Oswego State Student Association passed several changes to its bylaws April 16, with many pertaining to how SA will handle elections in the future.

While the SA elections for president and vice president were held in early March, the election results were not announced until April 17 amid investigations by the Student Association Supreme Court after receiving complaints about campaign violations by candidates, according to an email sent out by Edward Kelly, current SA vice president.

The bylaw changes passed on April 16 were written and submitted by Matthew O’Donnell, an SA senator representing Johnson Hall and chair of the Rules and Judiciary committee. O’Donnell said it was time to update the election rules, as many have not been changed since SA was founded.

“These bylaws, the brunt of them were made in the late ’60s early ’70s,” O’Donnell said. “We need to update them because some things just don’t work anymore.”

Kelly agreed the update was needed to reflect the current needs of students.

“It’s good to review your bylaws every few years just to ensure you’re up to date,” Kelly said. “If we operate on things from the ’60s and ’70s, are they still relevant to our campus? We were finding the policies we were operating under were not.”

The changes included a bill altering the definition of a polling site to include personal electronic devices as distinct polling places, as many students vote online by LakerLife instead of the designated voting areas provided by SA. Previous SA election rules required candidates to remove all campaign material from areas within 20 feet of polling sites the day before and during the election. It included personal electronic devices as polling sites.

“There was a need [to review the rules]. In observing the past election, if there were certain things that, for example, if there were any posters that were left up, somebody could be in violation because anybody’s polling site is their phone,” Kelly said.

This means a candidate could violate election rules inadvertently due to the widespread use of personal electronics, making nearly every campaign poster on campus the responsibility of the candidate to remove in a short time period.

“It’s impossible for someone to take down posters all around campus in one night,” O’Donnell said. “There should be electronic polling sites that you do on your phone, and there can be physical polling sites.”

O’Donnell submitted a bill, which passed, outlining how SA would operate these physical polling sites. At least one site would be offered and would be operated by two senators that were not candidates to ensure fairness. 

According to O’Donnell, only about 1,100 out of about 8,000 students voted in the 2018 election, and changing how voting is done may get more students involved in the process.

“I think we can get these numbers up,” O’Donnell said.

Another change was to restrict the use of official SA email addresses for campaign purposes. As the use of an official email system would be unfair to candidates challenging a sitting executive, only personal email accounts can be used for campaign purposes.

O’Donnell said he plans to submit another election bylaw change relating to social media posts. With current rules, social media posts could be treated as campaign material and would have to be removed before the election, which may not possible if the candidate did not make the post.

“We already entered [the age of social media], and we need to adjust our bylaws,” O’Donnell said. “One of the big problems we have that my community has brought up to me is when people are posting [campaign material] when polling has already started. Under our current bylaws, we have to penalize the candidate.”

Under current rules, candidates that violate campaign rules may face disqualification from the election.

“I think it’s more fair,” said Sarah Nashak, a senior at Oswego State. “If you’re not running, why does it matter? You’re just supporting a friend, so it’s fair to leave it up.”

Raising awareness for the election was also a positive move, Nashak said.

“As a student, I don’t really know what goes on unless I’m actively involved in it,” Nashak said. “I think seeing those posts will actually make me want to go vote.”

SA taking social media into account is important for Kenny D’Amico, an Oswego State junior, but he said he worries whether students could be too easily impacted by social media posts.

“A lot of people don’t know what’s going on … they’ll see one post [and be influenced],” D’Amico said.

Another student, junior Daniel Frawley, agrees with updating the election bylaws.

“The candidate having to police social media and have it on themselves to take care of that kind of thing is unrealistic,” he said. “If it’s something the candidate did not post themselves, I don’t think I can hold them responsible for something someone else put out there.”

Photo by Kassadee Paulo | The Oswegonian