05/10/2019
SBA's Official Statement Regarding University's Decision on SBI
You may have seen news articles and Facebook posts about the UB Administration (“UB”) forcing all the seven student governments to use the Faculty Student Association (“FSA”) for fiscal (or accounting) services instead of the current fiscal service agent Sub Board, Inc. (“SBI”). We implore you to read this email in its entirety as UB’s decision will affect the operations of the SBA, and in turn affect the student body.
On February 4, Kevin Southern received an email from the Director of Business Compliance and Internal Controls, Carrie Woodrow. She serves as the Chair of the Administrative Review Committee (“Review Committee”). A portion of the email states the following:
“The University has launch[ed] an administrative review of the services provided by Sub Board Inc. (SBI). The objective of our review is to assess SBI’s effectiveness in achieving its mission. To gain an understanding of the relationship between the student governments and SBI we are requesting to meet with leadership from each government (7 separate meetings). This meeting will be an informal conversation where we would like to hear from you regarding your experiences with SBI. You are welcome to include any members of your government leadership but we ask that you do not include representatives from the fiscal agency.”
Kevin attended the meeting with Ms. Woodrow on Thursday, March 7 at 1pm. He shared his, and SBA’s, experiences using SBI’s fiscal services and other services that SBI provides to all university students. We believed this meeting was about making improvements to SBI’s current operation, but that was not the case. Aside from being our fiscal service provider, SBI provides students other services, such as:
WRUB (radio station)
SBI Gaming (vídeo game tournaments)
Dry cleaning
Safety Shuttle
Off Campus housing website
SBI Legal
On May 1, Kevin, Abisha Vijayashanthar, and all of the current and incoming Presidents of the other six student governments received an email to attend a meeting at 10:00am on Monday, May 5 with Ms. Woodrow, the Vice-President for Finance and Administration Laura Hubbard, the Vice-President of Student Affairs Scott Weber, and SUNY Counsel Bob Ruggeri. The email states that the Review Committee would share “the outcome of the administrative review of Sub-Board.” They did not consult with the student government leaders to find a time that will fit our schedules. Instead of providing recommendations on how to better serve the students, they decided that SBI will no longer be our fiscal service provider and that we were required to contract with FSA as our service provider as of July 1, 2019. They made the decision arbitrarily and unilaterally. Half of the members of the Review Committee are FSA board members therefore; an unbiased/impartial solution could not have been reached. In addition, FSA is the same organization rife with scandal, corruption, embezzlement, and a lack of transparency. With the way they have been handling this situation recently, it is safe to say that these issues will continue.
In addition, we learned that UB seeks to end all of the services listed above. We would like to focus on one specific service that resonates with the mission of our profession. SBI Legal. SBI Legal serves an important purpose to university students. They provide free legal consultation to any student for myriad of issues including immigration, landlord/tenant, UB Disciplinary issues, DUIs, contract review, etc.
UB wants to end this vital resource, but they say they have a plan. Students who have immigration-based issues can receive consultation from someone in the International Student Support Services (“ISSS”). Please note the word “someone” instead of the word attorney. Furthermore, UB wants students to use local legal aid services if they need an attorney for landlord/tenant issues. Legal aid based services do not have the resources to accommodate the citizens of Buffalo, let alone 10% of the university students. In addition, students may not qualify for services from these offices. Students do have a guaranteed office to receive legal assistance: SBI Legal.
UB believes this service is a liability to the university because if a student sues SBI Legal for dissatisfaction of services received, then the university will be pulled into the lawsuit as a named party. This is a bogus claim. During the meeting on May 5, we asked the Review Committee if they can point to any case where any university was dragged into a lawsuit because a student sued its fiscal agent. They danced around the question for 15 minutes. Eventually, SUNY Counsel said that he would not provide any case citations or case names. He was unable to do so because there are no cases where this scenario occurred.
We learned in law school how people without access to legal services are negatively affected. For those of you who took Criminal Procedure, you have read cases where suspects rights are violated because they did not have the counsel of an attorney. We as leaders believe it is important to fight for the rights of you and the rest of the student body. We were not given notice or an opportunity to be heard before UB made this “recommendation.”
We are asking you all to attend a special Informational Meeting on Saturday, May 11 at 2pm in Room 106. We will give you a full overview of what happened in that May 5 meeting; allow you time to ask questions, and discuss a plan of action as a unified student body.
We understand that you are all in the midst of finals, but this is exactly why UB chose this time to spring this on us. They chose the most inconvenient time for students hoping it would silence us. Please do not allow them to do this!
If you have any questions, comments or concerns, please attend the meeting, or contact Kevin Southern or Abisha Vijayashanthar.
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SBA 2018-19
Kevin Southern
Abisha Vijayashanthar
Tazbir Alam
Breanna Reilly
Peter Farruggia
SBA 2019-2020
Abisha Vijayashanthar
Rina Hernandez
Eliza Frank
Aldiama Anthony
Savannah Figueroa
