Two Student Union senators accused the Union of a lack of transparency on Brandeis University class Facebook groups and in an email to the class of 2022 on Tuesday, Nov. 6. In a Facebook post, first-year Senator Alex Chang ’22 proposed amending the Union’s constitution requiring $50,000 of funding, after claiming that the union only had $80 left in its budget.

The Union currently has a benchmark funding goal of $50,000. According to Allocations Board Chair Aseem Kumar ’20, a “benchmark” is denoted as a target amount of money that would be allocated, but it was not a guaranteed amount of money. This fiscal year, the union as a whole was allocated $38,000 with the senate branch receiving $20,000. Kumar explained that the senate had only spent about $1,000 of their budget since the beginning of the school year, but has directed funds at other projects, leaving little money for extra projects.

The Union plans to release a statement regarding the situation, according to an email to The Brandeis Hoot from Vice President Benedikt Reynolds ’19.

Chang, who was working on a project to provide electric pianos in the first-year common spaces, posted on Facebook about the senate’s funds. “Ten minutes before the [senate] meeting, the Vice President (Benedikt Reynolds) accosted me and informed me that only $80 remained in the Senate’s budget (out of an original $20,000),” he wrote. “I was dumbstruck, not only at the minuscule amount, but at the fact that he delayed telling the senate about our dwindling funds for several weeks.”

Kumar explained that the senate has $19,000 left in their budget but that it plans to spend that money on specific needs. “The way the money is budgeted they don’t have leftover [money] for things such as pianos.”

In an interview with The Hoot, Chang said he would “fully stand by the accuracy of the information presented in my senate reports.”

In a separate email to the Class of 2022, Senator Linfei Yang ’19 said that the reason for the lack of dedicated funds to the piano project was because of conflict between two branches of the Union, the executive board and the Allocations Board.

“The Executive Board has been in a heated conflict with the Allocations Board since the start of the semester,” he wrote. “The ‘benchmark’ for the Senate budget as stipulated in the Student Union Constitution is 50,000 dollars, but the Allocations Board decided to only allocate us 20,000.”

Yang continued, “Recently, it is understood that the President issued a Presidential Veto to this decision, but the Allocations Board unanimously voted to overturn her veto. Regardless, this has effectively left us with a severely limited budget and greatly hindered our progress. Although the worst part is, throughout this whole process, the branch to which this funding directly pertains to—the Senate— has never been once been informed of this situation, with not a single reason given.”

The Hoot confirmed that the president of the Union, Hannah Brown ’19, vetoed the Allocations Board’s decision to not give the union an additional $12,000, but this decision was unanimously overturned by the Allocations Board.

Kumar described the decision process in funding the Union, saying that they were allocated $38,000, which can be split among the branches of the Union. Since the Union is a secured club, they receive the money as a general grant and are able to move money around if necessary to the different branches. The decision to allocate the union that sum was based on how much they spent the last fiscal year: $30,000. The extra $8,000 was given as a cushion if there were any extra unforeseen expenses.

Kumar explained that the Union did ask for an additional $12,000 to reach their $50,000 benchmark but said, “We didn’t think that substantial reasoning was provided for as to why they needed that 12,000 [dollar] increase.” He clarified that if the Union needed money for a specific event, they would be willing to allocate it.

Another member of the Allocations Board, Alan Huang ’21, explained that the reason for the $12,000 being denied was that the Union did not request it to pay for specific items or costs they may encounter but rather just asked for more money for different events they plan on hosting.

The email by Yang and the Facebook post by Chang come after the plans to install two electric pianos in the first-year common spaces had been continuously postponed by the union during their weekly senate meetings.

When asked about what the next steps would be for the two in an interview with The Hoot, Chang said, “Specifically we would like an apology from Benedikt Reynolds, the Vice President of the Student Union; we would like for him to apologize for his behavior and give him an opportunity to explain it to the Student Union and to the student body.”

Chang discussed possible next steps that part of the first-year class has been taking, saying, “They are in the process of drafting a petition actually to hold a recall vote for Benedikt.” He continued, “I told them that they should hold off on that. We want to give Benedikt the opportunity to apologize for his actions before the student body and if we don’t get that from him, then I personally can’t make any promises about this group of students which has come up to me as a response to the senate report, and who have expressed great distress over the situation.”

Chang and Yang described the series of events that lead to the Facebook posts and email in an interview with The Hoot.

Chang initially proposed putting one piano in each of the lounges of first-year quads, Polaris Lounge in North Quad and Shapiro Lounge in Massell Quad on Oct. 12, according to a Brandeis Hoot senate log.

Following discussions with Dr. Tim Touchette, the Assistant Dean of Student Affairs, Chang received approval to install two electric pianos in the lounges. In an email sent to members of the Class of 2022 and the MyDeis2022 Facebook group, Chang wrote, “He gave us his wholehearted support and provided us with written approval to install two electric pianos in the first-year lounges.”

But at a recent senate meeting, Yang described feeling that Reynolds was trying to intimidate the two from discussing their project and informed them that the senate didn’t have the funds for the installation of the pianos, which was proposed as a senate money resolution (SMR).

Both spoke about Reynolds, saying that he at times misinformed them and was untransparent on the student budget. Chang said he repeatedly asked Reynolds about the budget, saying, “Every single time he [Reynolds] responded saying he had no updates for us.”

Several SMRs were passed as the piano project was delayed, Yang said. These resolutions included funding for the Turkey shuttles, which deliver students to and from the airport to ease travel near the Thanksgiving break.

Both Chang and Yang met with Student Union President Hannah Brown ’19 and Chief of Staff Emma Russell ’19 Thursday morning but were dissatisfied with how the meeting went. Chang said that Brown and Russell accused them of “character assassination” of Reynolds. Yang felt that the two were insensitive and invalidated their feelings that Reynolds was intimidating them.

Chang and Yang explained that it wasn’t the piano project that upset them and that the point of the letter was to be transparent and “to relay to the student body what we have been hearing and what we have been seeing in the senate for the last few months,” Chang said. He continued, “The piano project is just an unfortunate casualty of this greater issue.”

Yang emphasized that they wanted to resolve the situation so that their piano proposal is no longer a “victim” of tensions between the Allocations Board and the executive board.