The Board believes Bruin Bash, an annual concert hosted by the UCLA Cultural Affairs Commission and Campus Events Commission, is a selling point for the university, not essential to student life. Bruins, already squeezed by tuition and cost-of-living increases, should not be expected to pay to entertain the fraction of students that secure tickets.

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UCLA students pay a $1.87 quarterly fee for Bruin Bash, amounting to an annual budget of $126,811 for the event. According to the referendum’s proposal language, this money only covers roughly 40% of the total cost of the event, insufficient to cover even artist honorariums.

Bruins experiencing financial constraints should not be expected to pay over a hundred thousand dollars to artists that they won’t see perform. Rather, only those students who secure tickets to the event should pay.

Bruin Bash annually attracts around 7,000 to 8,000 attendees, which only makes up roughly 20% of the undergraduate student body.

In a 2023 Daily Bruin article Alicia Verdugo, then-Cultural Affairs commissioner, said post-pandemic rising labor costs contributed to the need for more funding for Bruin Bash. Those who organize the event, though, should be paid by those that actually benefit from their labor – not by students who can’t attend.

[Related: USAC partially approves requests for funding for Bruin Bash]

In the same 2023 story, then-Campus Events commissioner Giovanna Boffa said CEC and CAC’s partnership with marketing firm Learfield made it difficult to secure sponsorships for Bruin Bash that year due to a lack of contract transparency.

Whatever complications CEC and CAC experience in their event planning should not be the burden of students – the majority of whom will not secure tickets to the concert.