The future of Student Government elections lies in the hands of SG members, who will vote at tonight's meeting whether to rid the process of party tickets or to make only minor changes to the process.
The election reform bill, AB 18, proposed at last week's meeting, focuses on individualizing campaigns in order to avoid ticket sweeps and create more diversity and accountability among assemblies. The bill also drastically increases each candidate's spending limit by nearly doubling and, in some cases, tripling limits.
Under the bill, only presidential and vice-presidential candidates would be allowed to run together, while at-large and college representative candidates would be on their own. Only oral endorsements of other candidates would be permitted, banning the distribution of materials listing candidate names, in order to prevent uninformed voters from straight ticket voting.
"People are handed a list of candidates, and they vote from the card to the computer," said Matt Ross, two-year-at-large-member and government junior. "The hope is it will open up so more people will run, and hopefully the most qualified will rise above the pack."
Ross said running individually will create more debates within colleges, thus creating more informed voters and bringing out more qualified candidates who would not have stood a chance to win if running independently against a ticket.
Michelle Fuller-Wigg, communications representative and public relations junior, said candidates who run alone are at a disadvantage, because they cannot enjoy the same amount of workers, money, publicity and resources as a ticket.
"As long as it is inherently easier for a student running with a ticket to run and win than it is for a student to run independently, the system will be unfair," Fuller-Wigg said. "We must attempt to level the playing field."
Supporters of the bill say they hope the proposed new system will eliminate the "popularity contest" associated with SG elections and begging students to run in certain offices in order to gain the financial benefits of having more candidates.
However, liberal arts representative Clayton Stewart, a government junior, said he believes the changes will only give way to more votes cast based on popularity.
"When a ticket is being built, you try to make it as diverse as possible," Stewart said. "When you have the underrepresented parts of campus represented on a ticket, you eliminate the popularity contest." Stewart said regardless of ticket affiliation, people are still going to vote based on familiarity.
SG President Brent Chaney, whose Focus ticket swept the 2004 election by 100 percent, said though he believes the election process needs reform, SG needs to take "baby steps" toward change. However, the English senior said one weakness of running individually was a possible separation of the president and the assembly, who could be pitted against one another if not sharing the same basic goals. He said the main focus of the elections should be to increase voter turnout and to educate voters.
AB 18 also proposes changing presidential and vice-presidential campaign limits from $450 to $850, or $1,200 if running alone. At-large candidate limits could change from $275 to $850, and college representatives from $175 to $500. Candidates would still be able to use the money for materials such as T-shirts and fliers, as long as they don't endorse multiple candidates.
Presidential and vice-presidential candidates would still be able to choose a common name to run under, as long as it has not been used in the past six years.
The Election Improvement Act of 2005 (AB 19) proposes less drastic changes than AB 18, such as providing links to candidate information on ballots, eliminating ticket names from the ballot and disclosing campaign financial records to be available to the public 24 hours after submission.
Chris Kennedy, two-year-at-large rep and economics senior, said the bill was not an alternative to AB 18 but supplemental ideas to improve the election process, whether or not tickets exist.
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