News
 

Bell rings, Student Voice silent in runoff

Candidate wins SGA vice presidency with 67.7 percent of vote

By Geronimo Rodriguez
Senior Staff Writer

UH 4 U's Matt Bell defeated Student Voice's Alysia Minor with 67.7 percent of the 622 votes cast in the Student Government Association vice presidential runoff election, SGA Chief Election Commissioner Jason Short announced Thursday evening at the SGA offices.

Manuel Rearte/The Daily Cougar

---

Student Government Association Vice President-elect Matt Bell celebrates his runoff victory with Student Regent Laura M. Salinas on Thursday evening.

Bell's win means two of the three members of the SGA executive branch ? President-elect Jon Quintanilla and Bell ? won their respective positions on the UH 4 U ticket. Incumbent Student Regent Laura M. Salinas regained her seat during the March 10 and 11 general election as a Student Voice party member.

The commission received and dropped five complaints Thursday, the second day of the two-day runoff, including one from Frontier Fiesta Chairman David Dalton claiming a Student Voice campaign flyer regarding Fiesta was riddled with false information.

"The first problem I have with the flyer is that the facts are wrong, and the second thing is that the event would still go on without Student Voice," Dalton, who is serving his second consecutive term as the event's chairman, said. "At the same time, we appreciate Student Voice's support."

The flyer states that Faisal Zahed, a former student regent and Student Voice member, was the "sole student champion" in 2001 "in the fight to save a space for Fiesta." The flyer says Vice President for Student Affairs Elwyn C. Lee and then-Vice President for Administration and Finance Randy Harris neglected to set aside space for the erection of Fiesta City in 2001.

Education Senator-elect Lori Posey and Bell both filed complaints against Minor for campaigning less than 50 feet from designated polling locations, but the commission said they were not notified of a change in designated polling locations Thursday.

Public relations freshman Kelli Anderson filed two complaints against Quintanilla, one of which claimed he campaigned inside the M.D. Anderson Memorial Library on Wednesday. The second complaint alleged that Quintanilla used copy machines at the library to duplicate campaign material.

After an investigation, the commission decided Quintanilla was not campaigning inside the library and said using its copy machines does not violate the SGA Election Code.
 

 Send comments to dcnews@mail.uh.edu