Campus

Athletics referendum passes

|  Nine Nguyen/The Daily Cougar

| Nine Nguyen/The Daily Cougar

The student body has given their approval of the athletics referendum. The official results of the referendum were announced at noon today in the UC World Affairs Lounge. According to Executive Director of Learning and Assessment Services Patrick Daniel, the referendum was passed by a 4,745 vote margin.

“Of the 9,923 ballots casted, there were 7,334 in favor of the referendum,” Daniel said. “That means the referendum passes.”

UH students will start paying an additional $45 in student fees per semester to fund the construction, renovation and operation of athletic facilities if the increase is approved by the UH Board of Regents at their special meeting on March 27. If approved, the fee increase would take effect this fall.

Through the efforts of SGA, the athletics program and the Department of Student Affairs, 26.1 percent of the student body was mobilized to vote in the referendum.

According to Vice President for Student Affairs Richard Walker, this is the highest turnout ever for a UH student referendum. The previous highest turnout was in 1998 when 15 percent of UH students voted in the referendum for the Campus Recreation and Wellness Center.

“What a great day for athletics, and really I believe a great day for this university,” said Athletics Director Mack Rhoades.

“This is a game changer. Fifteen years from now, 20 years from now we are going to look back at this day and say that was a significant moment in the turning point of our intercollegiate athletics program. Bottom line, we want to be the best. We want to make sure that we have an athletics program that every one of our students can be proud of. That we can have national visibility, that we can win championships, compete nationally, but do it the right way. So what a great day, and certainly you did not get here without a great team effort. I just can’t quit smiling.”

SGA Senator Jared Gogets credits the team work between the athletics department, the Department of Student Affairs and UH students for the success of the referendum.

“Before I say anything, anyone in SPB that wants to go back to the office, you can turn off the Adele and put my ice cream away because it passed and I don’t have to go in there and be depressed for the rest of the day,” said Gogets, who is president of Student Program Board.

Gogets said the passage of the referendum was an prime example of how the students, faculty and staff of UH can come together as one in order to move the University forward.

“Thank you to the thousands of students that went out and set the record for voting. Try to tell somebody that you guys don’t care about UH now because you went out there and you showed that you care about moving us forward, you care about Tier One and you care about the athletics program.”

 

 

12 Comments

  • Did we have any independent 3rd party organization making sure no foul play was involved? Because almost everyone I've talked too voted against it. Sure, that's not an accurate way of predicting votes but there has been some animosity against it and I'm very surprised it passed especially in this economy.

      • The students at UH are so GULLIBLE and IGNORANT. The bonds that UH is taking out for this project are only going to inflate the cost of pretty much EVERYTHING on campus. And with keenum gone, the football team is going to suck HARDDDDD!!!!

        • Actually… its quite the opposite. There has never been a better time to take out bonds on construction projects with such low rates. And are you completely blind to yesterday's recruiting class. wow.

  • Jared Gogets is my hero. Finally, somebody with the balls to just get this thing done. We've needed a stadium for 40 years. It's finally happening. What a great day to be a Houston Cougar!

  • I'm sure the guys in front of the UC Satellite saying "Free t-shirts! All you gotta do is vote 'yes!'" helped in winning these votes.

    Also, I'm glad that ALL students will now pay this fee regardless if they use the stadium or not. Other options, such as charging students $1 or $5 per game, would be unfair because only the consumers of the stadium would be paying for their use of it; if there is a stadium, I say EVERYBODY should pay for it, even if you never have and never will go to a football game in your life because this is AMERICA!

  • i say we tax all the students who make bad grades in class since they are the ones who will go to these football games. leave the rest of us alone – we don't care about football or the school. school pride is for tools.

Leave a Comment