Early elections decide new campus representatives

Six of seven vacant seats in Student Congress were filled Tuesday through an online special election.

Results for the South Campus District 3 seat are pending due to a Board of Elections investigation into a potential violation of campaign rules, said Andrew Phillips, chairman of the Board of Elections.

Preliminary results released Tuesday night are as follows:

- District 2 (Middle Campus): Annalise Farris, sophomore

- District 4 (Granville Towers): Will Lindsey, freshman

- District 6 (off-campus): Cam Hill, junior, and Leah Josephson, senior

- District 8 (graduate students): Edward Franklin and Jordan Stobaugh

Phillips said the preliminary results will be verified by Saturday night and, by that time, the representative should be announced for district 3, unless the board has cause to extend the investigation.

He said the board chose to hold elections earlier this year than it has in the past to ensure seats are filled and the student body is accurately represented as early in the year as possible.

“This is the earliest in recent years that we’ve ever had a special election,” Phillips said. “And it’s also the only time in the last couple years that we’ve had a special election that doesn’t coincide with Homecoming.”

The early date, not aligned with the Homecoming elections, affected the preliminary turnout of 919 ballots, Phillips said

The Student Code requires the board to start action to fill these vacant seats within 15-30 days of the previous seat holder’s resignation, said Deanna Santoro, speaker of Student Congress.

Tuesday’s election was held to fill seven vacant seats in five districts — 2, 3, 4, 6 and 8 — but there were no candidates for district 8, and the candidates in both district 2 and district 4 ran unopposed.

Both of the elected representatives in district 8 were write-in candidates.

Josephson, a senior, said she entered the race to equal out the gender ratio in Student Congress.

She said all of the seats in district 6 were filled by male students last year, a statistic that defies the lopsided gender ratio that dominates campus as a whole.

“Women rule this campus, but this isn’t true when we look at who’s in power and administration,” she said.

Will Lindsey, a freshman, won the district 4 seat for Granville Towers without any competition, although he still campaigned online. He said he made sure to campaign without surpassing the board’s $10 financial limit on spending.

“This is literally my election to lose,” he said.

Lindsey said he chose to run for Congress to raise awareness of student representation in Granville, and to promote transparency in student government.

“I felt like not a lot of people in Granville knew much about student government and Congress, especially because we’re so Greek dominated,” he said.

“I wanted to bridge the gap between the Granville Towers freshmen community and the University community.”

Contact the University Editor at udesk@unc.edu