SGA Elections Stalled

Author: Megan O'Keefe

Student Government Association (SGA) online Senate elections, originally scheduled for Oct. 2 and Oct. 3, were postponed until Wednesday and Thursday of this week because of miscommunication between the SGA and Library and Information Services (LIS).

The initial election dates, announced in an all-student e-mail sent out by the SGA Director of Membership and Chair of the Elections Council Courtney Taylor '04 on September 28, 2003, fell just inside the deadline for voting set in the Middlebury College Handbook and the SGA Constitution: "no later than the fourth week of classes."

The postponed elections, now in the fifth week of classes, will be followed by special elections next week to fill Senate positions for which there are currently no candidates: senior Feb representative, senior class representative, Cook Commons representative, Brainerd Commons representative and Inter-House Council (IHC) representative.

Last week's elections were cancelled due to the absence of an online interface for voting. In an interview with The Middlebury Campus on Sunday, SGA Chief of Staff Andrew Pugsley '04 cited difficulties in establishing contact with appropriate individuals in the Information and Technology Services (ITS) department and a perceived unwillingness of certain individuals at ITS to accommodate the SGA elections needs as the cause of the delay.

Pugsley said, "A member of the elections was put in contact with an [ITS staff member] and was told that he would be the person to talk to and would be handling the situation. She called him on Monday afternoon, but didn't reach him until Tuesday. He was very disrespectful, completely unhelpful, basically said, 'If we have time we will get around to it.'"

Dean of Library and Information Services Barbara Doyle-Wilch told The Campus, "I spoke with several of the IT and administrative staff about this unfortunate incident. We all agree that better and more timely communication between the SGA and Library and Information Services would have resolved this problem."

Doyle-Wilch continued, "Preparing for an election takes a full week's notice and preparation. The faculty elections that took place over the past few weeks had been planned since the end of August and were on the work schedule for a year. Our programmers are very busy with a variety of applications this fall and, of course, with the constant battle with viruses and worms. In fact, our programmer came in on the Sunday to accommodate SGA's request and tried very hard to meet their needs for the election in less than two days. Perhaps there is a misunderstanding of the complexity in setting up an online election. Usually, we are not able to provide customized programming support in less than a week."

Pugsley defended the SGA election timeline, noting, "The reason why [the elections council] did not start before Monday was because they didn't have a field of candidates yet because the petitions for the candidates weren't due until Friday afternoon at 5 p.m."

Dean of Student Affairs and SGA advisor Ann Hanson said, "The request [for an online voting forum] was made, but the person who usually helps them was leaving on vacation and didn't have enough notice to get it completed before he left. He gave it top priority when he returned. In the future, the SGA plans to give ITS more lead time."

SGA President Samuel Rodriguez '04 is adamant that the SGA did all it could to get the elections up on schedule.

In an interview with The Campus on Sunday, he said, "We did not violate the SGA constitution in so far as we upheld all of our obligations in order to have elections occur on time. ITS did not meet its obligations. The Handbook is meant to govern the school, and we did our best but we were disempowered by, it seems, a specific official who is unwilling to fulfill his obligations. I refuse to accept any accusations that the SGA has violated the elections rules because we have done our best and we don't own ITS."

Pugsley, who addressed the elections delay along with Taylor while Rodriguez was out of town over the weekend, said that he tried several times to reach Hanson after 4 p.m. on Thursday, but was unable to speak to her before the weekend. Taylor printed ballots on Thursday in case manual elections would need to be held, but Pugsley and Taylor hesitated to use this electoral method without a go-ahead from Hanson. "We didn't want to have elections that would be rendered illegitimate," explained Rodriguez.

On Sunday night, Rodriguez and Pugsley were also waiting for advice before informing students of the elections delay.

"The problem still remains: what am I going to say in this all-student e-mail? I think it would be best if we could wait to talk to either Dean Hanson or Eric Davis who can let us know about proper governance," said Rodriguez. Students were not notified of the elections delay until Monday at 9:24 p.m. when an all-student e-mail sent by the SGA announced the cancellation and notified students that elections had been rescheduled for Wednesday and Thursday.

Elections on Wednesday and Thursday will fill 10 of 15 open Senate positions. Only members of the first-year class and Wonnacott Commons will have an opportunity to vote. Five first-year students are campaigning for two Senate positions, while two students are contesting a single Wonnacott Senate position. Seven Senate positions are uncontested.

Rodriguez admitted, "Could the election's council have put up more posters. Sure? Should I have encouraged them to do so? In retrospect, absolutely. Hindsight is 20/20."

Taylor said, "We probably did not publicize it as much as we should have."

Rodriguez plans to hold the first Senate meeting on Sunday. Though some Senate positions will still not be filled, Rodriguez noted, "We will at least have quorum this Sunday," referring to the number of Senators required for voting on Senate bills.

"My plan for the Senate meeting will be to have the comprehensive cabinet report, as usual. Introducing the Senate to what the cabinet has been doing, I would have each cabinet member forward their report to the newly elected senator and expect those senators to review the reports and be updated for the next session of the Senate," explained Rodriguez.