Adam Petkun and Mena Ravassipour clinched the race for ASUO president and vice president Monday, edging out Ben Strawn and Diana Aguilar by 112 votes at the end of general election voting.
Students cast 870 votes for the Petkun/Ravassipour ticket and 758 votes for the Strawn/Aguilar ticket. In all, only 1,731 students, or 9.86 percent of the student body, voted in the weekend-spanning general election.
“Mena and I are really happy that all of the support for us really culminated,” Petkun said. “There were a lot of people that put a lot of hard work into this, whether it meant waking up at 4:30 in the morning to go put up posters, or if it meant standing in the rain to talk to students … We’re grateful to all of them.”
Strawn said he was disappointed to have lost, but he similarly expressed gratitude to his campaign volunteers.
“If there’s one thing that has truly amazed me about this campaign, it is that so many people will sacrifice so much for somebody else, so selflessly,” Strawn said. “We owe a huge debt of gratitude to a large group of people, and we have no idea how to express that.”
Aguilar said she also is a little disappointed but she has faith in Petkun and Ravassipour.
“I think I owe the next president a hot dog,” Aguilar said. “I really do. I think I owe him a hot dog from the hot dog man … I think I’ll buy (Petkun) a hot dog, but I think he wants to buy me a hot dog, too. We have this mutual hot dog craze.”
The Progressive Students Starting Today candidate bloc added three more candidates to the 2004-2005 ASUO: Stephanie Erickson, Sarah Wells and Stephanie Stoll. PSST member Rodrigo Moreno-Villamar edged out three opponents to advance to a special election this week for ASUO Student Senate Seat 14.
The 13-member PSST bloc earned 10 government seats for the 2004-2005 school year. PSST’s campaign platform is geared toward giving a voice to underrepresented students on campus.
ASUO Elections spokesman Nathan Strauss said PSST’s success will probably spur more party-affiliated candidates in the future.
“I think it took a lot of candidates by surprise this year,” Strauss said. “I think next year people will be a little more prepared and there will be more than one slate.”
Elections are not yet finished, however. Because of a DuckWeb error during the primary election for Student Senate Seats 10, 12 and 14, the results were thrown out. Seats 10 and 12 were decided in the general election, but Seat 14 will require a special election to determine a winner. Moreno-Villamar and Spencer Hardy will compete in that election, which begins at 9 a.m. Wednesday and continues until 5 p.m. Friday.
Strauss said he expects an especially low voter turnout for that election because there are only two candidates running in the election.
ASUO Elections Coordinator Stephanie Day said it’s more difficult for candidates because they must campaign specifically to social science majors, “compared to anybody that walks by.”
Day said the elections board is planning to do what it can to help the candidates.
Strauss said the elections board has not developed a plan to raise awareness about the special election.
“I think the elections board will probably meet (today) and figure out what we want to do to promote this special election,” he said.