SG voted to discontinue the RSO van during the assembly meeting last night.
According to SG President Renard Miller, SG has not received any requests for the use of the RSO van since the program’s inception last spring. The van rental was actualized after being in the works for years, and was intended to meet the needs of athletic groups and community service RSOs. This year, SG asked the van’s target audience if they were going to use the van and both groups said no. The University Community Service Center responded that they already maintain a van of their own, which is only used 25 percent of the time with no time conflicts.
SG has been renting the van for the past 13 months. The ending service cost to the van’s company is estimated at $4,000, according to Douglas Everson, vice president for administration of SG. The van’s yearly cost was $12,000.
Everson said that the van would not be offered to UChicago’s more than 300 RSOs, as subcontracting use of the van to another group on campus would be unreasonably expensive, and one van would not be able to meet the needs of such a large number of people.