SA voting delayed one day after ballot errors
‘This election cannot continue tomorrow’: Anonymous complaint claims election committee violated rules
The Student Association election ballot was recalled just an hour after it went live, after voters found errors in the ballot’s language. At the end of the ballot, voters were presented with five different constitutional amendments, which proposed varying changes — ranging from grammatical fixes to raising the Blanket Tax. The ballot only allowed students one vote instead of five individual ones, presenting the amendments as a bundle.
Just before 1:30 p.m. on Feb. 26, the SA elections committee released a statement — via the SA’s Instagram story — acknowledging the error and moving the voting period timeline. The ballot will now reopen on Feb. 27 and close one day later than planned, March 6. All current votes will be erased, the committee wrote.
“This error occurred due to a miscommunication between the Elections Committee and the faculty member responsible for creating and distributing surveys,” the statement read.
The Thresher obtained an anonymous complaint, filed with the elections committee, alleging that the changed timeline is in violation of an elections rule, Bylaw 3102.1.4, which states that any changes must first be approved by a majority vote at Senate.
“Simply changing the timeline via Instagram is not enough,” the complainant, an anonymous student, wrote.
The complaint also alleges that the SA elections committee has violated another rule, Bylaw 3102.1.3, which states that the director of elections must announce the general election — and all relevant timelines — at least three weeks prior to the start of voting.
The director of elections, Natalie Wang, did not respond to a request for comment.
“By changing when the election will take place, the Director of Elections has deviated from the timeline in the Election Rules Handbook that was approved by the Senate on the 18th of November,” the complaint reads.
The complaint also raises issues with the SA’s method of communicating ballot changes.
“Announcing this change via Instagram does not serve as an effective means of communication to the student body,” the complaint continues. “This election cannot continue tomorrow, as doing so would be a flagrant violation of the Student Association’s Constitution and Bylaws.”
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