Big win for Freedom

Freedom Party members thought they had lost. The slate's presidential candidate, Lee Sprague had even given a concession speech the evening of the last day of the election, and opponent Jon Artigo accepted as the new Associated Students' president.

But Artigo's reign was short, and you can bet Freedom Party members were shocked to discover that all five of the slate's candidates on the ballot won their positions as president, vice president, treasurer and two representatives at large.

"All I can say is that I picked qualified people and our position was never to dominate the election," said Sprague. "The Freedom Party's only agenda was to create a government where [the programs other slates proposed in their platforms] could happen."

Sprague said his slate's first three proposals will be programs from Student Struggle's platform.

The slate is satisfied with the elections, despite its complaints about an election committee decision to remove two Student Struggle slate members' names from the ballot and complaints about their campaign literature being removed and replaced by a parody of their posters.

The Freedom Party was not alone in filing grievances. Seven grievances were filed, but according to election committee member Eric Granera somebody went through his things and misplaced a couple of them and the committee requested that those missing be resubmitted.

"We have six here," Granera said pointing to his binder, "but I know there are seven."

The election committee was supposed to meet yesterday to discuss Tuesday night's count and the grievances that were filed, but two members could not attend and it was rescheduled for next Monday, committee members said.

This semester 2012 ballots were cast, which means 7.6 percent of SF State participated in the battle between the Freedom Party, Students for Students, Student Struggle and five independent candidates, for the 21 slots which will be vacated this May.

Tuesday evening the third count was tabulated and the results matched a previous count. However, because the committee did not meet and members who had the final count did not come to school, the numbers could not be released.

According to Granera, now that the vote count is matching for all the candidates, the results must go before the Associated Students Legislature for validation before becoming official.

But, in order for results to be approved by the legislature, the seven grievances have to be decided first by the election committee and then by the grievance committee, a new committee designed to replace the missing judiciary branch of the Associated Students.

"It all depends on the grievance committee," he explained. "They have to meet."

To date, the grievance committee has never met, despite a letter written by Camillo Cruz, the chair of the election committee, requesting members of the committee to meet at the mandatory candidates meeting on March 5, Granera said.

And though the final results still have to go through the election committee and the legislature, the second count results are accurate enough to distinguish next year's officers.

Sprague received 942 votes, or 50 percent, to take the top Associated Students position, president. Artigo received 835 votes and the independent candidate, Elizabeth Campos received 113, according to counts Monday.

For the Associated Students second spot, vice president, Lorena Soto-Rios of the Freedom Party had the most votes, 932. Student Struggle's Arash Yaganehdoost had 795 votes and Clayton Marrow an independent candidate had 128 votes.

The new Associated Students treasurer will also be from the Freedom Party. Eva Jimenez got 955 votes, while her opponent, Poppy Surowski of Student Struggle, received 846 votes.

The five class representatives will be: Paul Chang as graduate representative, Kelly Tharp as senior representative, Eric Hammer as junior representative, Ricky Montenegro as sophomore representative and Sarah Low as freshman representative.

The six school representatives will be: Nellie Rahimzadeh representing creative arts, Marisol Pinto representing ethnic studies, Olivia Ruiz representing health and human services, Langston Edwards representing behavioral and social sciences, Cole Krippene representing humanities and Terri Wong representing science and engineering.

The six representatives at large will be: Michele Agid, Kurt Brown, Emily Cabaccang, Bitta Farahmand, Yolanda Jenkins and Sheldon Norberg.

A three-way tie for Education Representative among Rebecca Rios, Raymond Collado and Tueria Jenkins will have to be decided in a special election later this semester, according to election committee members.

There were several write-in candidates, but election committee member Anom Chavez said, "There was nothing significant like last year's election.

"I am the only who wrote in 'Model Minority?'."

Last year 190 Asian students protested the elections by writing in "Model Minority?" because there were no Asians on the ballot.

[ Golden Gater Online March 28, 1996 ]

[ Top of document ]