meant to pay off loans that the university incurred for the building of the Hearnes Center. Committee member Nick Trusty said the debt from the Hearnes Center was paid off in 1995.
The fee was not redirected until 2004. The extra money, totaling about $1 million, has been kept in an endowment fund for the use of the facility's maintenance.
On Feb. 22, the committee held a meeting to discuss a proposal by Trusty and Missouri Students Association Vice President Andrew Cafourek to transfer the funds to the Student Fee Capital Improvement Committee. If SFCIC receives the funds, it could distribute it to campus organizations and departments. Because the Hearnes Center was funded in part with student fees, it would be eligible to apply for funds from SFCIC, but other athletic facilities that were not funded by students would not be eligible.
At the meeting, 15 members of the committee voted 9-6 against the proposal. But ex-officio committee members cast three of the votes against the proposal. Without those votes, the vote is a tie.
Committee Chairman Kevin Moore said he is unsure whether to count the votes.
"Faculty Council asserts that ex-officio members should not have the right to vote," he stated in an e-mail. "They are present for input and advice based on their positions and knowledge. But Roberts Rules of Order states that unless otherwise noted, ex-officio members are appointed with full voting rights."
The Roberts Rules of Order is a commonly used manual for meeting procedure.
Moore said some standing committees at MU allow ex-officio members to vote but others do not. He said standing committees were formed a long time ago, so it is now unclear to him what the original intent was on this issue.
"It is not even clear that it is within the scope of each committee to determine whether or not ex-officio members can vote," he said.
MU Project Specialist Linda Cook is in charge of communicating with the chancellor's office on the issue. She said she is unsure when Deaton will return and when she will be able to get an answer from him to resolve the issue.
—News Editor Alex Lundy contributed to this report
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