The Students’ Association’s proposal would have funded various projects.

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The increase of the General Activity Fee has been put on hold in light of the anticipated tuition increase for the 2011-2012 academic year.

“Due to the timing of the situation, we will see the smallest GAF increase in a long time,” former Students’ Association President Brett Monson said.

Due to the timing of situation, we will see the smallest GAF increase in a long time,” former Students’ Association President Brett Monson said.

Due to state budget cuts, Jack Warner, the executive director of the Board of Regents, recommended that the BOR not pass an increase to the fee, aside from the 1 percent to compensate for inflation.

“For us it is a question of timing,” Warner said. “We want to keep the overall tuition and fee increases as low as possible during a very difficult year.”

“We are aware that tuition will be higher next year for students around the state,” Monte Kramer, the BOR’s system vice president for administration, said. “Overall, we have concerns of keeping costs low for students.”

The SA originally proposed a fee increase of $3.38 per credit hour. The organization acknowledged that it may not have been the right time for the issue to be brought before the BOR.

“It’s all about timing,” Monson said. “We are already proposing a lot of things [as a university] and right now, after the budget decrease, it would not be the best time to deal with the fee increase.”

The original proposal had five different projects which all came about through student input. Around 600 electronic surveys, along with 375 paper surveys, were sent out in order to gauge what issues were most important to students.

The largest parts of the proposal would have provided funds for the expansion of the Wellness Center and PAC. In addition, the proposed increase of the GAF would have created more student organization space and would have made SDSU more energy efficient.

“We were planning to create more space so that we could move Multicultural Affairs upstairs so that it could be incorporated into the university,” Monson said. “We also were looking at saving money for SDSU by making it more energy efficient. One of the projects included putting sensors in rooms so that the lights would turn off when nobody was in the room.”

Despite the fact that many of the projects are going to be shelved for the time being, SA still plans to push through with a project that would bring another nurse practitioner to campus.

“Around 7.8 unscheduled student visits per day are turned away because we don’t have enough practitioners to see them. “I think that the issue has a lot of light in the future year and we are trying to get the proposal pushed through by other means.”

On March 28, SA will state that it supports a proposal to take $30,000 out of the university’s reserves to help cover the initial cost.

Despite the fact that the increase will not occur in time for the fall semester, Monson said that he is proud to be a part of the proposal.

“This project has really been a team effort,” Monson said. “I have never seen an effort that has pulled together so many groups, and I don’t think that there is a better project to do so. I’ve always thought of it as the balanced deal where everyone gets a piece of the pie.”

Monson added that SA will return to the issue in October.

“All of these are really good projects,” he said. “At the end of the day, all of them will get done. It’s just a matter of timing.”

The general activity fee at SDSU currently is set at $24.80 per credit hour. Even with the proposed increase, USD’s fee, which is set at over $35, would remain higher.

The BOR will make a formal decision on March 31.