A former member of the undergraduate student government election board is formally challenging the current board’s decision to shorten the election voting period.
Next week, the Undergraduate Students Association Council Judicial Board plans to review a petition calling for the current elections calendar to be extended. This year’s voting period shrunk from four days to 56 hours, or from 9 a.m. Tuesday to 5 p.m. on the Thursday of week 6.
The Judicial Board, which is composed of six students, reviews cases to ensure that the USAC bylaws and Constitution are upheld.
The USAC election code mandates that polls for the spring USAC elections stay open for at least three full days. But the lack of a specific definition for “full days” in the code has caused some different interpretations to emerge this year.
Ian Cocroft, a former USAC Election Board member, filed a petition against the Election Board Friday, asserting that board members violated the election code by cutting down the election time period to less than 72 hours this year.
Some current board members interpret “full days” as business days and chose to shorten the voting period in an effort to give students the Monday of sixth week to reflect and think about the elections.
Anthony Padilla, the USAC Election Board chair, said he stands by the board’s decision to change the calendar.
Cocroft, a second-year political science student, said he thinks the shorter voting period may cause voter turnout to decrease and disenfranchise voters. But members of the USAC Election Board do not think the shorter voting period will be the only factor determining voter turnout.
For the past seven USAC elections, polls have opened the Monday of elections week and closed that Thursday.
“I don’t think anyone can say with certainty that (the change) won’t affect voter turnout,” Cocroft said.
The petition calls for the calendar to be changed so polls remain open for at least 72 hours. The Judicial Board will vote on the petition after holding an open-court hearing.
Matt Satyadi, the chief justice of the USAC Judicial Board, said he does not know of a complaint similar to Cocroft’s that has come up in the past 40 years.
“We kind of have to play it by ear because we don’t have many past cases to look at,” said Satyadi, a second-year sociology student.
A closed preliminary hearing for the case is currently set to take place Wednesday. After that, the Judicial Board would have a week to hold a court of hearing and then up to two more weeks to file an official decision, Satyadi said.
But Cocroft said he hopes to expedite the process so councilmembers can vote to change the calendar at the next USAC meeting.
Satyadi declined to comment on whether the Judicial Board would expedite the process for the calendar to be in place before the elections.