Two weeks ago Student Senate passed new guidelines for this year’s student body elections. This week I am going to post in a three part series on the changes to these guidelines for the student body elections next semester. In each post I will write about one of three major changes to the rules. These changes are:
- Reduction of the spending caps
- Change in the time line
- Creation of the President/Vice-President “ticket”
Today’s topic is the reduction in spending caps. This year the caps have been reduced to $2000 for the President & Vice President “ticket” with an additional $800 for the candidates for Vice President of Student Organizations & Vice President of Campus Activities ($500 each if they join a “ticket”). This change is largely ceremonial, but still important. Last year’s caps for each candidate was raised to $1500 from $500. The idea was to raise the caps high enough that no one would be able to reach the ceiling. To understand this logic we must first look at how the Elections Committee holds candidates to a cap. In years past the caps for individual candidates were between $300-$500.
Adam, Thad, and Mallory look at our hard work after a day of banner making for my VP of Student Organizations campaign in spring 2008.
However, it was widely known that most candidates overspent these amounts by double or triple because Elections Committee could not accurately assess how much a candidate had spent. Thus by increasing the caps, honest reporting was encouraged. Still, large spending caps do is create mental barriers for candidates of low economic status who at first glance cannot afford to spend $1500 on a campaign. Elections Committee must work with candidates who struggle financially to help them understand how they can effectively campaign without breaking the bank.
In the end, I don’t believe that money can buy an election at Miami. I was elected last year with the highest margin of victory ever for a president, but I spent only a little over $800 to elect 3 candidates. Anyone who has run in an election knows that hard work and relationships are a candidate’s most valuable assets and $1500 cannot buy these.
