UPDATE: 7:50 p.m.: Fee committee considers requests for up to 12 percent increase in student fees

Fourteen groups made proposals to the Committee for Fee Review to increase by $50 how much students pay in mandatory fees, which would be an increase of 12 percent to 13 percent.\nCommittee co-chair and IU Student Association President Betsy Henke said the University administration has not put a cap on mandatory fee increases, but they do not want to see fees increase by more than 6 percent.\nStudents currently pay $401.61 in mandatory fees each semester.\nThe Committee for Fee Review listened to proposals this weekend from the groups that receive the money students pay in mandatory fees.\nThe committee makes recommendations on how the $29 million generated by mandatory fees will be divided. After listening to proposals, the committee will have several meetings until April 2, when its recommendations are to be submitted to Dean of Students Dick McKaig. The recommendations are then passed on to President Adam Herbert and finally to the board of trustees.\nLast year the committee was only allowed to increase the total of all mandatory fees by 1.5 percent. The committee was not given a limit this year, but Herbert visited during the committee’s lunch break Saturday and indicated money would be tight, said Damon Sims, associate vice president for student affairs.\nSims, who provides advice and support for the committee, said the committee’s recommendations have only been changed three times.\n“The committee has no authority to set fees,” Sims said. “But their recommendations have carried considerable weight.”\nThe committee is normally made up of two graduate students and five undergraduate students. This year, however, the committee received a last-minute e-mail from one graduate student member saying she wouldn’t be able to attend the meetings, Sims said.\nThe committee also has two co-chairs: Henke and Graduate and Professional Student Organization moderator Paul Rohwer. The two will only cast one combined vote if there is a tie.\nSims said most of the money from mandatory fees goes to personnel costs, such as salaries and benefits. Inflation causes salaries and benefits to increase at a higher rate than the committee is allowed to recommend mandatory fees be increased by, he said.\n“These groups have to cannibalize themselves and take money away from other things,” Sims said.\nThe IU Health Center is struggling to keep staff members who could take jobs at Bloomington Hospital or Monroe Hospital, Sims said.\n“It doesn’t leave you in a good spot after awhile,” Sims said. “If you don’t get what you requested, what do you do?”\nRepresentatives from the health center said that if they didn’t get what they requested, they would have to talk about cutting services, Sims said.\nThe effect this will have on students varies from organization to organization, said sophomore and Committee for Fee Review member Anthony Smith.\n“Some have committed to maintain the same level of service, but others assert their level of service will decrease,” Smith said.\nUniversity Information Technology Services is an operation students use daily, so its proposal is given more weight, Smith said.\nSims said too few people in the campus community understand all the services and programs that money from mandatory fees provides.\n“They believe the fees pay for pizza (that) student government buys for itself,” Sims said. “But it really pays for fundamental services students need and demand.”\nEven though the committee is not allowed to request fee increases to satisfy all 14 groups, Sims still supports the process for fee review that began in 1988.\n“I firmly believe this is the single best example of meaningful student involvement in institutional decision-making,” Sims said.