The Undergraduate Council plans to spend $15,000 on publicity and equipment this year—thousands more than last year—despite objections from some that the money should be returned to students.

This year’s budget, passed by the council last night, also increases the amount of money given to student groups to a record amount.

The new budget allots $180,000 of the council’s $285,541 total available assets to fund undergraduate projects.

But some, pointing to what they called a failed Fallfest concert, said even more of the council’s money should go to students.

“It was an utter failure,” said council member Jason L. Lurie ’05. “It was an embarrassment.”

The concert, which cost the council $11,000 and featured the band North Mississippi Allstars, was plagued by inclement weather and a last-minute move from the Quad to Lowell Lecture Hall.

“The event didn’t stand a chance,” said its organizer, Jack P. McCambridge ’06.

The council was expecting about 1000 students to attend but only about 315 showed up, McCambridge said.

He said that the costs included $800 for a stage, which eventually was not used due to the location change.

“Its really unfortunate,” Council President Rohit Chopra ’04 said.

Lurie cited poor publicity as one cause of the low turnout and said that the council’s members falsely advertised the North Mississippi Allstars as a Grammy award-winning band.

The band was nominated for a Grammy but did not win one.

“That’s lying to the public,” Lurie said.

Some of the contention over the budget centered on the increase of $6,500 in the operations fund, bringing its total value to $15,000.

The operations fund is used to publicize events, reimburse candidates during the presidential election and for improvements to the council’s office.

Council member P.K. Agarwalla ’04 suggested that $3,000 of this fund be transferred to the grants fund.

“We should give the most money back to students. It’s the most important part of the council,” Agarwalla said.

But other council members felt that the extra money was needed to publicize events.

“We do a horrible job of publicizing and reaching out to students,” said Matt W. Mahan ’05, chair of the student affairs committee.

—Staff writer Ebonie D. Hazle can be reached at hazle@fas.harvard.edu