Luke Loranger |
Election day may have ended yesterday for most ASUP candidates, but for the treasurer and presidential candidates, elections will continue through Friday evening. Since none of the three presidential tickets or treasurer candidates received more than 50 percent of the vote, there will be a runoff.
Khalid Osman and Grace Holmes are running for the presidential ticket in the runoff against Mariah Wildgen and Chelsea Richards. In the treasurer’s race are Bryan Chipman and David Zabinski.
The runoff elections started at 8 a.m. today and will run through 5 p.m. Friday. ASUP will host a pizza party for the class with the highest voter turnout.
The election on Tuesday and Wednesday drew the largest turnout for an election at UP to date, with more than 47 percent of the student body voting.
Osman and Holmes are the frontrunners in the presidential election, receiving the highest percentage of yesterday’s vote with 38 percent. Wildgen and Richards received 33 percent of the vote.
Osman and Holmes’ campaign has focused on addressing the rising cost of tuition, the need for a student center and promoting dialogue between ASUP and students.
“Me and Grace were never friends before this year. We met because Grace was running a program at Roosevelt High School where she helped students apply for college,” Osman said. “(We realized) that we both would be good candidates because programs such as these are things UP can be doing in the community. (Ultimately) what matters to you, matters to us.”
Wildgen and Richards’ campaign has stressed the importance of parking, health services and sexual assault awareness.
“We have heard the same issues again and again,” Wildgen said. “People are unable to find places to park or get in to the Health Center when they need to. We really care about giving a voice to the student body.”
The other runoff is between treasurer candidates Bryan Chipman and David Zabinski. Zabinski came out of the first round of elections with 42 percent of the vote, with Chipman winning 38 percent of the vote.
The election for CPB director and secretary will not be contested tomorrow. Samantha van den Berg won in an unopposed race for CPB director.
“I feel that I was groomed for the position because I work as the Rock the Bluff coordinator, and helped Sarah develop her campaign last year,” van den Berg said.
Joseph Rojo won 55 percent of the vote for secretary in yesterday’s election.
“I feel I won because of (how much) experience I have in my platform, including community inclusion, transparency, and outreach,” Rojo said.
Matthew Baer, ASUP elections committee chair, voiced concern about the amount of write-in votes in this election, which decreased the number of votes for registered candidates. This is evident in the race for CPB director, in which Samantha van den Berg ran unopposed but received only 90 percent of the vote.
Resolution 14-03
Resolution 14-03 passed with 89 percent of the vote, creating a nondiscrimination clause in the ASUP constitution.
Joseph Rojo spearheaded the effort to write the resolution, which includes gender identity, genetic information, veteran status, gender expression, religion, socioeconomic status and documentation status in the constitution.
Rojo said the resolution is one part of a larger discussion on diversity and inclusion.
“This is a place to start, and show that as a community we care,” Rojo said. “And I think that people realized this has been needed for a long time. This is not the end of the conversation, but the beginning.”
Resolution 15-01
Resolution 15-01, which eliminates the Major Project Fund (MPF) and creates the Campus Traditions Fund (CTF), passed with 75 percent of the vote.
The CTF will ensure that the student fee is used within the year it is paid. The change guarantees student events each year, unlike the MPF, which had the option of making physical changes to campus.
“The point of this resolution is to take more of the responsibility from CPB,” Samantha van den Berg, who helped write Resolution 15-01, said. “I think this is important because the biggest problem with the Major Project Fund was that it was too rigid for planning events, and this makes it easier to put money towards things that students will see that year.”
Luke Loranger is a reporter for The Beacon. He can be reached at loranger18@up.edu.
