When FUSA announced that its programming board had booked college-cliché band O.A.R. for their next concert, it was met with a variety of reactions not dissimilar to acts of years past, ranging from unbridled enthusiasm all the way down to finger-pointing disapproval. This is the harsh reality that will never change.
Our student government has a tough role to fulfill as that of amateur showman, one that requires them to get neck deep in a dirty business of dishonest and unreliable characters. With this in mind, we commend the student association for managing to get a band that commands a broad following among the Fairfield crowd. We cast shame on them, however, for deciding that this would be the only act of the year and for making that decision behind an iron curtain of closed-door meetings.
The concept of having two acts per year is a sound one for many reasons, not the least of which being that the event organizers will virtually double their odds of fulfilling their one and only goal – to please the average, activity-fee-paying Fairfield student. With just one concert for the 2006-2007 school year, they have forfeited that advantage. It’s impossible to ascertain the percentage of students in favor of this act since we were given no alternative.
It is with this in mind that we call on FUSA to be more transparent in their dealing and decision-making associated with major concerts. Their money is not on the line – it belongs to the students. Therefore, it follows that as many students as possible need to be involved every step of the way.
Essentially, the fate of more than $20,000 worth of student money was decided by four decision makers – Cristina Pires ’08, Kara Ackerman ’08, Mike Mancini ’07 and John Velotta ’07.
One suspects they keep their talks so insular to avoid the bad publicity of missed bids and broken contracts. We’ll concede that these occurrences are outside the realm of FUSA’s control. Sometimes, though, FUSA probably drops the ball.
Are we having one concert because so many students love O.A.R., and that the aging three-hit wonders are more valuable than Dashboard Confessional and Guster, Dane Cook and the Roots, or Dave Chapelle and Third Eye Blind combined? Or is it because they weren’t able to book an act in time for fall and billed one quasi-popular band in January to save face?
No one will ever know which answer is true, other than, of course, Pires, Ackerman, Mancini, and Velotta.
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