Although Student Government Association (SGA) sees its latest procedural flub as an embarrassment, we see it as a saving grace.
In an effort to extract a 20-percent voter turnout from an apathetic student body, SGA resorted to means that violate the essence of democratic voting.
Online voting opens today for senate candidates and a constitutional amendment that would allow SGA to fill its review board. We agree with the amendment itself. We object to SGA executive members taking the voting box out a week early to collect handwritten ballots from select campus organizations.
This isn't the first time Megan Demshki, President of SGA and former vice president of Associated Students, has stuffed ballot boxes. A year ago, Demshki and Kahan Chandrani, then president of Associated Students, personally collected votes in support of the government's structural overhaul. This time, SGA tried to hide its act with excuses: The president and vice president presented to a club and then left the room. Director of Elections Chelsea Simmons then entered the room to distribute and collect the ballots.
Simmons is a member of SGA. Simmons still has a vested interest in seeing the amendment pass.
Not only did certain students vote before the rest of the student body, and not only was the voting box handled by a biased member of SGA, but the vote was also preceded by a presentation from the writers of the amendment.
Do political candidates stand in the voting booth and give a spiel before you place a vote in a ballot box his colleague carries with him? SGA unfairly influences the voter, even if its advocacy isn't explicit. It merely needs to present an argument.
Nobody has bothered to teach SGA members why their procedures aren't right. Colleen Wood, SGA adviser, was aware the ballots were collected in an inappropriate manner and never stepped in to stop it.
Whether they end up in local government or higher, our elected student government officials are potential future political leaders. This is their training ground. But they are not learning democratic process.
In democracy, the ends don't justify the means when the means are clearly stilted in favor of one party. If SGA wants to achieve a certain voter turnout, it should find a clean way to do it.
To read the news story on this subject, "SGA violates procedure, throws out ballots," go to http://www.thepantheronline.com/news/sga-violates-procedure-throws-out-ballots-1.2724722.
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7 comments
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If SGA had wanted to stuff the ballot box, they probably would have read the election code, and then stuffed the ballot box properly.
If we are distinguishing between important and not so important, then why does the Panther even exist? Every article they choose to publish is not so important, not to mention usually devoid of any actual factual evidence or decent journalism.
In all of the editorials I have read, never once has a Senator complained to the Panther. They are above whining to some insignificant piece of journalism that feels entitled to an opinion despite the majority of the student body finding their work simply laughable.
This whole editorial is ridiculous and a waste of space. The Panther needs to concern themselves more with writing articles worth reading than covering up the errors they made in attacking individuals of other organizations.
Sincerely,
Do not assume everyone who reads this is a member of SGA