But will students vote again?

by Megan Stewart

UVSS chairperson candidate Agata Lis isn’t calling for a second election—she’ll leave that up to voters.

With 1,148 votes in her favour before last Friday’s re-count, Lis trailed her opponent, Penny-Lane Beames, by 10 ballots. After the March 11 re-count, that margin is down to four votes. Because of a number of complaints, however, the re-count has not muffled the suspicion that a second election would bring about an alternate result.

Lis, the current UVSS director of finance, has a list of complaints for the electoral office, the governing body that oversees campaigning, polling and ballot counting. Her concerns deal with a number of election shortfalls, which include, among other things, a shortage of ballots at various voting stations.

“We’re talking 10 votes,” emphasized Lis before the re-count. Her slate, the Coalition of Independent Students (CIS) was elected to seven out of eleven seats on the Board of Directors, while being denied any of the four executive positions. Lis questions if the final tally accurately reflects the choice of the student body in the first place.

There was a shortage of ballots on the afternoon of March 4 at the McPherson Library, the Student Union Building, the Engineering Lab Wing (ELW), and the MacLaurin and Clearihue buildings. Kathy Borneman, chief electoral officer, says students were directed to the nearest alternate polling booth but said, “It’s impossible to guess how many students were turned away.”

When it was clear there was going to be a shortage, the elections office began printing additional ballots and at the same time moved ballots from less-visited polls to busier ones. However, at certain times there were no ballots at five different voting stations, a fact Lis said might have been preventable in at least one case.

Borneman said the electoral office has yet to receive a complaint regarding the shortage of ballots.

Lis said the higher turnout at various polling stations could have been predicted, especially at the library and the ELW. She expected that more engineers would be coming out to vote than in previous years because her slate, CIS was campaigning heavily in and around the ELW, an area she considered a “key campaign zone.”

With two engineers—Mike Waters and Bill Gallop—running for director at large, Lis said it was “a factor that should have been taken into consideration” and more ballots could have been allocated to that building.

In 2004, a total of 97 people voted at the ELW and this year’s rise to 140 voters is higher than the average increase in voter turnout.

Deputy Elections Officer Jon Bradbury said the polling station in the ELW was only short ballots for several minutes. But Lis said she still wonders if the number of voters would have increased had there been ballots available. Would those students have voted for Lis or other members of the CIS slate? “You never know,” she said.

Beames said she had never thought of the possibility of a second election until approached by the Martlet, but said she can’t consider herself the elected chairperson until the results are ratified by the UVSS. Should enough of the student body voice concern over the lack of ballots, say 300 to 400 people, Beames said she would be in favour of upholding the ideal democratic process and “would be hard pressed to say ‘no’” to a second election.

In consideration of the 2004 turnout of 2,208 on-campus voters, 2,300 ballots were printed this year. Borneman said the elections office was not expecting a significantly higher turnout this year. The total number of on-campus voters this year increased by 17 per cent to 2,573.

Borneman said she would call a second election only “if there was an overwhelming voice of students who were unhappy with the decision.” The chief electoral officer decides if the election results are fair and accurate and presents the results to the UVSS who ratify the election, making it official.

In the event of a complaint, the electoral office would consider what the student felt went wrong and why he or she were requesting a second vote. The electoral office would not need to know which candidate the student supported. Any ruling of the chief electoral officer may be appealed to the electoral committee within 48 hours, and any decision of the committee may be appealed to the UVSS within the same time limit.

Borneman applauded the efforts of both the electoral office and candidates for garnering attention and enlisting support. “We tried to increase voter turnout, but it goes to show that the candidates were recruiting votes too,” she said.