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The Daily Northwestern Thursday, April 14, 2016
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Cilento, Vinson focus on funding New plan proposes restructuring distribution of funds By ERICA SNOW
the daily northwestern @ericasnoww
Daily file photo by Leeks Lim
MAILING MISHAP A row of houses in the city’s 5th Ward. City officials mailed tax forms to employees with their personal information visible.
City mishandles personal info Officials offer year-long protection services By RISHIKA DUGYALA
the daily northwestern @rdugyala822
Evanston will provide free, yearlong identity theft insurance and credit monitoring to employees whose tax information was accidentally revealed in the mail. Marty Lyons, Evanston’s chief financial officer, told members of City Council’s Administration and Public Works Committee on Monday that in addition to the
employees’ social security numbers being displayed through the envelopes’ windows, the envelopes themselves were not properly sealed and were even unsealed in some cases. Lyons said he received one of these unsealed envelopes. Employees who were impacted will have the chance to sign up to receive free credit monitoring and insurance to make sure nobody is accessing their information, Lyons said. Employees can sign up until April 7, 2017. “We hope (employees) take
advantage of the offer to employ the security services,” Lyons said. David Ellis, a retired Evanston firefighter and paramedic, told council members at the meeting that as a result of the exposed information on the tax forms, there were attempts to hijack information from some active firefighters and establish credit under their names. Ellis urged city officials to find a backup protection service to safeguard employees’ information for » See IDENTITY, page 8
Macs Vinson said it’s “disheartening” to reject student groups who apply for Associated Student Government funding. So, the new executive vice president is looking to put into motion plans that he and others have worked on to change the way ASG funds student groups. Vinson, a McCormick junior, along with new president Christina Cilento, said he has wanted to reform funding in ASG for more than a year. After the pair narrowly won the election Friday with a platform centered on marginalized students, Vinson and Cilento said they both want to focus on using the spring budget to help student groups. Cilento wants to make sure groups like Quest Scholars Network are a top priority, and Vinson wants to abolish the current A- and B-status labeling system that ASG uses to categorize students groups when it comes to funding. Vinson said his past experience in the B-status finances committee showed him flaws in the funding system. He said he and other former ASG executives will propose a plan that would move toward a threefund system, comprised of a programming, operating and general fund. Vinson said the possibility of a widerscale funding reform, which may be
presented to Senate later this quarter, could help smaller student groups — some being cultural groups — get the funds they need. Currently, student groups recognized by ASG are ranked as either A- or B-status. Student groups that often hold large events and sometimes receive tens of thousands of dollars are classified as A-status while student groups with lower costs, often only a few hundred dollars, are called B-status. Vinson worked with three Weinberg seniors on the proposal: former vice president for B-status finances Kenny Mok, former vice president for A-status finances Mackenzie Schneider and former vice president for student activities Parag Dharmavarapu in making a proposal to Senate. Vinson said the new system would take away the “hierarchy” between student groups and make the funding system more flexible and responsive. “Our funding system literally only accommodates only a few groups, and the other groups are just finangaled to fit into it,” Vinson said, referring to groups such as A&O Productions and Mayfest. “What we’re effectively trying to do is thinking about all the groups we have and how to best cater to them.” But A&O co-chair Cory Goldman said A&O was not a better student group because it’s considered an A-status group, but rather it needed larger funds for annual productions like Blowout. Last year, funds allocated to A&O and Mayfest together totaled roughly $540,000, more than half of the A-status finance pool. » See FUNDING, page 8
Northwestern announces $14 million in startup funds Money aimed at fostering innovative culture among students, faculty By STAVROS AGORAKIS
the daily northwestern @stavrosagorakis
Northwestern has invested $14 million in creating its first-ever entrepreneurship funds to support Universitybased student and faculty ventures, further incentivizing the growth of NU’s business community. The $10 million N.XT Fund and $4 million NUseeds Fund build on the University’s recent efforts to promote innovation and idea-building, said Alicia Loffler, executive director at the Innovation and New Ventures Office. N.XT mostly focuses on funding earlystage faculty ventures, and NUseeds,
State Senate passes relief funding amid budget crisis
The Illinois Senate passed emergency relief funding for public colleges, community services and other unfunded areas Wednesday as programs struggle to function as usual on month nine without a budget. The bill would appropriate $3.9
partly funded by the “We Will” campaign, targets student ideas, she said. “Our social contract is that we have to move our innovations to society, to the public,” Loffler said. “There was a demand by students and faculty that really want to get their ideas to the market, and it’s very hard to prove the concept of those technologies.” N.XT Fund grants will be awarded annually, with each investment ranging from $50,000 to $200,000. However, to be eligible, each venture’s intellectual property must be owned by the University and commercialize NU-owned intellectual property. “The stipulation is that (the venture) has to be owned by Northwestern,” said Nick Maull, assistant director of new
ventures at the INVO. “So you have to be essentially working on an idea that is spun out of Northwestern.” The NUseeds Fund will invest in student startups with each award ranging from $10,000 to $100,000. To be eligible, ventures must have participated in The Garage Residency Program and previously received money from institutional investors or an accelerator program. These criteria exist to ensure the financial soundness of the ideas in order for the $4 million to not burn out quickly, said Melissa Crounse, executive director of The Garage. “If the University invests in a company, it takes a stake,” Crounse said. “If that company ends up doing very well,
that money will renew to the NUseeds account and will be reinvested in other Northwestern companies.” The two funds came out of necessity after past technologies developed at the University lacked the financial resources to push them forward, Maull said. The N.XT and NUseed grants aim to avoid ventures potentially failing and falling into the “valley of death,” he said. The first round of applications for the N.XT Fund are due April 23 and finalists will present their innovations to a panel June 2. Rolling applications for NUseeds will open Friday. “We’re really excited about this,” Maull said. “We think it’s going to help our faculty and our innovators
tremendously and I think it will be exciting moving forward. We have a great vision for how we’re going to see this grow over the next few years.” McCormick senior Akshat Thirani, who runs the startup Amper and participated in both an accelerator program and The Garage Residency Program, said the funds will create more opportunities for the business culture to grow at NU. “It’s definitely great for teams coming out of Northwestern to have this funding,” Thirani said. “I think that this might create a launchpad for student startups coming right out of college.”
billion, mainly from general revenue funds, to a variety of human services, public health programs and back pay for some public employees in addition to higher education funding. The bill, which passed by a vote of 38-17, awaits Gov. Bruce Rauner’s approval. “If the governor signs this piece of legislation, we’ll keep talking; we’ll come back to the table to work out a budget plan,” Illinois Sen. Heather Steans (D-Chicago) said in a news release. “But while we’re talking, the
organizations serving our most vulnerable residents can be submitting their vouchers and continuing their important work.” The action came 17 days before Chicago State University, a public university serving largely lowincome, minority and non-traditional students, planned to shut down and lay off its employees. In addition, the bill funded MAP grants, financial assistance to lowincome students attending college
in Illinois. Although Rauner could not be reached for comment, he said he would veto the bill when it was passed in the Senate for the first time last September. Illinois Sen. Jacqueline Collins (D-Chicago) said in a news release that passing the legislation was a “moral obligation,” and that Rauner and all Illinois elected officials need to take responsibility for the budget. “If the governor is going to continue
holding the state and its most vulnerable residents hostage while he demands reforms that would hurt the middle class and aren’t proven to benefit anyone but large corporations and the wealthy, the least he can do is allow universities and service providers to present their bills to the Comptroller and get in line to be paid as soon as the money becomes available,” Collins said in the release.
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