After a week-long delay and exodus of members from the Elections Board (ELBO), eight freshman senators were chosen at yesterday's Tufts Community Union (TCU) Senate election.
Voters yesterday also cast ballots for a the open seat for the TCU Judiciary, but ballots were not counted because of controversy over whether the election was fair. A mass e-mail was sent out endorsing Phil Berenbroick, allegedly by Tufts Republicans, could be in violation campaign protocol. ELBO did not comment on the situation, and it is unclear whether Berenbroick was aware of the e-mail. Votes will not be counted until the issue is resolved.
An estimated 350 ballots were cast at the campus center, and at the end of the day eight new freshmen senators were elected. Adam Koeppel, Jacqueline Zapata, Jon Gold, Rachel Marx, Rebecca Francis, Robert Brentley Patterson, Vincent Ebhojiaye and Vuong Nguyen were selected from a field of eighteen freshmen.
Koeppel led the group with a strong lead of 166 votes, while Gold, Zapata, Marx, Patterson and Francis each received more than 100 votes. Close calls had to be double-counted, such as Ebhojiaye's 91 votes, and Ben Rubenstein's and Uchenna Anykiam's 88 votes each. In the end, the three votes made a difference - Ebhojiaye was elected, the other two were not.
The elections were supposed to be held online last Friday but were postponed because of miscommunication between the ELBO members and iBallot.com, the company hired to administer the virtual election.
The delay forced the Senate to postpone its annual retreat, scheduled for last weekend, and it has been tentatively rescheduled for the weekend of Oct. 19.
The delay prompted the resignation of ELBO members Shane Mason and Adam Mueller. Valentino Caruso, the only remaining member of ELBO, ran yesterday's election and counted votes with former TCU Senator and former Trustee Representative Jesse Levey.
Due to the complications with the election, some students expressed concern that freshmen have already lost faith in student government.
But some of the new senators are nevertheless optimistic. "I think that once the Senate starts getting things done and starts getting back to work, hopefully their faith in student government will be restored," newly-elected senator Gold said.
Candidate Laura Taranto, who did not win a seat, said she lost the enthusiasm required for an extra week of campaigning. She explained that her commitment to rugby limited the time for self-promotion with voters.
She added that an online election would have yielded a greater turnout. The polling stations were only open until 8 p.m., whereas an online vote would have allowed students to cast ballots during a 24-hour period.
"They should have made sure that they would be able to pull off the electronic voting before they started [the election]," Taranto said.
But for some candidates, the extra week gave them a chance to campaign even more. ELBO held another "Meet the Candidates" forum where Senate hopefuls spoke to a small audience.
Other popular campaign methods included hanging up posters around campus and going door-to-door to meet students.
"Meeting people in person was the best way to form an identity with the students much more than a poster or advertising could," said Gold, who visited about 350 students.
Koeppel also relentlessly toured dorms. But interaction did not method did not guarantee a senatorial seat. Wittels said he visited many students in different dorms, but was not elected.
Other campaign methods were more creative, but produced varying results. Francis, one of the elected candidates, stood out because of the rhyme that she made out of the letters of her first name, Rebecca. A number of candidates hung posters that read "Sex!" at the top to attract readers' attention. But the gimmick was overused and did not bring the results candidates Fleischman and Taranto wanted.
Some candidates created team tickets with joint promotional posters. The results, however, were mixed. The Koeppel and Zapata ticket worked, while Rubinstein and Bailey did not. Taranto, who was not elected, shared her ticket with Ebhojiaye, who was.
