Election day campaigning by both the SOUND and Prepared to Engage, Act and Respond parties came to a brief halt yesterday afternoon when confusion about an election rule left the candidates questioning if their edible handouts were in fact contraband.
Members of both tickets passed out slushies, suckers or pear slices in addition to their usual flyers, pens and stickers outside the fourth floor of Baker University Center for much of yesterday.
Candidates from SOUND won every position but one: the senator for the College of Fine Arts, which went to P.E.A.R. candidate Emma Hein.
A forgotten line in senate's election rules forbids candidates from passing out anything but stickers, buttons and flyers, but Board of Elections Chairman Matthew Denhart said the rule was invalid and allowed both parties to continue distributing food.
The rule prohibiting the distribution of food during Election Day appears under the section of the rules addressing voting with paper ballots. Since this year's election utilized only online ballots, that section of the rules did not come into play, Denhart said.
When originally contacted about the potential rule violation, Denhart was not aware the ban on food distribution existed.
Emily Hanford, running for president on the P.E.A.R. ticket, said she initially believed candidates would not be permitted to distribute food.
Our interpretation going into today was that we weren't going to hand out stuff
but last night we heard SOUND would be doing it said Hanford, who added that the members of P.E.A.R. cleared their actions with Denhart before making a late-night run to the store for pears and slushie supplies.
We had to keep up with the competition Hanford said. If they're handing out stuff
people respond to that.
SOUND had always planned to distribute food during Election Day, said Jesse Neader, who ran for president on the SOUND ticket.
By the time we heard it might be against the rules
even if we had stopped
we would have already been fined
Neader said.
Both Hanford and Neader said they thought the rules about what can be distributed during Election Day should have been made more clear. Denhart maintained no rule was broken.
That entire section is voided
Denhart said. Everything that was passed out this year was legal according to our interpretation of the rules.
Several instances of rules violations were brought to the Board of Elections during the 30 days of campaigning, and several of them resulted in monetary fines.
P.E.A.R. was fined $5 early during its campaign for the early launch of its website and blog.
Both tickets were fined for having members submit inaccurate grade point averages.
Three P.E.A.R. members - Christopher Wimsatt, Nathaniel Coman and Mike Calderone - were fined for reporting incorrect grade point averages on their applications for candidacy. Another three candidates - SOUND members Chelsea Previs, Adetunji Adedip and Rebecca Schueller - were fined for reporting inaccurate GPAs.
The tickets were fined $5 for each offense.
Another SOUND member, Christopher Uihlein, was penalized for negative campaigning after he called members of the P.E.A.R. ticket a bunch of little hypocrites
on Facebook. Uihlein was fined $20 and the SOUND ticket $5 for the offense.
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