Your Student Paper is in Perilous Danger

Will you FIGHT for The Husky Herald?

UW Bothell has been growing for the past 20 years, striving to expand in size and quality, needing financial support along the way, in pursuit of its full potential.  Similarly, The Husky Herald is growing.  In only our 5^th month of operation, we are still in an infantile stage, and lack of financial support at this juncture would be crippling.  In these past 5 months, our board of directors, along with our excellent team of staff writers and photographers, has provided a sound structure that will lead to flourishing success if allowed to grow and operate without hindrance.

Currently The Husky Herald is receiving some funding from the Student Activities Fees committee (SAF), which ultimately comes from you the students when you pay your tuition each quarter.  A group of students here on campus are in charge of distributing that money to various groups, clubs and offices.  A few more examples of who is funded by SAF are the Career Center, ASUWB, and the Literary Journal.  You can visit www.uwb.edu/studentlife/safc for more detailed information of SAF and its policies and procedures.  Specifics of the preliminary budget that SAF awarded can be found here.

Unfortunately, the preliminary SAF budget for next year leaves The Husky Herald short on staff to create content that is of a diverse nature, accurate in content, and quality in style.  The budget attempts to dramatically alter the make-up of the board, such that vetting, in-depth discussion, and majority consensus of decisions would be all but destroyed.  Lastly, given the weekly hours necessary to execute proper publication operations, the proposed budget for next year would force Herald members to work at less than Washington State minimum wage.

Given the above facts regarding the SAF proposal, it is difficult to envision The Husky Herald producing a publication worthy of such a fine and unique university, with discerning intelligent readers such as yourselves.  We at The Husky Herald refuse to produce a low quality publication.

Losing The Husky Herald does not just mean losing something to read while waiting for class to start; The Husky Herald is much more than that.  The Husky Herald is a space for students to speak their mind, for clubs and departments to promote themselves, for students to learn how our campus is operating and where it is headed.  It is a tool of accountability for all who participate in the representation, development, and management of our university.  It is a means of ensuring that we remain a tight knit campus while staying connected to the larger UW network.  Lastly, The Husky Herald lends legitimacy to UW Bothell, as any top tier university should have a quality student publication.

The Husky Herald needs your support; our survival depends on it.  Please express your support for The Husky Herald and its requested funding amount.  You can do this by:

• Emailing Sam Shupe, Editor-in-Chief at editorinchief@uwb.edu
• Emailing Lauren Burnes, SAF committee Chair at llb8@u.washington.edu
• Attending the open forum meeting with SAF, Friday April 9^th at 9:15am in UW1-103
• Adding your comments to this letter’s posting on The Husky Herald website
• Signing this letter’s corresponding petition

Thank you for your support!

Regards,

The Husky Herald

For Reference: the two below documents are our original request to the SAF committee and our proposed budget, which was submitted January 27 of this year.  Statistics on readership since then have changed.

SAF request 2010-2011 Justification