A revised proposal for a room and board rate increase next year will be submitted to the Student Senate tomorrow, said Adam Weyhaupt, speaker of the senate.

The Student Senate will meet tomorrow at 7 p.m. in the Arcola/Tuscola Room of the Martin Luther King Jr. University Union.

The proposal, worked out by Weyhaupt, Student Body President Katie Cox, and Vice President for Student Affairs Lou Hencken late last week, recommends that the Board of Trustees raise housing and dining rates by as much as $233 per semester beginning this fall, Weyhaupt said.

The legislation is the latest development of the senate’s first-time involvement with the Bond Revenue committee’s annual housing budget proposal to the BOT.

Last month, the senate considered for the first time a resolution on whether to endorse the committee’s proposal, which included an increase in rates for housing and meal plans. After several senate members expressed concern that the senate and the student body didn’t have enough time to review the proposal, Hencken agreed to delay submitting the budget proposal to the BOT until the senate and students became more familiar with the plan.

However, confusion over some figures in the budget proposal between the senate and the housing office forced the senate to delay both actions until this week, making time an important factor as well.

“It is a time-critical issue,” Weyhaupt said.

Today and tomorrow, senate members will distribute surveys about the rate increase in Carman, Taylor, Coleman, and Stevenson Halls, Weyhaupt said.

The student forum has also been rescheduled to Monday at 7 p.m. in Lumpkin Hall, Fanthorpe said. The room the forum will be held in is still undetermined, she said.

Because the motion is required by senate bylaws to be tabled one week, Weyhaupt said the senate would not be able to vote on it until next week. By that time, Weyhaupt said, the senate hopes to have student reaction from both the surveys and the forum.

The new proposal is not written in stone, either.Under the new proposal, the cost of a standard double room and a 5-plus meal plan with 200 dining dollars would jump to $2,138 a semester, a $138 increase over the present rate, and an $8 increase over the Bond Revenue committee’s original proposal. A double room with a 10-plus meal plan, 12-plus meal plan and a 15-plus meal plan would cost $233, $167, and $161 more than this semester, respectively, he said.

According to the motion, these rates would increase an additional $17 under the proposal If the university continues the residence hall newspaper program and installs paper towel dispensers or hand dryers in the residence halls.

Weyhaupt said the housing fee issue is not a simple one for the senate to tackle.

“This is different than than the typical fee process because we’ve never done this before,” Weyhaupt said.

Weyhaupt said time is a factor as well, as the BOT will meet next week.

In other business, the senate will vote on two motions at its meeting, Weyhaupt said. One would allocate $200 toward mayoral debates, voter registration and a forum on the electronic writing portfolio; the other allocates $100 to place a Student Government advertisement in the Miss Black EIU program booklet.