Food Budget
Monthly Food Budget
The baseline monthly food budget, for the FYE '13 budget (TheBudget), is $1,325 per month.
$55 per "bonus member" is added to the above monthly baseline budget (see below).
(The previous monthly food budget for FYE '12 was $1350 per month.)
$55 per "Bonus Member"
On 8-13-06, the house voted to increase the monthly food budget by $30 for each "Bonus Member" we have at the time -- "Bonus Member" being defined as each member over and above the normal house occupancy of 17. On 8-19-07, this was increased to $40 per bonus member. On 10-18-09, this was increased to $55 per bonus member.
Number of Bonus Members = Total Number of Members - 17.
If there are currently 19 members, that means we have 2 bonus members, and therefore $110 more per month for food. The idea was that if more members (such as associate members or doubles) are paying part of their rent for food, and there are more mouths to feed, then the food budget should increase accordingly. If you are unsure of how many members we currently have, consult the MemberRentsAndDates page.
Transparency
From the Shopper's labor description: "Give receipts to treasurer/bookkeeper. Inform the house of each shopping trip, including at least how much food money was spent and how much is remaining in the monthly food budget. Listing the items purchased would be cool, but is not required." - JobDescriptions#FoodShopper
The above was added to the labor description ca 2007 after massive overspending by the Shopper. This has traditionally been fulfilled by posting a sheet in the kitchen, which not only provides transparency to the house but also proves that the Shopper is indeed budgeting (that is, keeping track of the expenses and how much is remaining in the budget).
Food budget sheet.pdf -- This sheet was created to be posted in the kitchen and updated by the shopper after each shopping trip. This will allow every member to know at all times how much we are spending on food.
Word document -- Food budget sheet.doc
Shopper Account
There is a separate account from which the Shopper spends money (from the food budget and miscellaneous budget).
How much money is in this account is NOT the same thing as how much money is in the food budget or the miscellaneous budget.
Money is transferred twice a month into this account in excess of the amount of the food budget and miscellaneous budget in order to ensure that there will be money even in the case of overspending for the month. (It is understood that the Shopper might occasionally overspend for one month and make up for it the next month.) So there should be more money in this account than there is in the food budget and miscellaneous budget.
For example, although the food budget is (as of this writing) $1325/month, $1670/month is being transferred into the shopper account. If this accounts builds up too much money, the Treasurer might want to pay a bill from this account to even it back out.
Money can only be transferred into this account by setting up, in person at the bank, scheduled transfers of set amounts. This cannot be done online.
- added for the sake of clarification by parker (former treasurer) Aug 2012.