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Petition disrupts student election

The Associated Students of Madison elections for two open seats on the Student Services Finance Committee, the segregated-fee governance body, were disrupted Tuesday night after former Student Council chair Austin Evans filed a petition.

Evans filed his suit against Student Election Commission chair Shelton Roulhac, alleging there are “irregularities” in the elections, according to Student Judiciary Chief Justice Nathaniel Ramano.

“[Evans claimed] one [SSFC] seat should be a one-year [term] and the other a two-year [term] … In the election, they’re both being run as one-year seats,” Ramano said.

Roulhac violated a resolution designed to stagger elections of newly created SSFC elected seats, according to Evans’ complaint. The resolution passed last year while Evans was council chair.

“The SEC has failed to show … proper knowledge for how to implement the resolution,” Evans stated in his complaint. “I have strong suspicion that [the resolution] was not read by the members of the SEC.”

The petition requested the suspension of the SSFC elections and the nullification of the results, followed by an “immediate re-election.” It also suggested an investigation of sanctions for the “gross incompetence in the proper implementation of [the cited resolution].”

Ramano granted Evans’ petition for preliminary relief in a limited fashion, which will allow the elections to continue accepting votes for the two candidates, but prohibit the SEC from releasing any results until the Student Judiciary makes a decision.

The Judiciary will hear the case Friday night.

Brad Vogel, who is running for one of the SSFC seats, said he thinks it is ridiculous that the elections and results are “under seal.”

“There are definitely areas the SEC could improve as far as running elections, but I think it would be better if this had been addressed earlier,” Vogel said. “Basically what this comes down to is a technicality and I don’t think it’s right to disenfranchise all these student voters.”

Vogel said he suggested to the Student Judiciary a better alternative to stopping the election would be assigning the candidate with more votes the longer of the two terms.

“I think we should … find a compromise that all parties can agree to and make sure this election counts for all students,” he said, adding an outcome different than the one Evans suggested is in the interest of students.

Vogel said he does not know why Evans waited until the election started to file a complaint.

“The only reason [I can think of] is to try and stop people from getting elected, because there are only two candidates running for two open seats,” he said.

UW junior Jenny Johnson, the only other student running for SSFC, could not be reached by press time.

Evans and Roulhac did not return phone calls by press time.