The Student Association executive board candidates presented their platforms at sweeps Wednesday night to the residential communities.
Karen Galan, elections committee chair (full disclosure: Karen Galan is a photographer for Pipe Dream), organized sweeps differently this year in hopes of making them more efficient. The event was held in Lecture Hall, rather than having candidates visit communities.
Each community had its own Lecture Hall classroom, which candidates rotated between. Residents from Hillside and Susquehanna communities did not attend the event.
Approximately 80 students attended overall.
“Our concern as a committee is voter turnout and sweeps is the way to do it,” Galan said.
Each candidate had two minutes to talk about their campaign and 10 minutes for follow-up questions from the audience. After the candidate(s) left the room, each community had the opportunity to discuss and endorse a candidate.
While some candidates were more laid back, others tried to pack as much information into their two minutes as possible. Some even filled any lulls with jokes or dances.
PRESIDENT
Jeremy Goldstein, who is running for SA president, said the focus of the SA needs to move away from the administration and back to the students.
He talked about the high prices in the University Bookstore and how he would like to bring those down.
Concerns about Goldstein mainly revolved around his lack of experience. However, he said he can make up for any lack of experience by sharing the problems of the “average student.”
Jared Kirschenbaum, the current executive vice president, is also running for president. He wants to work with Residential Life and wants resident assistants to be more involved with residence hall programming.
He responded to questions about the past SUNY SA scandal — where President Adam Amit, along with other delegates, were removed from the SUNY SA conference for drinking alcohol — with determination that an incident like that should never happen again.
“There can’t be any more scandals. We have to wear the SA emblem on our sleeve so we can always remember to be on our best behavior,” he said.
EXECUTIVE VICE PRESIDENT
With three contenders, the EVP position is the most fiercely contested.
Jenna Goldin, the only female candidate in the elections, wants to be EVP to give back to the many student groups she has been a part of during her time here. She said she is ”coming from student groups, for student groups.”
Randal Meyer plans to give groups more autonomy and have a variety of inter-community events.
Karl Bernhardsen would like to have group gatherings twice a month to discuss any issues instead of a Student Group Council, which is mandatory for student group leaders to attend once a semester.
VICE PRESIDENT FOR MULTICULTURAL AFFAIRS
Edmund Mays, current SA treasurer, is running unopposed. He wants to encourage collaboration of cultural groups on events and programming.
“I want to add to what Ricky [Da Costa, the current VPMA] has done and continue to work on making the office stronger by adjusting bylaws,” Mays said.
VICE PRESIDENT FOR FINANCE
Adam Shamah is offering his cell number to student groups, and also plans to work to get businesses to accept purchase orders from student groups.
Phillip Calderon said he would make use of PAWS discussion boards to make sure students know what is going on with the position.
VICE PRESIDENT FOR ACADEMIC AFFAIRS
Daniel Rabinowitz, an unopposed incumbent, plans to have student advocates detail the needs of the student body and groups that don’t have as much of a say, such as the disabled community.
VICE PRESIDENT FOR PROGRAMMING
Aaron Cohn, also an unopposed incumbent, brought on the laughter by saying he can “do only good, no evil.” He discussed plans for this year’s Spring Fling and hopes to make events like Frost Fest bigger and better next year.
More information about the candidates or the election is available on www.binghamtonsa.org/elections.