Ohio University Student Senate voted Wednesday to hold more than a dozen debates during spring elections to allow more candidates to express their views.
Ohio University students will have more than a dozen opportunities to hear Student Senate candidates speak during the active campaign period in the spring.
The senate body voted Wednesday to increase the number of debates by allowing debates for all elected positions rather than just the executive candidates.
Last year there were fewer than five debates, all of which focused solely on executive or presidential candidates, Vice President of Student Senate Jared Ohnsman said.
The spring elections will feature a total of 18 debates, one for each academic college senator position, each residential green senator position, the off-campus senator position, the international affairs senator position and two executive debates, Ohnsman said.
“We definitely know turnout will be low,” Landen Lama, lead parliamentarian and election committee chair, said. “I like to be optimistic in thinking there would be more than 10 people there, but, you know.”
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Some senate members had mixed feelings about an increase in the number of debates.
“I really like the idea of having a debate for each college senator, it allows them to express their own personal views,” Brian Stover, the College of Business senator, said. “But we already know that we have, I think, 15 percent voter turnout, so that shows how many people don’t really care, or don’t choose to make that effort to make their best judgment in their votes. If there’s nobody there to watch it then what is the point in debating?”
Jack Davies, Honors Tutorial College senator, said adding more debates was “an absolutely brilliant idea.”
“The previous years, the only people who were allowed to speak in public to an audience and were capable of answering questions were execs,” Davies, who is a Post columnist, said. “The others were restricted entirely to social media, to chalk, to street conversations.”
The debate resolution was the only one out of five campaign reform resolutions to pass during the meeting. The other four were tabled, including one that would raise the funding cap for independent candidates from $10 to $900.
“If we really want to focus on taking money out of politics, which I hope that we would, so that politics can be judged by merit, argument and not how much money you have, I think it makes sense to consider that and vote appropriately,” Ryan Powers, a Student Union member, said during Student SpeakOUt, which is held at the beginning of senate meetings.
Another election-centered resolution proposed that all academic affairs candidates, all residence life candidates and all off-campus candidates must run independently. In past elections, those candidates were permitted to join a ticket.
The resolution was tabled until the next general body meeting once the body realized the resolution presented to the body was different than the resolution approved by the Rules and Procedures Committee.
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@mayganbeeler
