Westwood Neighborhood Council election results challenged

Following the first-ever Westwood Neighborhood Council election that took place on June 26, a number of challenges have been submitted to the Office of the City Clerk regarding campaign violations and voting procedures.

Roxane Stern, secretary of the Westwood Neighborhood Council Transition Committee, said she felt there were a series of campaign violations during the election. In her challenge application, Stern said she observed people wearing T-shirts promoting Team Westwood, one of the slates, within 100 feet of the polling place, as well as Team Westwood flyers inside the polling center.

“This is a campaign violation which prohibits electioneering within 100 feet of the polling place,” Stern said.

However, Steven Somers, student director-elect who ran with Team Westwood and a third-year communication studies student, said the rules were explicitly stated by the city clerk, and members of his slate made sure to remain outside of that zone.

“We made sure to abide by all the rules stated,” Somers said. “Regarding the challenge, all the members of the slate cooperated with these procedures to the best of their abilities.”

In addition, Stern noted in her challenge submission that there was an abnormally high number of people voting by mail.

“I reviewed the Vote By Mail roster and identified those who did not seem eligible for that ballot,” Stern said. “A few of them were actually at the polls and there was documentation.”

Deborah Carabet, who ran for an at large director position as a write-in candidate, also submitted a challenge that questioned some of the stakeholders who voted in the election. She said in her submission that Team Westwood members had told many people that they were stakeholders and could vote in the election just because they were sitting in a Westwood park. Since it was unknown as to whether or not these individuals in the park were affected by the results of the election, Carabet said in her submission that this was an act of promoting fraud in the election process.

Brent Gaisford, a Westwood Coalition candidate who was elected rental residential group director and a third-year economics student, also said he felt there was an irregularity regarding who was considered a stakeholder in the election.

“With the way the rules of the election are set up now, there is likely to be error,” Gaisford said. “Many people were brought in to vote, even though they didn’t have identification.”

Carabet also said in her report that she had talked to a local business owner who told her that Team Westwood members threatened to boycott the establishment if the business owner did not vote for Team Westwood candidates.

Somers said even though these challenges were submitted by the July 14 deadline, the outcome of the election will be hard to overturn since many of the candidates won by such a large margin.

“Stakeholders still have all the right in the world to file their claims,” Somers said. “The right outcome to the election will be had eventually.”

Stern said she filed the complaint to call into question the voting practices enforced on June 26. Even though she would like to see the election run again, she said she knows it is not a very practical solution.

The challenges will now be submitted to a challenge review panel within the city clerk’s office, where a decision will ultimately be made as to whether the election is to be considered official.

Gaisford said he hopes the panel will declare the election official.

“If the panel declares the election null and void, then another election wouldn’t come for two years,” Gaisford said. “It would be a huge waste of city resources, and as a student, I wouldn’t be able to run in it again.”

Gaisford went on to say that although some disputes have been raised as far as this election, he hopes the results will become official so he can get started on making a difference.

“These challenges can help us change some of the election rules, as a council, as far as who the stakeholders are and proper campaign procedures to be enforced,” Gaisford said.

The deadline for the Challenge Review Panel to issue its verdict to the city clerk is Aug. 24, and the deadline for the city clerk to issue the final challenge report is Sept. 2.

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