SGB elections infractions filed, retracted

Politics is a dirty game, even here at Pitt.

This week, the Student Government Board Elections Committee — a group of students tasked with overseeing the SGB elections — called both of the slates containing presidential candidates into hearings to discuss election code infractions. But those unknown individuals who filed complaints about infractions dropped them before the committee could reach a decision.

Last year’s Elections Committee — whose chair is appointed by the SGB president and whose members are chosen by the chair — dealt with zero reported infractions.

However, that hasn’t been the case this year.

“A lot of disappointing things have been happening,” said Annie Brown, the current SGB Elections Committee chair, appointed by President James Landreneau.

At 7:30 a.m. on Tuesday, the Elections Committee held its first hearing to assess complaints of infringements on the SGB election code. Gordon Louderback, current SGB Board member and presidential candidate on the Forbes slate, said his slate was involved with Tuesday’s hearing, but he declined to say on what side.

Louderback and Brown also refused to comment on the other parties involved in Tuesday’s hearings and on the specific complaints, but Brown did say that the charges have been withdrawn because the Elections Committee had seen “inconsistencies with the evidence” and was under the impression that some of the evidence may have been gathered illegally.

The SGB Elections Committee presides over the hearings and administers the rulings. In attendance are the complainant and defendant parties, and whatever witnesses they choose to bring. Brown said that punishment of any parties found guilty would depend on the severity of the infraction, and that the most severe infractions could affect a candidate’s eligibility to get elected.

The hearings were to continue into Wednesday, when the Steel and Stone slates, who were the accused, would have also been brought before the Elections Committee, but the charges were dropped the night before.

Brown also declined to comment on the parties and complaints involved in Wednesday’s hearing, but Sowmya Sanapala, a candidate for the Board on the Stone slate, said the complaint was that some of her slate’s flyers were taped directly to walls — a violation of a posting regulation.

“From what I heard, [this election’s] been more dicey than it’s been before,” Sanapala said.

Hearings involving Steel and Stone as well as other unnamed slates were scheduled for Wednesday as well, but those who filed the complaints dropped them.

Brown said she believes that the complainants dropped the charges because they felt the hearings were taking up too much time and distracting the candidates too much. She also said she doesn’t expect any more complaints to be filed, but added, “you never know, there’s still two more day before the election.”

Brown also mentioned that this election cycle has seen incidents of vandalism, as well, but it is unknown whether those actions have been done by those campaigning or by people uninvolved in the campaign.

Natalie Rothenberger, current Board member and presidential candidate on the Steel slate, said that a banner for her slate that hung on the trailer outside The Pitt Stop on Forbes Avenue had been taken down last weekend. In addition, Mary Mallampalli, current Community Outreach chair and SGB candidate on the Pitt United slate, said that someone had been taking down the flyers of the Forbes and Fifth slates.

Brown confirmed these claims, saying that two police reports had been filed with the Pitt police in response to the vandalism, but to no avail.

In an attempt to combat the nastier tone of this year’s election, Brown had sent out an email to all candidates on Monday, which she paraphrased, “tensions run high in the last week and people can get nasty … it’s good to remind the candidates that this can be a fun process and to engage with it positively.”