UA students struck down a $40-per-year Student Union fee in a referendum vote this week, leaving officials to search for other ways to avoid cutting services and raising prices.
In voting Tuesday and Wednesday, 70 percent of students said they were not in favor of levying a mandatory fee to support services at the Student Union.
Although the vote is non-binding and only the Arizona Board of Regents has the authority to implement fees, university officials acknowledged the board isn't likely to go against the wishes of the students.
More revenue is needed to maintain current levels of student services, prices and hours of operation at the 405,000-square-foot Student Union Memorial Center, said Dan Adams, Student Union director.
Revenue and expense forecasts for the three-year-old, $60 million building have been on target, but state employee raises are costly because the union gets only 3 percent of its budget from the university, Adams said.
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"We're pretty much right on the money with those," Adams said. "What we have experienced in the last few years is our employee benefits have gone up pretty significantly."
Last year, employee benefits cost an additional $700,000 and raises that took effect in March will cost the union another $150,000 by the end of this fiscal year.
The union receives 3 percent of its income from university and the rest is self-generated, Adams said. The dining services help underwrite other programs and services.
Without a fee, the union will be forced to cut services, raise prices and even institute some user fees, Adams said. Next year's budget already calls for cutting late-night hours.
"We'll end up raising our prices across the board, a minimum of 5 percent," Adams said. "We're having to identify other ways to come up with the revenue source we need."
About 35,000 people use the union on a typical day and more than 14,000 events are scheduled a year.
"The role of the Student Union isn't just to be a shopping mall or anything like that," Adams said. "The rest of that space has a larger role of serving the campus community. We have lounges, computer labs and a number of things that are intended to be for students, more service than revenue-producing."
Many students saw the fee as arbitrary and questioned why it was necessary, said Rhonda Tubbs, a student senator and finance senior who opposed the fee.
"I definitely saw some holes in the plan and obviously the student body did, too," Tubbs said. "The union needs to handle itself like a corporation and find ways to trim costs."
Tubbs said she hopes officials don't immediately start increasing prices and find other ways to cut back instead. Price hikes could drive students away and raise even less money for the union, she said.
