The debate over a fee for The Northern Star ended Thursday after the Board of Regents approved a refundable fee of 8 cents per credit hour.

The fee will cost students 96 cents per semester.

Despite strong opposition from NIU Student Regent Nick Valadez, and after deliberations of more than 45 minutes, the Regents approved the fee by a vote of 4 to 1.

Regent Clara Fitzpatrick cast the only vote against the fee. She said the information she received about the fee did not give enough reasoning for the implementation of the fee.

Valadez’s attempts to influence the fee decision included motions to postpone the vote, to lower the fee to 6 cents and again to 7 cents and to add an additional Student Association member to the Star publication board. All of Valadez’s motions failed.

Valadez’s main concern was financial management of the Star. “The issue here is creating a student fee in the dark,” Valadez said.

Valadez said there is a discrepancy of about $70,000 in the Star’s projected 1989-90 budget, after unavoidable costs of $46,000 are included in the budget. The 1988-89 Star budget was $488,000, the projected budget for 1989-90 is $666,000. “That’s well over a $100,000 increase,” he said.

The Star’s projeced budget states an increase that would be enough to fund a full-time business manager and an increase in student employee wages, Valadez said.

Tom Montiegel, vice president for Development and University Relations and member of the Star publication board, said the projected 1989-90 budget includes projected revenue from a $1.20 per-semester fee. Without the fee, the budget would be reduced to about $600,000.

Valadez said he “never wanted to have a discussion (on the budget) at this level.” However, he said the Star’s $500,000 budget is on one piece of paper and needed explanation and discussion of certain line items.

Regent Milton McClure, who proposed the refundable fee Thursday, said the 8 cents would adequately cover the expenses of a business manager and a student wage increase.

At the Regents’ meeting in March, the Regents rejected a 10-cent per-credit-hour, non-refundable fee for the Star.

Chancellor Roderick Groves said, “An 8-cent fee is a little bit on the low side. It’s certainly not unreasonable.”

He said students should pay for the service they receive from the Star.

McClure said the newspaper serves a valuable service on the NIU campus. “It deserves support,” he said.

Regent Harry Wellbanks supported the fee. “More was spent yesterday on tea bags than anyone will spend on this increase,” he said in reference to the distribution of tea bags at Wednesday’s Day of Action III.

Dan Wagner, Illinois State University student regent, and Brian Hopkins, Sangamon State University student regent also opposed the fee.

The SA held an initiative on the SA executive election ballots asking if students would be willing to pay a 50-cent refundable fee. The initiative failed 51 percent to 49 percent, a difference of 18 votes.

NIU President John LaTourette said there is at least a 3 percent margin of error in the SA vote. “These are not overwhelming mandates one way or the other.

“Basically we have a 50-50 situation here,” he said.

“The telling piece of information, however, I think, is that 77 percent of the students in the survey indicated that they read The Northern Star three or four times a week,” LaTourette said. The survey was conducted by the NIU Public Opinion Lab.