In 1922, the Janss Investment Company purchased the land that would become the new UCLA campus only a few years later.
Since then, UCLA has been a critical part of the Westwood community as many of the community’s residents are students, faculty or staff. UCLA officially has about 40,000 students, and the official population of Westwood is about 52,000.
So it would only make sense that the newly formed Westwood Neighborhood Council, the community’s liaison to Los Angeles, would be comprised of mostly UCLA students. Yet that is not the case. Results of the election that took place Saturday, June 26 show that of the 19 seat races, only two are being won by UCLA students, one of which is a student seat and logically has to be filled by a student. One faculty member is also winning a seat.
This lack of interest is not caused by a lack of students running for positions. There were at least seven UCLA students running for various positions in the election. This lack of interest has two causes: First, the vote took place on a Saturday in summer vacation. Second, UCLA students failed to come out in large numbers.
In the summer, one can usually get Diddy Riese cookies without lining up on Le Conte Avenue, the In-N-Out drive thru line doesn’t normally extend onto the street, and street parking is a viable option. Campus and Westwood are noticeably emptier than during the school year. So by having a summer vote, the city, knowingly or unknowingly, disenfranchised a large part of Westwood.
But the entire blame cannot be put on the city. UCLA students failed to show up. While there are no reliable numbers on how many students voted in this election (I can’t believe they didn’t do exit polls and surveys), some rough math yields the fact that around 5 percent of students who are here in the summer voted.
As Brent Gaisford, a candidate on the Westwood Coalition slate, put it, “If we don’t show up to be the majority we are, it doesn’t matter.”
This pitiful turnout is not a surprise. Student government, which controls millions of dollars of student fees and should have high voter turnouts, just had an election with a turnout of only 35 percent.
But all is not lost. The UCLA community still has a voice on the council via the two students and one faculty member elected. Further, one of the most important aspects of the Council is the public forum it provides, according to Sandy Throop, who was a candidate to be an owner residential group director.
Therefore, it falls on Undergraduate Students Association Council External Vice President Chris Santos and his office to attend the Westwood Neighborhood Council public meetings and represent the undergraduate student voice.
The next round of elections, two years from now, needs to occur during the school year to include the bulk of the UCLA community. Even a small voter turnout of students would become a majority in Westwood elections.