Here is a message to the Student Association: Give Campus Activities Board the funding that it has requested.

We will agree that $117,684, a 25.2-percent increase in funding, is a lot of money to ask for, but some much-needed adjustments by the SA could allow this to happen. So, the question is, where would the funding come from, and why is it so important?

CAB president Mike Brady said the reason behind the request was to help CAB return as a driving force in campus entertainment. He added that if CAB would’ve received at least a six-percent increase in funding during the past five years, this request wouldn’t be needed.

The allocation of funds to CAB is extremely important in that bigger and better concerts and other events should then see a dramatic increase in quality. No more would be the days of CAB struggling to get headlining acts back to the land of corn. Need we remind you that in the past, DeKalb has had such acts as Pearl Jam, The Smashing Pumpkins, The Barenaked Ladies, The Police, The Grateful Dead, just to name a few.

But still, where would the extra funding come from?

The first stop on this train of allotment would be the other SA-funded student groups. The campus definitely has become super-saturated with clubs and organizations to the point that the money pool is being diluted. Better restrictions on new groups, some which are almost identical to others already in existence, would help limit the number of organizations.

The SA then should do a thorough review process of the groups that already exist to make sure the funds given to them are being used for the right things & and parties don’t always constitute as the right things.

Once the total number of groups is lowered, the groups that are left would have more money and resources, along with workers as the groups combine, to provide better avenues of entertainment and education to the community. Fewer groups could mean more volunteers for CAB, meaning it could easily pick up the slack of lost organizations.

SA speaker Kevin Miller said this request, if granted, could drastically increase student fees, cut other organizations’ budgets or both. If student fees need to be raised for CAB to get more funding, then we must be in a fantasy land where the convocation center and Altgeld Hall were done on schedule.

And speaking of schedules, the SA should not let this issue get caught up in red tape. Yes, it is an important decision, but there is no need to argue it to death.

The SA is here to serve student needs, and right now one of the most frequently criticized components of student life is entertainment. CAB can fix that, but only if it gets the funds.