A second event in the International Festival, Thai Night, has been canceled because of the food policy adopted by the university in December.

The International Fair, which in the past provided home-cooked food from a variety of cultures, was the first event canceled. Now, members of the Thai Student Association have decided to cancel this weekend's Thai Night in part because of the new regulation that does not allow self-prepared food to be served at on-campus events.

"We've had to cancel the fair and now another one of the events is gone," Jim Lynch, International Students and Scholars Office director, said.

Thai Student Association members originally planned to prepare the event's food themselves. The Penn State regulation prohibiting home-cooked food at on-campus events forced the group plan for a more expensive, prepared food menu.

Lynch said his understanding is that the University Park Allocations Committee decided not to fund the event last Friday, a week before it was to occur.

First UPAC told the Thai Student Association the event was oriented too much toward food and refused to provide funding for food expenditures, he said. Then UPAC decided the event would be unsuccessful without food and decided not to fund it at all, he added.

Thai Students Association vice president Decha Sermwittayawong said his group made the decision to cancel the event after they heard they would not receive funding from UPAC.

"It doesn't make any sense to me," he said of UPAC's decision.

Jason Lane, UPAC chair, said Thai Night was not funded primarily because of its ties to food.

"It was predominately a food-based event," he said.

UPAC decided not to fund the food aspect of the event, in accordance with a newly adopted policy that does not allow the group to fund food costs for on-campus events.

After that funding was taken away, UPAC members were not convinced that TSA could afford to run the event at all, Lane said.

For this reason, UPAC decided not to give any money for Thai Night, he said.

Members of TSA were particularly upset that UPAC decided not to fund the event just one week before it was scheduled to happen, Sermwittayawong said. The timing gave them little options besides cancellation, he added.

"We could have thought about some other plan," he said.

Lane said UPAC deliberated on the funding request for Thai Night based on when TSA handed in their completed budget.

"We review everything on a first-come, first-serve basis," Lane said.

Lynch said there are 12 to 15 student-run international groups that hold similar events to Thai Night. Most of those groups will probably be affected by the new food ruling, he said. He said he invited concerned students to organize as a group and try to solve the problems the new policy has created.