MSU student government freezes newspaper's funds

By Erin Brodbeck
Collegian Editor
February 6, 2008

Following a months-long conflict between Montclair State University’s Student Government Association and student newspaper, The Mont-clarion, the SGA informed the newspaper in a letter Jan. 22 that their funds had been temporarily frozen, halting production of the weekly paper’s print version.

The dispute between the student organizations has brought much negative press to Montclair State. At many universities, including La Salle, such takeovers are not possible because the SGA is not the sole regulator of funding.

After a Jan. 31 SGA meeting, The Montclarion’s funding was unfrozen for the next month, but the issue remains unresolved.

“It’s almost a joke,” The Montclarion’s news editor, Shayna Jacobs, said. “They are so stubborn, and this whole thing is personal. The SGA just really personally doesn’t like us.”

The ordeal began in November, after the Montclair, N.J. student newspaper’s staff hired a lawyer to help them gain access to the SGA’s private meetings. Holding student government meetings behind closed doors violates the New Jersey open meetings law. 

Montclair SGA President Ron Chicken had the lawyer fired after The Montclarion’s editor-in-chief, Karl de Vries, refused to turn over any correspondence between The Montclarion and the lawyer, citing attorney-client privacy rights. Chicken then had an SGA bookkeeper call the paper’s printer, telling them to cease printing copies until further notice. The Montclarion received a letter from the SGA Jan. 22, notifying them that their Jan. 24 issue, the first of the semester, would not be published.

The Montclarion continued to publish an online version of the paper on their College Publisher site. 

“While hubris on the part of the student government is evidently a very powerful force, eventually they’ll have to back down,” de Vries said. “Unless the thought of spending thousands of dollars in student fees to fight a First Amendment charge in court appeals to them.”

News of the conflict between Montclair’s SGA and student newspaper spread, with coverage from the AP, The New York Times and other New Jersey papers. The Montclarion even received a letter of support from the Society of Professional Journalists, and encouragement from the New Jersey Press Association and the American Civil Liberties Union.

“Members of the Society are always concerned when student journalists’ press rights are threatened,” Neil Ralston, an SPJ member and assistant professor at Western Kentucky University, said. “Not only because the student journalists are at risk of losing an important right but because their audiences may become victims of censorship, too.”

Because Montclair’s SGA has total control over what organizations receive funding, they had the authority to shut The Montclarion down. At La Salle, funding is controlled by a body of voters selected by the SGA, instead of being ruled by the SGA only. This funding board, with members from all of the Point organizations such as the Masque, the Fellowship of Community and University Services and Interfraternity-Sorority Council, has a say in what organizations are awarded funding. 

“What has happened between The Montclarion and Montclair State’s SGA is a sad affair,” La Salle’s SGA President, senior organizational management major Jonathan Webster, said. “This type of circumstance could not happen here at La Salle, because SGA does not have any direct control over the funds distributed to organizations.”

Webster also stressed that all students, including members of the student press, are always welcome at Tuesday night SGA meetings.

“We encourage anybody who is interested to attend,” Webster said. “It is never a bad thing to have more opinions and viewpoints present.”

Since the issue at Montclair began with a dispute over the freedom of the press, Chicken eliminated the problem by shutting down the paper. In his only interview (he declined to comment to The New York Times and various other daily newspapers), he told The Signal, The College of New Jersey’s student newspaper, that the SGA’s decision to freeze The Montclarion’s funds had nothing to do with censorship. Rather, The Montclarion was being punished for breaking SGA policy by hiring its own lawyer instead of using the one employed by SGA. De Vries responded to this accusation by claiming that using the SGA’s attorney would be a conflict of interest.

Because The Montclarion depends on the SGA for about $33,000 annually in funding, they cannot exist without their support. 

Currently, The Montclarion takes in around $60,000 in ad revenue, but editors say these earnings alone are not enough for the costs of printing, supplies and other expenses. 

Within the next 30 days, The Monclarion staff members will sit down with the Montclair SGA and some school administrators and lawyers in an attempt to mediate the issue. For the most part, however, Montclair administrators have stayed out of the conflict and let the students settle the matter themselves.

“I refuse to believe that they’re enjoying the fact that the name Montclair State University is being splashed across the AP and New York Times in conjunction with this mess,” de Vries said. “God only knows how many would-be journalism/English students are now reconsidering the thought of applying to MSU now.”

La Salle’s own Dean of Students, Dr. Joseph J. Cicala, declined to comment on the situation at Montclair.

According to Jacobs, the issue will not be resolved until Chicken admits that he made the wrong decision.

“Everyone [on SGA] follows Chicken,” Jacobs said. “Until he says he was wrong, I don’t think anything will happen. They don’t conduct themselves like a government, they act like a debate team.”

Although The Montclarion might run out of funding, according to de Vries, there has been significant support from outside organizations.

“Our office has become inundated with offers of pro bono legal counsel,” he said. “We’ve received dozens of e-mails and Web site comments pledging moral support/encouragement and I’ve even heard several offers of people inquiring as to how much it costs to publish one issue of The Montclarion (approximately $2,000) so they can write the check—all the while knowing that there are no guarantees of reimbursement.”

brodbecke1@lasalle.edu