Errors in Student Council Elections Prompt Revote

At Student Council’s (StuCo) meeting this Tuesday, class representative candidates and regular attendees came to the meeting with hopes of learning the results from the elections that day. After committee reports and budget approvals for Graphic Design Club and other costs for events StuCo will hold before the school year came to a close, students were disappointed to learn that the elections would be rescheduled for Thursday. Due to a myriad of reasons, the elections were not completely fair and the committee decided to hold them a second time; results will be reported on Friday.

“[Hobbie] and I will work to envision and implement a new system and constitutional amendments that potentially provide a new system for each election and/or a more general guideline for the general election procedure as a whole.”

First, elections didn’t open until more than an hour after they were scheduled to start. Additionally, upper Levon Brunson’s name was put on the ballot for upper representatives and remained there for the start of the elections, rendering current uppers unable to vote for him for senior class representative and thus unfairly decreasing his chances. Also, upper Emma Kim, another candidate for senior class representative, is going abroad to Taiwan next winter—this fact was not stated next to her name on ballots, which is necessary for any candidate who will not be on campus for the duration of his or her term. The third problem was that the candidate statements were not laid out by the voting station, which is contrary to protocol.

Elections Committee head Montana St. Pierre said that the current elections system allows for a large margin of error in the process, a fact he realized this year along with committee co-head and senior Clara Hobbie.

Hobbie said she understood “the frustration of candidates and voters, but hopes people see that an unfair election is a lot more frustrating than a fair re-election.” She also explained that the process itself is not bad, but the small mistakes compounded and created an ultimately unfair election. She stressed that “no one wants this to happen in the future,” and suggested that there needed to be more planning for elections farther in advance.

“[Hobbie] and I will work to envision and implement a new system and constitutional amendments that potentially provide a new system for each election and/or a more general guideline for the general election procedure as a whole,” St. Pierre said. He added that he and the student council regret deeply the necessity of a second election.

StuCo adviser and health instructor Carol Cahalane said that because of the large number of errors and problems, she stood fully behind the decision to schedule a revote. “I support the decision to run this election again so as to be sure that it is completely fair to all candidates,” Cahalane said. She added that as an adviser, it is not her position to micromanage; that making mistakes and learning from them is an important experience for members of student government. Cahalane suggested that she trusted the current and future committee heads to fix these problems and create a more streamlined system to keep these “avoidable” errors from occurring again.

To incentivize students to come to the second election today, StuCo passed a motion to buy $300 worth of candy to keep at the booth and hand out to students after they vote. This, the committee heads hoped, would make up for the possibility of a lower turnout.

Senior and StuCo President Benj Cohen said he was “surprised” that this had happened again. A second election was also held earlier this year for student representatives on the Discipline Committee. However, Cohen noted that it is ultimately not “that big of a deal” to hold it again. “For the candidates,” he explained, “it means two more days to campaign. And for turnout, we are hopeful that candy will draw more students to come vote. Turnout could even rise [from that of the first elections].”

Candidates and voters alike echoed frustration that the elections are being held again. Brunson said that waiting for results will prove to be an “inconvenience” for candidates, but hoped that voting won’t be largely affected and the second election will be as fair as possible.

Kim said that the reasons for rescheduling “are valid” and that the elections committee does its best to ensure that every candidate has an equal chance to be elected; since some candidate’s chances were decreased on Tuesday’s election, “it is only fair that we redo it.” While she saw it as the right thing to do, Kim explained that it is frustrating and might be a burden to everyone to vote a second time.

Lower Julia Friberg, who is running for upper representative, said that many were annoyed because the elections committee, “is supposed to be focused on problem-free and fair elections” has failed to do so in two out of three elections they’ve held this year. “I hope in the future they can alter their planning and avoid this,” she said. Brunson agreed, and suggested that the committee might make use of a “different system” for voting, that could involve voting online, or simply a better screening process for ballots, the lack of which led to the misprinting of his name.

As the school year comes to a close and StuCo prepares to turn over, Cohen said he hopes to conclude on a high note. He said that the newly elected Executive Board has been coming to meetings and he will work closely with them at the start of their tenure as they settle into their new responsibilities. Cohen said that they are “an excellent set of individuals” that will work well together, which he named as the most important characteristic of an Executive Board in StuCo; he expressed confidence that next year will see more positive changes.