Updated on 3/24 at 1 p.m.
The ASUO Constitution Court ruled Friday that the Multicultural Center measure is in full compliance with the ASUO Constitution and shall be placed on the 2001 ballot. The measure requests an $18,555.87 cultural programming fund, which would come from an increase in student incidental fees. Justice Ahsan A. Awan issued the court’s unanimous opinion.
The decision, along with a second Court decision released Tuesday, clears the way for this year’s student elections to resume sometime during the first few weeks of spring term. A timetable for that to happen has not yet been established.
Five student senators, led by Sen. Mary Elizabeth Madden, petitioned the Court to dismiss the MCC ballot measure based on two main arguments: allowing the MCC to allocate student incidental fee money would usurp the authorities of the Programs Finance Committee and the Student Senate to make those decisions; and that the measure violated the viewpoint neutrality component of the University’s incidental fee system, which is bound by the Clark Document and must follow last year’s U.S. Supreme Court ruling in the Southworth case.
The Constitution Court’s decision denied the grievance filed March 7 by Madden and four other senators — Jennifer Greenough, Jackie Ray, Skye Tenney and Greg Zimmel. Court Justice Alan Tauber filed an injunction that same evening, and voting that had started on the MCC and OSPIRG ballot measures was stopped.
The general election was scheduled to begin March 5, but the Court postponed voting to hear ASUO presidential candidate Bret Jacobson’s appeal on an Elections Board decision to remove him from the ballot. Jacobson and running mate Matt Cook finished second in the primary election voting behind Nilda Brooklyn and Joy Nair, but the board ruled in favor of a grievance filed by vice presidential candidate Jeff Oliver. Oliver and his running mate, Eric Bailey, finished third in the primary election.
The Court ruled Tuesday that Jacobson’s due process had been violated and that neither Cook nor the candidates’ campaign manager Eric Pfeiffer broke Housing rules while handing out fliers in dorms, as charged by Oliver.
Jacobson and Cook will square off against Brooklyn and Nair for ASUO Executive once the general election is rescheduled. The MCC and OSPIRG measures will be on the same ballot. Check the April 2 issue of the Emerald for an update on the election.