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Appeals process carries on

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by Nick Penzenstadler

Tuesday, October 31, 2006

Now that the victory parties have been quieted, the University of Wisconsin Associated Students of Madison Student Judiciary is deep in the appeals process. Several organizations are challenging the ASM election, citing a variety of issues affecting the Living Wage initiative and Student Union Initiative.

The Student Election Committee is also challenging UW freshman Byron Eagon — who ran for a seat on ASM Student Council — on allegations of illegal campaigning.

SJ Chief Justice Josh Tyack said the case brought against SEC by six ASM representatives alleges the Student Union Initiative should not have been on the ballot at all.

The petition cites several infractions with the ASM Constitution, according to SJ representative Sol Grosskopf.

"They are complaining it's wrong for a multitude of reasons. One is that it's an all-or-nothing vote, where they couldn't vote for just Union South or Memorial Union," Grosskopf said. "Another is that segregated fees should be consistent with the policy detailed by the university."

The petition also cites several infractions by Wisconsin Union representative Rachelle Stone and Wisconsin Union President Shayna Hetzel, who allegedly "misled students on the impact of voting 'No.'"

The Student Labor Action Coalition also filed a complaint with SJ regarding the recent ASM election, citing disenfranchisement of eligible voters.

"There was no transparent way for students out of town to cast their votes," SLAC representative Mark Supanich said.

Supanich is also a member of the Teaching Assistants Association, which is concerned with the low voter turnout and alleged lack of absentee voting availability.

But Hetzel said everyone who wanted to vote had the opportunity, even if it wasn't convenient.

Supanich noted that although SLAC was satisfied with the election results of the Living Wage initiative, it is concerned with the polling situation and the Student Union Initiative decision.

If the election were to be held again, Supanich said he is confident the results would be consistent with the last spring's election.

"I would expect to see results similar to those in the spring when the students decided 'No' on the union initiative and 'Yes' on the living wage," Supanich said.

But historically low turnout is commonplace when deciding monumental initiatives at UW, Hetzel said.

"[Less than 7] percent is not ideal with the paper ballot, but it's not abnormal," Hetzel said. "In 1999, with the Student Activity Center, only 7 percent of students turned out, and in 2000 with the [South East Recreational Facility] expansion there was only 6.8 percent."

According to Hetzel, the decision for the Unions could get pushed to the next semester's vote because of the lawsuit between six ASM representatives and SEC. If that happened, Hetzel said, another effort would be launched to garner support for the Union renovations.

Grosskopf said the election results would be scrutinized by SJ to ensure the outcome of the election was obtained in a clean and fair process.

Questions have also been raised recently about whether the two initiatives will be implemented into university policy.

"Whether or not the initiatives are binding or advisory only is the real question," Grosskopf said. "The cases that we are handling will be precedent-setting for future elections, and could affect how our elections are handled in the future on this campus."