Ebnit elected SGA President

As the Student Government Association elections wrapped up, write-in presidential
candidate Ithaca sophomore Adam Ebnit and vice-presidential running-mate Erica
Johnson, Jenison junior, won with 462 of the 1026 votes.
As write-in candidates, Ebnit and Johnson needed a minimum of 450 votes to even
be considered candidate.
Ebnit said he was extremely excited about winning the election.
“I know it was very close, we got 12 votes over necessary number of votes.
I’m pleased that students went out to voice their opinion,” he said.
Compared to the 1,200 students who voted last year, Ebnit said this year was
a little low.
“I was hoping for a little more. I don’t know if it was the (public
relations) or not, but I’m pleased at least 1,000 got out.”
Ebnit said he thinks next year will be wonderful.
“I’m extremely excited to work with the administration,” he said.
The first goal Ebnit said he wants to accomplish is to start a committee to
look at the vision of student government.
“I want to try to determine the priorities for SGA. It would be a committee
to work throughout the year to produce a document to show how SGA is going to
run for the next four years,” he said.
After a campaign that started with all candidates wanting to run a clean race,
someone wrote negative chalk messages about one of the candidates across campus.
Then on Tuesday, after all candidates were required to stop campaigning, a person
was handing out stickers for Presidential candidate Ebnit and his running-mate
Johnson, according to SGA members.
A meeting took place Wednesday between all members of the election committee,
chaired by Windi Yager, Beaverton senior, and all candidates running for any
position to discuss the matter.
At the meeting the issue of campaigning after the deadline was brought up and
Ebnit and Johnson said they knew nothing about it, which is believable, said
Presidential nominee Steve Latour, Berkley junior.
“We (all) left that meeting with the understanding that we were going to
confirm with our campaign staff that nothing was going on,” he said.
Some felt the decision to allow Ebnit and Johnson to remain in the race violated
the section of the election rules, reading: “On election days, candidates
will not be allowed to campaign anywhere on campus and all campaign material
must not be within one hundred feet of the ballot boxes. There are NO EXCEPTIONS
to this rule and violations will result in immediate disqualification.”
“If they knew the rule, they should have taken themselves out of the race,”
Latour said.
After the issue was addressed at the meeting, some students reported the stickers
were again handed out Wednesday.
When asked about the allegations of campaigning after the deadline, Ebnit said,
“I have no comment on that.”
The SGA elections committee said in its release, “the presence of viable
write-in candidates has encouraged SGA to examine its elections practices. Although
there have been allegations of violations, the elections committee has not found
any such violations.”
They continued, Section 3, letter P of the elections rules said “the decisions
of the elections director and the elections committee are final without argument.”
“We need to take a serious look at the election rules because they are
not clear with write-in candidates,” Latour said.
Other candidates included Latour and Angela Lewis, Saginaw sophomore, who came
in second with 314 votes and Melissa Gill, Sterling Heights junior and Jonathan
Seyferth, Muskegon junior, who received 250 votes.
“Congratulations to Adam and Erica,” Seyferth said. “We lost
and we are disappointed, but everyone ran a great race.”
Latour echoed Seyferth’s statement, saying he is looking forward to the
following year.
“We are going to enter a new era and I am excited,” Latour said. “Erica
and Adam will do a great job and 462 students believed that.”
Revisions to the SGA constitution, which was also on the ballet, passed with
887 votes.
“I was really upset that the constitution was written the way it appeared
on the back of the ballet,” said Dave Jones, Jenison senior.
SGA members passed the drug and alcohol free portion of the constitution and
then the exact wording of that portion was changed, he said.
In the original document that SGA passed, the wording said that members of SGA
would not use any illegal substances at SGA events. In the version that was
voted on by students, however, it said that members of SGA will remain drug
and alcohol free during SGA events, which would mean that prescription medication
could not be taken before attending one of these events, Jones said.
Johnson could not be reached for comment.