The Beach Legacy Referendum, a proposal by Cal State Long Beach’s Athletic Department to increase student fees by $95 per semester starting fall 2010, did not pass in the two-day online student vote.
Approximately 18 percent of the student body voted overall.
Of those students, more than 3,898 — approximately 60 percent — voted against the fee.
This is not the end for the potential fee. CSULB President F. King Alexander has the option to circumvent the vote outcome by taking the proposal directly to CSU Chancellor Charles Reed, and through CSU Executive Order 1034, all or part of the fee can be imposed. Alexander has yet to address this option.
Christina Esparza, Associated Students Inc. communications coordinator, said the fee increase would have kept ASI from cutting 8 percent of its budget.
“If the BLR passed … [ASI] budget cuts would not be necessary. The money that student organizations receive from ASI will be affected greatly,” Esparza said.
Vic Cegles, the director of the athletics department, said he wanted to acknowledge those who helped with the BLR campaign.
“First, I’m really proud of the effort from the coaches, student-athletes and staff, they were awesome,” he said before Long Beach State’s semifinal game at the Big West Tournament in Anaheim.
“It is unfortunate that a majority of the students who voted were opposed to something that would have benefited our campus as a whole,” Cegles said. “Recreation sports, Greeks, club sports, kinesiology students and other clubs and organizations on campus would have benefited greatly from the BLR if it had passed.”
Wayne Stickney, the development coordinator for the athletics department, said the result of the vote reveals students’ mindsets.
“It shows a lot of people are focused on the here-and-now instead of the future,” he said. Stickney also said that those students who voted “no” most likely saw the $95 fee increase and immediately decided to vote against it.
“It’s sad because we gambled and we lost,” he said.
Stickney said he is hopeful that more students will get involved with athletics after campaigning for the BLR.
“We met with a ton of students and have a finger on the pulse of many,” Stickney said.
Stickney was not present at the announcement of the results. “We already knew,” he said, because “someone called someone.”
Cegles said the athletic teams will have to put in more effort to fundraise and maximize their revenue.
If passed, the BLR would have added a women’s rowing team to satisfy Title IX.
“We’re going to have to find a way to get more women to participate and I’m not sure what that all means,” he said. “There’s no intent on our part to drop any sports and we just hope we can build on what we have and get better.”
Paul Nguyen, a junior engineering major and president of the Associated Engineering Student Body (AESB), said he was not surprised at the outcome of the vote.
“I figured that people who were uninformed but chose to vote upon receiving the e-mail would vote it down based on the amount of the fee increase alone, and that those informed would vote according to their best judgment — some for, and some against,” Nguyen said.
Before the fee went to a vote, the AESB posted a statement on their website indicating that the majority of its representatives opposed the BLR.
Nguyen said the results show a clear outcome and noted that “the voter participation was remarkably high, at 18 percent of the student body, whereas general elections typically draw about 10 percent of the campus.”
Voting was conducted online through a web-based platform, BigPulse — the same platform used in last spring’s ASI elections. Students received e-mails from Robinson with links to the voting site.
Kati Pessner and Tracy McDannald contributed to this article.
I’m happy to know that it didn’t pass. True, we need to look the future. But raising fees won’t help anything. The root of the problem is state cuts in education funding, which can be traced back to out-of-control government spending by irresponsible politicians.
A univeristy is not a democracy. It is an organization with a Presient who has executive priviledge to protect short-sighted students from themselves. S.I. Hawakawa did this very thing at S.F. State. I thought the student’s had embraced their univeristy and the old order was gone. Twenty years for now , those that voted No, will be saying they were wrong, but it will be 19 years too late. You can’t cut State funds, have disinterested alumni and students, and have a great univeristy. We have given generosuly for may years, but I think that will change and President Alexander will have no choice but to raise fees for the best most cost-effective education int the State. Good luck in your future careers, if you can find one in this economy.
Long Beach State Athletics
1949-2009
R.I.P.
so if I understand this correctly, even though the BLR was voted down we could still be required to pay if Alexander decides it? How is this right, or fair? I think if Alexander wants us to pay more, maybe he should be more involved in campus life….I, for one, still have no idea what the guy looks like!