The elections board will consider changes to campaigning rules for future elections in light of questions raised at a hearing Sunday afternoon by two candidates for the Undergraduate Finance Board, said elections board member Sarah Rutherford '12.
"Next year, we're definitely going to try to increase the transparency of the system," elections board chair Kening Tan '12 told The Herald. Rutherford added that by bringing up issues during campaigning, candidates provide input for discussion about improving the rules for future elections.
At Sunday's hearing, chair candidate Adam Kiki-Charles '11 and vice chair candidate Jason Lee '12 questioned whether candidates should be allowed to run on a ticket with an unopposed candidate who only needs 5 percent of the vote to win, Rutherford said.
In UCS and UFB elections, "running on a ticket only refers to campaigning strategies," Rutherford said, adding that "one of the biggest advantages and incentives to running on a ticket is the advantage of gaining advertising" through "the ability to mention another candidate positively." Using a point system where each type of campaigning costs points, individual candidates receive 100 points and $40 to campaign, while running on a ticket together allots a total of 150 points and $60.
Kiki-Charles and Lee voiced concerns over whether students running unopposed would give all of the campaigning funds to the candidate with whom they shared the ticket, thus giving them an advantage over individual candidates.
Chair candidate Salsabil Ahmed '11, who is running on a ticket with uncontested representative candidate Kelly Wess '11, The Herald's sales director, told The Herald that running on a ticket with a chair is positive because it gives the representatives with more attention than they would otherwise get while campaigning. Since representatives "do the bulk of the work" for UFB, Ahmed said, they should not be "marginalized" during the campaign.
The elections board ultimately concluded that because no groups violated rules regarding how funds are allocated when running on a ticket together, the issue would be considered for future elections, but could not be applied in this case, according to Rutherford.
Kiki-Charles and Lee also asked for more transparency in how candidates spend their funds. Rutherford said the elections board will also examine the rules pertaining to this issue for the future.
"I just wanted to raise the question so that it can be considered for next year," Kiki-Charles said.
Campaigning can be done in very creative ways, he added.
Rutherford also said that this year the elections board has run into issues with vague rules pertaining to campaigning through Twitter, blogging and listservs, and more concrete rules should be established in the future.
Campaigning is now winding to a close with the polls opening at 12 p.m. Tuesday and closing at 12 p.m. on Thursday.
