Last Wednesday the DASB election committee reconvened with three of the four members in attendance. Chairperson Grace Bello, Vice President of Finance Lydia Lescalleet and current Student Body President Sharla Stevens unanimously dismissed a majority of the official and unofficial grievances from the three presidential tickets.

Student at large Mimi Stewart, the fourth member of the committee, could not make the scheduled meeting.

Though Bello, Lascalleet and Stevens said at a previous election committee meeting that they had worked unofficially for an unnamed candidate, they continue to preside in a judicial capacity over this year’s elections.

The question of the committee’s bias has yet to be resolved to the satisfaction of some candidates.

“This is a joke,” said Barrington Dyer, vice presidential candidate.

Presidential candidate John Carlsen also expressed not feeling represented by the committee as his presentations of election code violations on behalf of presidential candidate Binh Ly and vice presidential candidate Les Leonardo were unanimously dismissed one after another.

Grievances brought before the committee fell into three major categories: offensive flyers, listing of unofficial club and senatorial endorsements on flyers and using DASB resources to make flyers, an action prohibited by the election code.

Carlsen submitted a written statement taking offense at Ly and Leonardo’s flyers in which they write the word, “shit” with a popular cartoon character representing the letter “i.”

The committee unanimously dismissed this, citing the fact that the word was implied, but not spelled out.

Student Kay Fisher also submitted a letter taking offense at flyers put up by Dyer.

Fisher wrote that she felt Dyer was, “lowering respect for easily targeted groups, such as women and to people of color.”

Dyer read a prepared apology for any offense he may have given to women before the committee, which ended with a promise that he would enroll himself in a male sensitivity workshop.

Dyer was, however taken aback by the allegations of racism on a flyer which shoes Dyer with an penned-in afro hairdo with the words,”Will work fo’ free” beneath it.

“I’m black. My father is black. I can say anything I want,” said Dyer.

Lescalleet recommended ordering candidates Stephanie Lagos and Dyer to remove the offensive flyers, but in light of their previous decision to dismiss the grievances against Ly amd Leonardo’s offensive flyers, the committee dismissed this as well.

The second major code violation that was alleged by Dyer, Carlsen and Christopher Domingo against Ly and Leonardo was listing senators and clubs as supporting Ly and Leonardo’s campaign without official documentation of support.

The committee heard from two members of the newly formed Pilipino club whose endorsement was contested. The picture that they presented to the committee was of a fledgling club confused by campus politics and whose meetings suffered because of candidates’ animosity.

“It’s affecting our club in a negative way,” said one of the representatives.

Another contested club endorsement came from the Vietnamese Students Association. Though a written statement from the VSA President Tam Do and Vice President Tu Tram says the club supports Lagos and Dyer, Leonardo said he was sure the club voted to support he and Ly.

The decision on whether to entertain this grievance was tabled until the VSA executive officers could be reached for confirmation. “I’m not sure if I would believe the [VSA] officers.” said Bello.

Carlsen and Dyer agreed that candidates were told at a prior mandatory meeting of the necessity of securing a written endorsement from clubs. However, this allegation was dismissed on the grounds that there is currently no written policy for documenting an official endorsement.

Finally, the last major allegation of code violations was directed toward Ly and Leonardo by Carlsen and Dyer concerning the use of DASB office equipment in producing campaign flyers. Dyer listed several witnesses who saw Ly and Leonardo’s flyers being printed in the DASB office.

Leonardo produced a half-printed flyer from Lagos and Dyer’s campaign, which implied that Dyer might also have used the DASB office printer.

This last allegation was dismissed on the grounds that it was impossible to prove whether any of the printed flyers were used or simply thrown out after printing.

Lascaleet concluded the meeting by speaking for several minutes disapprovingly about the actions of all the candidates.

Lescalleet also said that there wasn’t any single code violation that would constitute a “big enough deal” to disqualify a candidate. However, vice presidential candidate Celeste Roschuni responded to this, saying, “… as it piles up, it becomes a big deal.”

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