HUNTER HALTERMAN
Staff Writer
Fredonia’s Student Association (SA) has recently lost their comptroller and hired a new one.
Brian Lyght Jr., a junior music education major and former SA Comptroller, officially announced his resignation from that position on March 29, 2024.
Included in his letter, he wrote about his time with the organization.
“I want to express my gratitude to you and the entire Assembly for the positive and collaborative work environment,” Lyght wrote. “I have truly valued my time at the Student Association and will carry the experiences and skills gained here with me throughout my career.”
His resignation came as a shock to some, such as SA Chief Justice Bethany Anderson, a senior social work major.
“I was surprised when the former comptroller resigned, at the time it felt like everything was moving really fast,” Anderson said. “I respected his wishes, and wish him well in his future endeavors.”
The Student Association comptroller’s responsibilities include, but are not limited to, overseeing financial operations regarding approved club budgets and signing off on various purchase orders, working closely with the General Manager/Accountant of the Student Association and to attend all General Assembly meetings to give a report and financial advice to clubs.
Another responsibility of the comptroller is to appoint members to and head the Budget and Appropriations Committee, and to work with them to prepare the Student Association budget every year at General Assembly (GA) Day — an event that directly preceded Lyght’s resignation.
The committee, which for most of this year consisted of three students in addition to the comptroller, met with student clubs on a couple different occasions to create a preliminary budget with each of them.
This was based on what the club was asking for and discussions between them were about what could be rid of in their budgets.
Following these meetings, the committee must prepare an overall budget for the Association and work with all satisfied and dissatisfied clubs to reach a final consensus.
The committee faced a harder challenge this year compared to prior years as this was the first time that the Student Association budget was not balanced. In other words, the organization was pulling in less money than they were spending.
This is due to the University’s lower enrollment, which results in less student activity fees being paid. These student activity fees are included within every student’s tuition and make up a proportion of the Student Association’s budget.This is used for the budgets of all student clubs.
For the longevity of the Student Association, the Budget and Appropriations Committee decided to take firm action now, which came in the form of more funds being cut from clubs’ preliminary budgets.
This was a decision made by the committee and comptroller that resulted in controversy and anger, leaving 14 of the 23 constituted clubs initially dissatisfied with their proposed budgets.
GA Day ended up taking over nine hours to finish before SA representatives voted on the final budget.
As a result, this day left a bad taste in the mouths of many club leaders and SA representatives. This includes the B&A Committee, who had two of its three members quit.
Rosemarie Rapisarda, the Student Association president and a senior political science major said, “I think everyone in that room was angry. Everyone in that room wanted to leave, and just did not want to be there that long.”
Within the weeks following this meeting, more anger was directed towards Lyght and the committee.
Rapisarda specifically recalled a story about a club member coming up to Lyght in the Cranston Marche while he was eating his lunch.
“They went up to him and were pressuring him, and basically attacking him,” she said. “This could have played into the reason why he resigned — he was just not feeling support from the clubs anymore.”
On top of everything, later that day, a notice was also sent to the Student Association by an unknown student calling for the impeachment of Lyght.
Before the Assembly could meet to vote on and discuss the impeachment, however, Lyght submitted his resignation.
In his final statement addressed to The Leader, Lyght took time to express his gratitude towards his former Budget and Appropriations Committee members Yan Jiang, Jenna Polito and Cameron Showard, Student Association colleagues Vince Gugino, Michelle Corrente and Katie Siragusa, club E-Board members and all student workers in general.
“Please be kind to your student workers (or any worker, or staff member for that matter) because
they shouldn’t have to deal with an attitude or people being rude to them,” Lyght wrote. “They shouldn’t have to deal with angry emails or getting yelled at in public if something goes wrong. They shouldn’t have to lose sleep over their job, lose friends over their jobs or worry about what will happen to them the next day or after a meeting. They shouldn’t have to worry about their integrity or character getting dragged through the mud because of decisions or situations that are out of their hands.”
As a final note, Lyght wrote, “People must remember that we are all human. We make mistakes and have our moments, especially when we are under a lot of pressure and sometimes feel like they have the whole
world watching.”
Following Lyght’s resignation, the Student Association started looking for a new comptroller to take his place.
After interviewing multiple candidates, the organization settled on applicant Ebony Jones.
Jones is a second year accounting major, who transferred to Fredonia from Medgar Evers College in Brooklyn, NY with an associate’s degree in biology.
“I took on the role [of Comptroller] because I thought it really aligned with what I wanted to do in the future,” said Jones.
According to Rapisarda, Jones is looking to “get an internship at the New York State Comptroller’s Office” post-graduation.
“She is so sweet and when I interviewed her, I was like ‘wow, this girl is really passionate,’” Rapisarda said.
This was a huge selling point for Rapisarda, who was conducting the interviews for the position.
“If you are really passionate about the position that you’re in, you’re more likely to do a better job,” she said.
Jones officially took on the role of SA Comptroller on April 15.
Looking forward to next year’s GA Day, Jones hopes to be “more efficient” by working with clubs to be satisfied earlier.
“There were a lot of budget cuts and there was a lot of stuff going on,” said Jones. “Nothing that [Lyght] could control, but now I feel like we’re in … better standing. Although [Lyght] isn’t here, he did leave [behind] a lot of great things. And I’m going to try my best to basically finish what he started.”
The Budget and Appropriations Committee is seeking new members. If you’re interested, or have any questions, reach out to Jones at SA.Comptroller@fredonia.edu.