For many of us, the number of Washingtons, Lincolns, and Hamiltons we carry in our wallets dictates what we do on weekends, impacts where we go for lunch, and helps us decide whether getting to experience Avatar for the 10th time is really worth it (it is). So on those nights when everything but the last of the Ezell’s receipts has vacated our wallets, options for an exciting evening get cut down fast. But the possibilities are shrinking even faster for Garfield clubs facing economic destruction.

Across the GHS club scene, presidents and members alike have been peddling everything from baked goods to llama-blazoned sweatshirts in an attempt to escape the general lack of funds seen by many clubs at Garfield.

One club, the mentoring program, has been extremely limited by a lack of funding, to the point of being unable to expand.

“We want to give all mentors something to give to their freshman,” says Garfield Senior and Lead Mentor Zoe Kaiser. “We have a goal to make mentoring t-shirts, but there’s no money from ASB at all.”

Clubs at Garfield have a history of being mostly self-funded, but in order to be officially allowed to do any fundraising, the clubs are supposed to apply to the student government for approval. According to Garfield Senior and ASG vice president Michael Cunetta however, there is money readily available to clubs who pursue it.

“If they need funding, they’re always able to ask for money from the general ASB account,” says Cunetta.

The Garfield Messenger, a longtime fundraising giant and arguably the flyest club at Garfield, is especially poor. Due to loss of support from a range of sources, writers and photographers alike have taken to selling dozens of glazed Krispy Creme donuts and begging on the street for donations. If you notice a decline in the quality of life around school, there’s a good chance that the problem lies in the decreased number of issues the paper is able to produce this year.

Garfield’s Congress of Racial Equality (CORE), the team behind the uniquely influential cultural relations retreats, has also recently entered onto the fundraising scene. Normally a financially stable club, trouble with payments from the retreat last spring left CORE in debt and unsure of how to get out.

“There’s ambiguity as to whether we can or can’t host retreats if we’re in debt and they’re our main source of income,” says CORE member Paloma Contreras. “We’ve heard different things from different people.”

Also fighting the restrictions of clubbin’ in the recession is Future Billionare Investors, or FBI.

“The whole point of FBI club is to invest money as a team,” says Garfield Junior and FBI president Gali Russel. “We need the money to invest; without that we don’t really have anything to do in the club.”

Russel voices the problems that a lot of GHS clubs bump up against when trying to expand.

“We’re just starting out and can’t come up with any creative ways of raising cash,” says Russel.

Heifer Club, on the other hand, exists mostly as an entity that raises money, which it uses to purchase farm animals for families that don’t otherwise have the means. In the past year, they’ve hit on one of the most successful fundraising ideas visible at Garfield.

The livestock club has recently finished selling their second batch of plain, pullover sweatshirts featuring the outline of an animal on the front. The current line features a llama on the front, and at 15 dollars a piece, the club plans to reign in a couple hundred dollars.

The newly reinstated club Students Against Violence Everywhere (SAVE) has come up with a source of funding less reliant on the generosity of the Garfield community.

“Fortunately SAVE has a good sum of money from the Mayor’s millions that he sent out in youth violence prevention,” says Garfield junior and SAVE co-president Emerson North.

SAVE’s goals encompass strengthening programs that reach out to disadvantaged youth, and reducing violence citywide. All of this requires at least some money to be feasible, but the Garfield Mentoring program needs to expand to improve their reputation.

“It would probably smooth over teacher-mentor relations,” says Kaiser. “They can’t really see the effort we put in just by reading an email.”

Garfield puts itself out there as a school where there’s a club for every kid. We advertise the diversity of student groups and the opportunities they hold for those who put in the time. This still holds true, though the club of your choice may be struggling to expand over financial fallout.