New rules for MSA elections
New regulations were put on candidates' campaigning and materials.
Published Sept. 14, 2007
A new set of election guidelines was approved Wednesday for students interested in running for president and vice president of the Missouri Students Association.
MSA Senate's Board of Elections Commissioners revised its handbook to clarify regulations and guidelines for slates choosing to run in the 2008 elections.
"We hope that changes to this year's book makes things run more smoothly," BEC Chairwoman Amanda Morlock said.
The handbook was ratified at Wednesday's Senate Meeting with only one small change to the draft.
The amendments have been made in response to the skepticism that resulted when the slate of Sameera Ali and Kelley Robinson was eliminated from last year's race. The two were alleged to have caused damage to other slates' campaign materials.
Morlock said when she was appointed that she wants to avoid the controversy and problems from last year's election. One way Morlock wants to prevent problems is to clarify the points system, she said.
At the beginning of the election process, each slate receives eight points. These points are often removed to account for offenses throughout the election process, and a slate must still have one point at the end of the campaigning period to run for office.
Changes to this section of the BEC Handbook clarified BEC's policies on attendance and related violations. A slate can be absent or late to one meeting. Any tardiness or absence after this point merits a one-point decrease and additional absences merit two-point decreases.
Also, clarifications were made to the handbook to separate providing mistaken information on BEC forms from providing intentional false information. If a slate accidentally writes the incorrect date, misspells a word or something of that nature on a form, the members receive only a one-point penalty, but purposefully incorrect information will take two points from the slate.
In addition, the BEC Handbook sets maximum amounts for fines for offenses, instead of only setting minimum fines as in previous years. The BEC also added a section that mandates the hearing of oral arguments in cases where the slate potentially faces being removed from the election.
"Clarifying the duties of the court in relation to elections will hopefully make sure that any serious infractions and penalties are dealt with properly," Missouri Students Association Clerk Valerie Miller said.
Some other changes made include the process of notification to the commission when changes are made to slates' Web sites or Facebook.com pages or when videos are posted on sites such as YouTube.com or Google Video.
According to the BEC Handbook, Web sites can be publicized as early as Sept. 29 and must be approved by two members of BEC.
Before making future changes to the slates' Web site, the slate must notify BEC. After this point, the BEC can notify the slate of items they find inappropriate and the slate will have 24 hours to make the changes the BEC feels necessary. This includes pictures, adding or deleting text and logos on all blogs, social networking sites and Web pages.
A new section was added to the BEC Handbook, noting the growing popularity of sites that allow students to post their own videos. This section explains that the same process used for updating Web sites or other electronic material will be used for posting videos.
In the past, each slate has been provided with 100 official BEC fliers advertising the date, time and Web site link for voting. This year, the slates will each receive 50 official BEC fliers and one campus-wide e-mail to notify the student body of their existence and to encourage them to vote.
"The 2006 election was the first time I have experienced a slate being disqualified from the election," Miller said. "I feel that the student body was disappointed with the decision because they did not understand the BEC's role and the rules of the handbook."