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Sara Hamilton and Emily McLain will face off for the ASUO presidency in this week’s general election after having moved past the primaries Friday.
Hamilton and running mate Athan Papailiou received 1,108 votes to McLain and Chii-San SunOwen’s 969.
Hamilton said she and Papailiou have more budgeting and legislative experience than all the executive candidates combined and they know how to inspire change.
Hamilton said she and Papailiou recognize the need for change and have a willingness to tackle those problems.
McLain said she and SunOwen bring a wider range of experience because of their involvement with various groups. McLain said her work as the ASUO State Affairs Coordinator has prepared her for the position because she sat on the board of the Oregon Student Association.
“It has given me the experience of sitting on the same board the ASUO president does,” she said. “It has taught me how to lobby, advocate and work for students.”
SunOwen said her time on the Programs Finance Committee is essential because the next executive ticket needs to have experience with the budget process, especially after this year.
McLain said she and SunOwen have been on the streets every day talking with students and based their platform on what students wanted. These issues include improving the system of billing insurance at the health center, making course syllabi available at the time of registration and continuing to advocate for more affordability in higher education.
Hamilton said she and Papailiou will work to reform the budget process so that ASUO contracts and departments no longer compete with student programs for incidental fee money.
“Athan and I recognize the valuable contribution of student groups,” Hamilton said. “We will protect them. That’s what the incidental fee is for. It’s for the cultural and physical development of students.”
She said she wants to correct misunderstandings about issues such as Senate budget benchmarks, which she said are “targets,” not caps, for committees such as the PFC to shoot for. The entire process needs to be reformed in order to protect groups, she said.
“This is the reason I jumped in the race,” she said. “It’s exhausting work. It’s not always easy. We recognized the budgeting problems that surfaced this year, that contracts and departments compete with student groups. We were the first to come out and say this is unacceptable.”
Hamilton said anyone who characterizes Senate benchmarks as the sole reason for this year’s budgeting problems doesn’t understand the process.
SunOwen said PFC reform has been in the works all year and is something that she and McLain would continue to work on.
“We’ve seen that there are some speed bumps along the way in figuring out exactly how we’re going to manage that,” she said. “My experience being on the PFC this year – I am the only one who has sat on the PFC and has seen what’s wrong, what’s working and what can be fixed.”
McLain said a major problem with the ASUO is student groups are unfamiliar with the process. She said she and SunOwen will hold “ASUO 101” events and work to educate student groups about the process.
“So often students walk into Senate or the PFC or ASUO and feel intimidated, or it’s alien to them,” she said. “We really want to make sure that students know what they are doing.”
Every single candidate from Hamilton’s slate, known as the “Campaign for Change,” moved on as well. With the exception of Senate Seat 17 – a graduate and law seat – every single position up for grabs in the general election features a candidate from this slate. Kevin Parks, who is not affiliated with a slate, was declared the automatic winner of Seat 17 because he received more than 50 percent of the vote.
Hamilton said her slate is unique because she and Papailiou invited “independent” candidates, some of whom they did not know and do not agree with on some issues, to join.
“Athan and I began this journey – it’s really an election experiment – promising people they do not owe us any additional loyalty,” Hamilton said. “We recognize that motivation, passion (and) integrity matter more than political ideology.”
McLain and SunOwen have spoken out against slates, calling them a political tactic intended to get an executive ticket elected.
“It’s important to have candidates running individually who are motivated and supported based on their qualifications,” McLain said. “We supported different candidates from all the slates. We looked at each individual separately. We didn’t ask them for their support, we didn’t ask for their help, we didn’t ask for their vote.”
McLain said the problem with slates is members are chosen by other candidates and not voters.
“We support individuals who are motivated on their own,” she said. However, Hamilton said she and Papailiou did not choose their fellow slate members based on political ideology and said if she were to become president, she would be disappointed if former slate members based their votes on loyalty to her rather than their personal views.
“Our candidates were meant to represent all of campus,” she said.
Oscar Guerra, one of several candidates from the “Progressive Action Coalition” (PAC-8) to move past the primary, said he was very excited to have the chance to run for the EMU Board Senate Seat 4 and that he thinks he is more experienced than his opponent, Campaign For Change’s Kate Jones.
Shalan Ryan, another PAC-8 candidate, also moved on and will face Campaign for Change’s Neil Brown for Programs Finance Committee Senate Seat 3. Five of the 10 Senate races will pit a PAC-8 candidate against one from Campaign for Change.
Overall, 4,134 votes were cast in the election – roughly 20 percent of students. ASUO Elections Coordinator Dante Vivanco said this was a higher turnout than last year’s primary and general elections tend to have a lower turnout.
Hamilton and McLain will have two opportunities to debate this week. The formal debate, moderated by the Elections Board, is scheduled for 7 p.m. tonight in 282 Lillis.
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