Funding for NIU radio station WKDI was finally approved Sunday at the Student Association Senate meeting after prolonged negotiations caused by “a classic case of miscommunication” between the SA and WKDI.

The negotiations began in July when the SA approved a supplemental funding request for WKDI in order for radio station to apply for Federal Communications Commission frequency approval.

Although there was no fee to apply for use of the frequency, WKDI hired a engineer from Evans and Associaties costing $1500 to help prepare the technical information for the application.

WKDI requested the supplemental funding in order to hire a firm that would handle the application process when WKDI was petitioning FCC to recieve the 94.9 frequency.

Due to miscommunication between WKDI and the SA, WKDI did not receive the funding. The radio station received a $500 loan from WNIU as a deposit for the engineer who did the application work.

Currently, WKDI needs to repay the $500 loan from WNIU and the remaining $1000 to the Evans and Associate which is nearly one month past due, WKDI General Manager Helen Frank said.

At Sunday’s meeting, SA Vice President Cam Davis said WKDI also has not been approved for recognition because the organization’s constitution is lacks the organization’s recent amendments.

Frank said she had not heard until Sunday’s meeting that WKDI was not recognized. An SA recognition bylaw states organizations must be recognized in order to receive funding.

SA Treasurer Todd Lipscomb said he recommended senators to waive the recognition bylaw in order for WKDI to repay the WNIU loan and the pay the past due bill to the engineer.

Lipscomb said unless WKDI received its supplemental money to repay the loan from WNIU and remainder of the bill, workers may halt work on WNIU and NIU’s credit rating could be negatively affected.

Sen. Paula Graunke made the motion to temporarily recognize WKDI and approve the supplemental fund. However, Sen. Tom Zur said the senate was “setting very bad press by funding an organization that hasn’t been recognized yet.”

Frank said the funding problem was the result of “a classic case of miscommunication. WNIU will now get its money and the school won’t look bad for not paying bills.”

Lipscomb said although he approved of the senate waiving the bylaws in this instance but asked senators “not to waive bylaws in the future unless under any extenuating circumstances.”

Miscommunication concerning the SA recognition requirements was also the cause for problems in funding approval for the NIU literary magazine “Towers”.

Although the organization submitted its recognition packet to the SA, Davis said the constitution was incomplete. “I am not going to bring up an organization for recognition when it is still working on turning things in,” Davis said.

Dan (representatives) from “Towers” said the magazine is in urgent need of the money in order to put out last year’s issue of the magazine and to be able to release this year’s issue on time—Jan. 20.