As Georgetown University Student Association representatives filed out of their meeting Tuesday night, having tabled their long-awaited election bylaw reforms for another week, a plate of brownies lay untouched in the corner.
“They were sort of a motivation,” Andy Asensio (CAS ‘06), GUSA Director of Communications, said. “The idea was that, ‘if you pass these, you get brownies.’”
Since mid-September, GUSA has planned to vote in a series of reforms to close the loopholes in the election bylaws that have caused a series of embarrassing fiascos in past student elections, most notably in last year’s GUSA Presidential Election. This Wednesday is the second in two weeks that they have tabled the resolutions.
Despite the delays, the changes were held up, as the GUSA assembly representatives could not agree on the details of alterations. Now, any proposal to reform the bylaws will be submitted in writing by members of GUSA before the next meeting in two weeks, on Nov. 30.
“I think people are getting frustrated that it’s taking so long,” Asensio said.
The proposed reforms would include allowing increased time for candidates to campaign, eliminating the system of fines and disallowing the use of endorsements from student groups on campaign materials. None of these changes will go into effect unless the bylaw reforms are passed as a whole.
“A lot of people have different visions for what they want Georgetown to be and, because of that, we get hung up in the nitty-gritty, and I think that’s a problem,” former GUSA member Craig Kessler (SFS ‘07) said. “I think that GUSA has an unbelievable amount of potential.”
While some GUSA members remain upbeat, other representatives, including Drew Rau (CAS ‘06), believe the lack of progress to be an indication of problems in GUSA’s general structure.
“It’s just structural inefficiency and ignorance,” Rau said. “A lot of our problems will be solved by looking at the system as a whole and by minimizing the bureaucracy.”
Despite the intense debate going on within GUSA and the pressing need for election reform, many students simply feel unaffected by GUSA’s attempt to restructure the election process.
“Their changing of the bylaws doesn’t move me one way or the other,” Ana Telez (SFS ‘06) said. “It amuses me that they can’t come to an agreement.”
