Years after graduating from Binghamton University, I now advise organizations on how to govern responsibly, steward millions of dollars and make hard decisions under scrutiny. That professional lens is what brings me back to this conversation — not to argue about headlines, but to help the campus understand what responsible leadership inside the Student Association actually looks like.

Serving as vice president for finance was the most rewarding and exhausting responsibility of my life. I spent early mornings and late nights signing vouchers, developing wage plans for OCCT and executing what Pipe Dream described as the “biggest wage hike the company has ever seen,” because the SA is not a symbolic mock government, but a multimillion-dollar nonprofit with real fiduciary obligations to students.

Before my tenure, the SA was already highly capitalized. In the fiscal year ending in May 2023, the SA posted a surplus and ended the year with approximately $4.7 million in net assets. In the fiscal year ending May 2024, total revenue dipped to $4,343,947 — nearly $800,000 below 2025’s reported $5,131,355 in the IRS Form 990.

A responsible nonprofit facing a temporary revenue trough has two options — cut student services immediately or deliberately deploy reserves to preserve continuity while correcting course.

I chose to preserve continuity.

That choice produced a reported deficit in the IRS Form 990, but it preserved mission‑dominant operations during a high‑inflation year. The filing shows reserve deployment plainly: “Savings and temporary cash investments” declined from $4,380,815 to $3,720,036 across the IRS Form 990.

This wasn’t just spending; it was an investment in durability and control. The form shows a five‑figure “Information technology” expenses and a year‑over‑year increase in net capital assets: “Land, buildings, and equipment” rose from $226,987 to $266,298. The Balance Sheet also reflects operational hardening in that same filing: “Prepaid expenses and deferred charges” increased from $336,716 to $386,458, and accounts receivable dropped from $146,953 to $47,16 — signals of tighter vendor/contract administration and improved cash discipline.

Nonprofit audit and governance guidance is clear that reserves are not meant to be hoarded without purpose. The question is whether leadership can articulate why reserves are being deployed and how the organization will remain stable afterward. In plain English: using reserves can show up as a deficit on paper even when the organization is making time‑limited, mission‑focused investments in continuity and capacity.

Let me be clear. These operating deficits were not reckless spending; they were strategic capital deployments. We utilized dormant cash reserves to expand campus services while actively shielding the student body from a severe, immediate fee hike, ensuring that necessary increases could be phased in over time to protect student affordability.

To better measure the financial health of the SA, one must examine the program efficiency, or the percentage of every dollar spent that went directly to student services. The filings show program service expenses of $3,254,620 in the IRS Form 990 and $3,847,215 in the IRS Form 990. Under a mission‑accurate view of direct student programming dollars, the SA’s Adjusted Program Efficiency Ratio exceeds 96 percent, meaning only about four cents of every dollar supported all administrative overhead combined.

For perspective, SUNY peers show how Form 990 presentation can differ even when organizations are mission‑heavy. While BU’s Adjusted Program Efficiency Ratio exceeds 96 percent, the University at Buffalo Student Association’s Form 990 reveals a Program Expense Ratio of just 65.1 percent — reporting $3,006,944 in program services against $4,615,595 in total expenses. This highlights just how remarkably lean and student-focused the University’s administrative overhead truly is.

Compensation also needs timeline context. In the IRS Form 990, the Assistant Director position is listed at $77,000. During the professional support gap that followed the September 2023 vacancy of this role, student executives absorbed professional‑grade administrative and technical workload to keep the 501(c)(3) functional.

The “five‑figure” student stipends reported in the IRS Form 990 were a temporary, Congress‑approved crisis bridge — not a permanent baseline. Subsequent filings show that once professional coverage was restored and the immediate operational gap closed, student stipends reverted to historical levels.

The internal culture of an organization is just as important as the numbers. Leadership isn’t measured only in dollars and decisions; it’s measured in how people treat one another when tensions are high.

Organizations struggle not when they face hard choices, but when disagreement turns into division — when governance becomes defined by recordings, grievance hearings and veto cycles instead of trust and shared purpose.

That is why this moment matters. As documented publicly while I was in office, inflation and a flat fee structure were eroding reserves, and incremental action was needed to avoid sharper cuts later in a system where fees are revisited cyclically.

Now that I’ve graduated, today’s students get to define what the SA becomes next. My guiding principle then — and now — is simple: make the difficult but necessary choice over the easy and popular one.

The Student Association is, at its core, a nonprofit created to serve students — not factions, personalities or moments of outrage. As Thursday’s election approaches, I hope the campus lowers the temperature, assumes good intent and chooses kindness — especially toward those willing to step forward and serve. Student government works best when students support each other through disagreement and keep the mission at the center: trust, service and care for the people the organization exists to benefit.

Dan Croce was the Student Association’s vice president for finance from 2022 to 2024. 

A Letter to the Editor is an opinion column published in response to a column or article previously published. This is Dan Croce’s response to news coverage on 3/24 titled ”IRS filings reveal Student Association has over $140,000 deficit.”

Views expressed in the opinions pages represent the opinions of the columnists. The only piece that represents the view of the Pipe Dream Editorial Board is the staff editorial.