USAC endowment avoids loss with UCLA Foundation refund
By Kendal Mitchell
Jan. 24, 2014 12:58 a.m.
The undergraduate student government will receive about $6,500 from the UCLA Foundation, after a miscommunication about administrative costs involved with an endowment for student programing.
Last school year, the Undergraduate Students Association Council established a $100,000 endowment with the UCLA Foundation, a business entity that manages investments for the university. The funds came from USAC’s surplus from the 2011-2012 academic year.
Former USAC President David Bocarsly said he hoped the endowment would stabilize the council’s funds for years to come and would help fund student programming and council member initiatives for future councils with low surpluses.
When setting up the endowment, Bocarsly said UCLA Foundation officials agreed to waive $6,500 in administrative fees needed to establish the endowment.
Bocarsly told the Daily Bruin last year that the UCLA Foundation would run the endowment at no cost and ensure a 5 percent return each year, or about $5,000. At the time, there was no written agreement requiring the UCLA Foundation to waive the fee.
Before this school year started, UCLA Foundation officials charged the council the administrative fee that they originally told Bocarsly they would waive.
Without the refund, the endowment would have seen loses in its first year. USAC members would have to potentially look for other financial avenues to make up for the losses, including the USAC Discretionary Fund and unused councilmember’s budget.
But Thursday, the UCLA Foundation said they would uphold the verbal agreement made last year to council and return the $6,500 they charged earlier this school year.
Jacquelean Gilliam, the director of scholarship and fellowship for UCLA Development, said the UCLA Foundation always planned to waive the administrative fees, but needed to acquire the necessary approval.
“We are truly committed to students and value the connection with USAC,” Gilliam said.
USAC Finance Committee chair Cynthia Jasso said she does not entirely blame the UCLA Foundation for the miscommunication.
“We are the investors and we should have made sure we dotted our i’s and crossed our t’s,” Jasso said.
USAC members said they will have more information about the returns on the endowment when its first yearly payoff comes in March.
