Associated Student Government recently completed a five-month effort to lower venue rental costs for student groups when administrators said Cahn Auditorium is now available for no charge.

The rental fee for Cahn, usually $450 for one night and $350 for a night with multiple performances, will be waived for student groups that do not charge admission to their events, said ASG President Jordan Heinz. Groups still will have to pay for maintenance charges such as lighting and staff.

“If (the student groups) do charge admission, they can recover some of the costs of the rental fee with revenue,” said Heinz, an Education junior. “(Administrators are) trying to make it easier for groups who are putting on a benefit for the university.”

The rental-fee reduction is the third this year, following rental-price cuts at Lutkin Hall and Patten Gym. ASG lobbied administrators to make Lutkin free earlier this quarter, and Patten has been available without charge since Winter Quarter.

“We’re pretty much done,” Heinz said. “These are the venues I had targeted.”

Pick-Staiger Concert Hall also had been considered, Heinz said, but it wasn’t possible to lower costs because of the high demand for the hall.

While increased availability of venues on campus will help ease the crunch for student groups to find rental space, there are more important things to consider in programming events, Heinz said.

“More importantly, it reduces the amount of the student activities fee for venue rental,” he said. “Now that money can be available for programming.”

Having more space available could encourage new performing groups to form, said Kim Guenther, producer of Significant Others, a female a cappella group.

“There’s never enough space,” said Guenther, a Speech sophomore. “If there’s more space, more people (will) want to do it.”

Although Cahn’s availability will benefit large-scale groups, the auditorium’s near-1,000 seat capacity might be too big for a cappella groups to hold individual performances, she said.

But when a cappella groups collaborate, they get a larger turnout, she said. When Significant Others produced a show with several other groups in fall 1999, they sold out Lutkin, which seats about 400. At their spring show last year, about 450 people came to four performances.

The availability of Cahn might inspire a cappella groups to collaborate, Guenther said. The key is finding the right way to use such large venues.

“It’s exciting that it’s available – we just have to get used to it first,” she said.