The recent decision by the Tufts Community Union (TCU) Senate to fund construction of a new Trips Cabin in New Hampshire has caused a good deal of controversy around campus. Some members of the Tufts community support the project; many oppose it.
Me? I'm mad as hell.
I think the Trips Cabin is the absolute wrong way to spend $230,000. I understand the appeal that an additional site has. I understand how popular the Loj is, and I realize that popularity can cause it to become overcrowded. Naturally, building additional living space at the Loj site has a great deal of appeal for those who use the Loj.
The problem is that not everybody uses the Loj. The TCU Senate and various other groups may hold their retreats up at the Loj, and students not affiliated with Tufts Mountain Club (TMC) may hitch rides up to the site for the weekend, but that still leaves a good deal of the student body who don't go up to the Loj and maybe never will. I understand that in theory the new Trips Cabin will benefit all of Tufts, because ideally everybody would be afforded the chance to take the trip and enjoy their own space away from the crowds of the Loj. But in all honesty, how realistic is that assumption? Not everybody on campus has a car, which makes getting to the New Hampshire site difficult. Freshmen (and next year sophomores), who aren't allowed to have cars, would have to find rides up to the cabin. How is that accessibility for all? A shuttle from Tufts to the property has been proposed, but that would just cost even more money in addition to the almost-quarter-million dollars we've already spent.
And when people finally manage to get up to New Hampshire, they'll arrive at a TMC-maintained facility. The Tufts community isn't going to leave its mark on the Trips Cabin — TMC will. TMC maintains the Loj, and thus, for all intents and purposes, the Tufts Mountain Club runs the Loj. Make no mistake, TMC will run the Trips Cabin. TMC doesn't get TCU funding, but that in no way gives the Senate the right to appropriate $230,000 for the use of essentially one club. The funds could be spread around to dozens of clubs and organizations right here in Medford.
That money could be better spent on campus. Two hundred thirty thousand dollars would go a long way toward a wide range of improvements to the Tufts community. Buy Pizza Days for the whole school — as long as it benefits the entire Tufts student body. We were promised that the recovered funds would be spent on us, the students. We were constantly told that it was our money and we were encouraged to give our opinions on how best to spend it. And when no consensus was reached, we were told the money would be saved, not spent on a project that benefits a fraction of Tufts. Saving seems like a much more prudent course to take when considering the dire economic straits the world is in and the amount of money Tufts has lost recently.
The TCU Senate promised us transparency when it came to the recovered funds. Time and time again, the Senate pledged to us that they would try to keep the student body as involved as possible in the process of spending this money: our money, our decision. Senators swore that they would keep the process open to us. And what happened? They approved a project that had already been shelved by the Senate, a project that the administration would have lent money to. The Loj was built with money loaned from the school; why couldn't the Trips Cabin be built in a similar manner? The Senate should have waited to see how things would have shaped up regarding the cabin in the future.
At the very least, the vote should have been postponed until after the elections. Senators should have gone around campus asking people how they would feel about the construction of the cabin. If the majority of the student body had responded positively to the project, and the money had been appropriated just the same, fine. But at least get actual feedback from the students. See what they have to say, don't spout this nonsense about transparency and feedback and then spend a quarter-million dollars the Sunday before the election. If the new Senate wants to prove that it's serious about taking student feedback and spending in the best interest of the entire student body, it should call a session as soon as possible, revoke the funding and get serious about using our recovered funds responsibly.
The Trips Cabin is a major victory for the TMC. Congratulations to them. To the rest of Tufts, we've been cheated — cheated out of money we were promised was ours, cheated out of a quarter-million dollars because some senators wanted to make an impact and leave a physical legacy ‘at' Tufts.
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Matt Wittman is a freshman who has not yet declared a major.
