The Student Government Association voted to table a discussion on whether or not to allocate $6,325 to the Miss UCA competition in a meeting Oct. 24. The vote passed 32-10 in favor of tabling the discussion.

Stephen Shook and Susan Setzler represented the competition at the meeting.

Shook is the director for student leadership and Setzler has been a volunteer for the Miss UCA competition for 26 years.

“The thing I want you to know more than anything is that the [Miss UCA competition] is more than a beauty pageant and it’s more than a title,” Setzler said. “This organization is a movement of empowering young women everywhere to dream big, to insist that their voices be heard, and to inspire change in the world around them.”

Setzler and Shook passed out an itemized list of 17 different expenses for the competition that added up to $10,025. However, Setzler said that $3,700 has already been privately funded. 

Senator Makenna Goss voted against tabling the discussion to next week’s meeting.

“I think this is something that is really important on campus. I know Nia Kelley [Miss UCA], and every event that I was at for SGA, she was also there. Like they said, she’s made over 100 appearances for UCA and for the university. I think [the Miss UCA competition] is just a really good positive thing,” Goss said.

Senator Alex Clark voted for tabling the discussion to next week’s meeting.

“Looking through some of the line items on this request, $2,325 go towards what I would call administrative waste. They’ve got a line item that says ‘Miss UCA salute page in Miss Arkansas Program Book.’ I think that’s us purchasing an ad in the Miss Arkansas program. [Another item says] ‘gifts for MC, auditors and judges.’ I don’t understand why that falls on us,” Clark said.

Vice President of finance J’Lun Herron said that the finance committee would meet sometime before Monday, Oct. 31, to discuss the request.