In dividing its largest pot of money in history, Student Union’s general budget proposal passed unanimously for the second consecutive year on Tuesday night.

Eighteen representatives each from SU Treasury and Senate debated the breakdown of around $2.9 million in funds from the student activities fee, which is comprised of 1 percent of the tuition from each student. Despite two objecting votes against individual categories of funding, the representatives all voted in favor of the overall proposal.

The 2015-16 budget included increased funding for Social Programming Board and Sports Club Board as well as additional consideration of community service projects.

The most contentious category of funding was for Social Programming Board, which received around $596,000, or $4,000 more than a year ago. SPB’s higher cost resulted from the implementation of the group’s new film committee as well as increasing production costs for WILD, though the group cut back on Happy Hour costs to help balance some of the increase.

Senior Reuven Shechter, a Treasury representative, argued that giving SPB more money than all Category 1 student groups—the largest groups, which received $550,000 combined—was a poor use of funds.

“Student Union more highly values performers, comedians, etc., rather than sort of, what I think is perhaps more important work that student groups put on,” Shechter said. “We’re always struggling to fund everything that we want to because we’re worried about funding constraints, [but] I would make the argument that all those Category 1 groups do more important work on campus than SPB does.”

Fellow Treasury member James Harvey, a sophomore and SPB’s treasurer, abstained from voting on this category due to a conflict of interest but argued in favor of the allocation for fall and spring WILDs.

“I can assure you that every single thing there is necessary to put the event on. That’s just the nature of the event,” Harvey said.

Vice President of Finance Nick Palermo, a senior, argued that the high amount of funding was necessary considering WILD’s status as a popular, longstanding tradition on campus.

“Obviously, WILD is one of Wash. U.’s premier events on campus and something that SU is very proud to sponsor,” he said. “The fact that it is so well received and so popular on campus necessitates SU continuing to support it.”

In his first term as VP of Finance last year, Palermo cut funding for Bauhaus, the Architecture School Council’s traditional Halloween party, in the general budget, leaving the ASC to plan a new, weeklong celebration called Sam Fox Fest. Palermo admitted that the way Treasury handled the decision to defund Bauhaus wasn’t the best course of action.

“That was clearly a campus tradition, there’s no arguing that,” Palermo said. “But I don’t think anyone should be beholden to funding campus traditions if the demand isn’t there.”

“That was something we acted on, obviously a year ago, maybe not in the fashion we should have,” he added. “I don’t think we did a good enough job last year communicating to Architecture School Council the follow up that would be and all the ramifications of not funding [Bauhaus] in the general budget.”

But Palermo said that because the Architecture School Council proposed another Sam Fox Fest for next year, he was confident that the change properly reflected the interests of the architecture school and student body.

Shechter was also upset by the approval process, in which late budget submissions from various campus groups led to a lack of advance notice for Treasury members about what the specific allocations would be.

“Treasury reps don’t want to sit and go through it again next week, so it always gets passed through,” Shechter said. “I don’t really feel like people were making informed decisions.”

Despite his complaints and votes against some segments of funding, though, Shechter still voted in favor of the final budget.

“I realized that the votes I was making against them were merely symbolic, just showing that I don’t agree with the funding of these items, but I agree with the budget in whole,” he said.

Sports Club Board received $250,000, an increase of $50,000 from last year, due to increased student interest in club sports, Palermo said. The move came in advance of a planned transition in SCB’s overall funding structure, which now exists independently of Student Union.

Currently, sports clubs divide the overall SCB funding amongst themselves, with each club’s treasurer and president taking part in the process, but SU Exec plans to streamline the process going forward.

“We’re giving this as the top recommendation that the next SU Exec needs to be working on,” senior and SU President Emma Tyler said.

The Community Service Office received a $2,500 increase from last year’s amount ($13,000 from $10,500), and SU added a new $10,000 allocation for the Advocacy Fund. Other notable increases came for the newly returned Arts & Sciences College Council ($5,300 from $3,000 last year) and Student Sustainability Fund ($10,000 from $4,000).

An additional $9,150 was allotted for Category 3 groups, the smallest student clubs on campus, which for the first time this year received $150 per group to help the clubs grow their on-campus presence.