The University Programming Council will not be able to draw many big acts to OU for the rest of this year because it is running out of money.

UPC, which was allotted $63,000 for 1997-98, has about $8,000 to spend on programs and activities for the rest of the year, said Rick Danals, associate director of student activities and UPC's adviser.

Generally, UPC has about $12,000 to $15,000 at its disposal per quarter, said Michelle Hill, UPC president.

But the increased cost of holding programs at Grover Center and low attendance at shows have drained this year's funds, she said. UPC also did not receive as much funding as it requested from the Student Activities Committee last spring.

By the end of Fall Quarter, UPC had already sponsored $150,000 worth of programming. In a typical year, based on starting funds of $63,000, UPC can put on between $200,000 and $300,000 worth of programming, Danals said.

If UPC cannot cover the cost of holding programs with ticket sales alone, it must draw from the $63,000 SAC allocation.

"Sometimes (the UPC board) intentionally decides to subsidize a program to keep the ticket prices low for students," Danals said. "This fall, UPC ended up subsidizing more programs than expected."

Where is the show?

This year, the university began renovations to Templeton-Blackburn Alumni Memorial Auditorium. OU arranged for UPC to use Grover Center as a temporary auditorium until the renovations are complete.

OU spent more than $150,000 to build a stage, mount sound equipment and set up seating to transform the Grover Center gymnasium into an auditorium, Danals said.

But UPC shares the building with the OU athletic department. One-half of the auditorium remains an auditorium while the other half is used as an athletic practice facility.

A large program, like Greg Louganis' Sept. 22 speech, requires full usage of Grover Center. UPC must pay between $1,100 and $1,700 per program to set up more seats and a video projection system and staff the event, Danals said.

Where are the people?

Some events simply are too big to fit into Grover Center's 1,600 seats, Danals said.

The largest programs UPC has sponsored this year were the Rusted Root concert Oct. 29 and George Carlin Sept. 27, which both were held in The Convo.

Although the two shows attracted more than 5,500 people combined, Danals said UPC took risks by scheduling two events in The Convo. "I've been here seven years, and we've only done two Convo shows. This year we attempted two in one quarter," he said.

Hill said the Rusted Root concert did not attract as many students as expected, costing UPC $16,000.

"We took a big hit on that show," she said. "We thought it was an appropriate show and a lot of fans would attend."

Hill said the UPC officers try to predict the number of people who will attend a show before setting the prices, in order to keep them low.

"We usually plan on taking a cut for low prices, or try to break even," she said. "We could eliminate this problem with higher prices, but we try to keep the costs down because students usually don't make much money."

Rusted Root was not the only UPC sponsored event to have empty seats.

The UPC films series, which drew sell-out crowds at Mem Aud for movies such as "Jerry Maguire" and "The Lion King," generated revenue for UPC in the past. But this year students rarely fill Seigfried Hall's Mitchell Auditorium, which seats fewer than 200 people, said Alice Shoemaker, UPC officer in charge of films.

"I don't think we've broken even yet," she said. "Even if we show a movie three times in Mitchell Auditorium, we don't get close to what we did at Mem Aud."

Where is the money?

UPC was looking for money before students left for summer break last year.

Last year, SAC, a division of Student Senate that allocates money to more than 300 OU student organizations, requested $80,000 from the university, in addition to its $248,000 budget.

The $80,000 would have been dispersed among the organizations, and UPC would have been slated to receive $82,000 instead of $63,000, according to a 1998 Student Senate budget report.

"Without an $80,000 increase, SAC will be unable to fund even half of its fiscal year 1998 fundable requests, and student programming will undoubtedly degrade. When programming suffers so does campus and student life," according to the request.

The University Planning Advisory Council rejected the request last spring. UPAC ranked SAC as a low priority, said Darryl Winefordner, associate provost for budget and planning, in the Nov. 6, 1997 edition of The Post.

At the OU Board of Trustees meeting Saturday, OU President Robert Glidden told the board he thought student organizations, such as UPC, were going to receive more university funds this year, but "obviously we just didn't provide enough funding."

"It's hard to get an increase in student organization funding through UPAC," he said. "I think we're going to come up with a proposal for next year to try and produce funds. I'll take the responsibility for this year."

UPC started this year without the full $63,000 because they "went into the hole" after last spring's Violent Femmes concert, Hill said. The show was subsidized by the 1997-98 funds.

Meanwhile, UPC has four more months of events to organize.

This winter UPC will sponsor "smaller scale programs," such as collaborating with the Charles J. Ping Student Recreation Center and the Residents Action Council, Hill said.

Plans are in the works for a comedian for Mom's Weekend, but UPC will not sponsor another concert this year unless an outside promoter covers the costs, she said.

- Michelle Olney contributed to this story