The decision late last month to have the Student Organization Finance Committee and Campus Council hold joint sessions to determine the correct funding for events hosted by student groups comes as a welcome change to a system that was in many respects complicated, redundant and inefficient.

In the past student groups that sought funding for events were required to deal separately with SOFC and CC. They submitted two different applications and went through two separate meetings, and this made the search for funding an unnecessarily frustrating process.

Granted, SOFC and CC talked to each other about joint applications in order to avoid double-funding, but that communication was often insufficient and always ad hoc. Especially considering the amount of money involved in applications for event funding, this kind of informal process was out of place.

It is important to remember that the funding for student groups and events is in general a vague process. Almost every student has a story to tell about obtaining lots of unnecessary money either from the University administration or from SOFC, and there exists extensive overlap and uncertainty between the various sources of funding on campus.

For a long time, the entire funding process has virtually been begging for some intervention that would impose clarity and openness.

This latest reform does not propose a complete solution to the labyrinthine character of the funding process, but it is a step in the right direction for the short term.

Thus, with the advent of these new joint hearings, SOFC and CC can better enable the work of existing groups with their longstanding events, and carefully oversee the funding of new groups and their events.

The old system made it structurally difficult to allocate funds in the most efficient and cost-effective way, and the new system will almost certainly streamline this process.

Considering that SOFC (a branch of Duke Student Government) and CC are akin to governmental organizations in the role they play in student lives, and that the money allocated for student events is equivalent to student tax dollars, the implementation of better fiscal oversight is long overdue.

But even this latest attempt at reform highlights the original problem, which is that the University suffers from a tangle of student groups, many with overlapping missions, financial inefficiencies and not enough oversight of the way in which they spend student money.

And inefficiency, not necessarily of student groups themselves but of the way in which they are given money for events, should be exactly what the new connection between SOFC and CC seeks to address.

It should be expected that after this partial merger goes well, the focus of these organizations will broaden into a review of student groups in general and the streamlining of a process that has long consisted of a series of unclear hurdles.

Moreover, SOFC should be able to accomplish much of what DSG proposed through a student activities fee referendum through a smarter allocation of its existing money.

It is high time that SOFC and CC began working more closely on group funding allocation. In the future, student groups will hopefully get what funding they deserve without having to deal with more than one fair and direct authority.