For the first time this year, Tufts' student government has filled all positions on the Elections Board (ELBO), allowing the once defunct body to run upcoming Senate elections. ELBO's first task is to administer a special midyear election on Feb. 14 to fill three Tufts Community Union (TCU) Senate seats and one empty slot on the Committee for Student Life (CSL).
The three TCU Senate seats were vacated when juniors Ashley Wegener and Mernaysa Rivera went abroad and sophomore Melissa Carson resigned. Replacement senators will serve until April elections.
The seat on the Committee for Student Life (CSL) has been empty since this fall but ELBO shortcomings precluded an earlier election. The previous ELBO consisted of only three of the five constitutionally mandated members
"We couldn't function without the manpower," said then-ELBO Chair Bruce Kessler. "We stopped running elections because we couldn't guarantee they would be fair."
Despite the prolonged absence of one student representative, the CSL insists that it has experienced no trouble. "There was absolutely no problem while we lacked another member. We haven't been weakened at all," said CSL member Marco Carbone.
Two people have declared their candidacies for the CSL to this point, and petitions for the Senate will be available next week.
The new ELBO chair, sophomore Shane Mason, said that a fully-stocked ELBO will improve the quality of the campus election process. "For the first time in a long time we have a full elections board. They are a good group that will get a lot done," he said.
The board will allow candidates in the February election to run "reasonable campaigns," said ELBO Treasurer Valentino Caruso. The issue of what type of campaigning is permissible was hotly contested during the last election. Without a full board to enforce election rules, Kessler did not allow postering, chalking, or any form of advertising other than face-to-face campaigning and the official debate organized by the Election's Board.
To ensure fair elections, ELBO will keep a close eye on paid poll workers, who have been blamed for voting improprieties in past elections.
"There were issues of poll workers influencing people to vote one way or another," Mason said. In past elections, workers could often be found at polling tables reading books or studying, often shirking their election responsibilities. During this fall's freshmen election, several candidates reported that voting areas were not staffed during at points during the day.
Mid-year elections are common, as some student government representatives resign each year, while others are removed from office, or travel abroad. Last March, three senators were elected in a similar mid-term election. Every candidate walked away with a Sentate seat.
"I think there will be contested elections this time around," TCU Senate President David Moon said.
While newly elected senators will join the body more than half way through the year, Moon hopes to get them integrated as soon as possible. The Senate's upcoming second-semester retreat is this month..
"The retreat should help bring some continuity to the Senate and help us achieve our goals for the year," Moon said.
Moon encourages students to get involved with their student government elections. "We need larger turnouts in elections. Right now we get about 1,200 students, which is quite low," he said.
To increase voter participation, ELBO is revising one of its election procedures that forced candidates to collect 100 student ID numbers along with signatures before their name could appear on a ballot. In the past, some voters were hesitant to sign petitions for security reasons, since Tufts uses social security numbers to identify its students.
"I was reluctant to give my social security number to random students knocking on my door with petitions last fall," freshman Farley Jones said. The new system will ask students to provide a phone number, so that ELBO can verify the petition if necessary.
This election could also be the last pen-and-paper one held at Tufts. ELBO hopes that the Senate races and presidential election for next year's officers, to be held this April, will be conducted online.
"Online voting will simplify the process and hopefully increase turnout," Caruso said.
The possibility of holding an online election by April, however, is contingent on the current Senate finalizing the implementation of Tufts Polls, a software program that conducts students surveys over the Internet. Tufts Polls has been in the works for nearly three years, but the Senate is reassuring students that it is now prepared for field tests. The Senate still has not finalized date on the release for the program.
