By Michael A. Harris

Staff Writer

The CLAS Student Assembly last week passed legislation establishing dates for elections for the 51st CLAS Student Government Assembly and executive officers, but the elections may or may not be legal.

Under the legislation, which was passed by a unanimous vote of the Assembly, elections will be held over the course of a three-day period beginning on Monday, April 23 and ending Wednesday, April 25.

This year's elections are actually in violation of the CLAS Election Act, which states that five election commissioners must be certified as the CLAS Election Commission no later than November 1st of the year preceding the elections. As of press time only two out of the five commissioner positions had been filled.

"The College Wide Election Review Committee, which has the ultimate jurisdiction in all election matters, could refuse to certify the election results on the grounds that the Assembly failed to comply with the election act," said former Assembly Speaker Jonathan Judge (PHD).

"While I am confident that there will be a commission in place in the near future and that elections will definitely take place, CWERC could say 'you violated your own rules' and block BC from having a student government next year., Judge said, adding that he was fairly confident that CWERC wouldn't exercise that power. "I think that they might use it as a hook to say 'get yourselves together and comply with your own rules', but I highly doubt that they would deny the student body a student government on the basis of a technicality," he said.

Regardless of the certification question, Student Government officials vow that elections will take place as scheduled.

"We will be amending the Election Act on Tuesday to ensure that everything is 100 percent legal," said CLAS Assembly Speaker Pinni Bohm (PHD). "I am confident that our elections will go on as scheduled without any problems."

Bohm also expressed concern over another potential hurdle. He said that Assistant Dean for Student Development Vannessa had recently informed him of a rule passed by the CUNY Board of Trustees that required student governments to certify the dates of their elections by December.

"We just learned about this requirement and at our next meeting [last Tuesday] set the dates for elections," said Bohm. "I haven't actually seen the rule yet, so I don't know how rigid it is, but we may well be in violation of it and it may make our elections as they are currently set illegal. I will know more once I see the legislation that she is referring to."

Bohm said that if the rule turned out to be very rigid and that there were now ways around it he would go before the CUNY Board of Trustees and request an exception. "Elections will take place this April and there will be a student government next year. I am certain that the CUNY Board of Trustees would recognize the importance of student representation and grant us an exception were that to be necessary."

If that were to become necessary this would be the second year in a row that the CLAS Student Government had to go to the CUNY Board of Trustees for an exemption. Due to the timing of last year's spring break, elections had to be pushed into May, requiring Judge to go before the Trustees and request an extension.

All political parties must submit their slates no later than this Thursday, March 15th. The week-long petitioning period for candidates will begin at noon next Monday, March 19 and run through noon on Monday, March 26. The CLAS Election Act requires that all candidates for President and Vice-President gather at least 350 signatures and that candidates for all other offices collect a minimum of 70 petition signatures. No political Party may run more than 17 members for the 29-member Assembly.

Former Assemblyman Cory Provost (USL), who is rumored to be running as that Party's candidate for CLAS Student Government President has already criticized the Assembly over the days of the week that the elections have been set for.

"The elections be moved to Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday," said Provost. "That would allow those students who are campaigning for office to miss fewer classes, as there would be two days with common hours." Provost also proposed extending the elections to four days, so that Thursday would be included.

While initially receptive to considering Provost's proposal, Bohm later stated that dates for elections would stay as initially scheduled.

"Dean Green set up a meeting with me after hearing Cory's proposal and explained to me that there is a major college event scheduled for that Thursday with President Kimmich that was scheduled long ago," said Bohm. "Elections have to happen when they do."

Provost did not return requests for comment on either his potential candidacy or the days of elections.

Under the Act all CLAS students are eligible to vote for CLAS President and Vice-President, members of the CLAS Student Assembly, USS Delegate and Alternate USS Delegate and representatives to the Student-Faculty Disciplinary Committee.

This would be the second year in a row that students will be voting electronically, using laptops, which once again sparked controversy as a few Assembly Members raised concerns that electronic voting resulted in a lower voter turnout and resulted in students having difficulty navigating the ballots. Their objections were withdrawn after it was agreed that external mice would be used in this year's elections.

Bohm, a major proponent of laptop voting's ease of use and decreased cost plans to permanently amend the CLAS Election Act this week to explicitly provide for laptop voting.

"Voter turnout in student government elections has been steadily decreasing since 2003," said Bohm. "Laptops have nothing to do with that they will serve to make voting easier for students, tabulation easier, and election abuse harder."

Polling sites will be open from 9:00 a.m. until 5:00 p.m. during all three days of the elections.