September 14, 2006                                                                                                    65LCB#6

Sponsored by:                                      Megan Canon                           Second Vice President

                                                            Anthony Morfa             Graduate School Senator

Authored by:                                        Megan Canon                           Second Vice President

A Bill to Ratify the UCSU Election Code

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Bill History

As a result of the 2006 spring UCSU election, the court case, 2006-SP-02, was filed over alleged campaign financial violations made by Scott McEachron, UCSU Representative-at-Large candidate.  The complaints filed alleged that McEachron did not follow the UCSU Election Code regulations in Article VI, Section 10.1, stating, “Any executive ticket as well as any representative candidate shall only be allowed to have 50% of their spend budget donated to them.”  This clause can be interpreted in two ways, where 50% of the actual spent campaign budget can come from donations, or 50% of the allowed spend-able budget can come from donations.  The Appellate Court ruled in 2006-SP-01, that the latter interpretation was accurate. 

In order to avoid potential future discrepancies over this particular campaign financial regulation, this legislation aims to amend the UCSU Election Code to specifically state how much of campaign expenditures can come from donations, instead of giving a percentage number. 

Also in the same court case, the Appellate Court recommended that Legislative Council clarify the vagueness of election appeals found in Article VI, Section 13.1 and 13.2, because as it stands any penalties accrued during the election may be appealed to both the UCSU Election Committee AND the UCSU Appellate Court, where in the next section designates that the UCSU Appellate Court hears all appeals from rulings from the Election Committee.  The aforementioned sections are contradictory and thus need to be refined.

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Bill Summary

This bill would amend the UCSU Election Code to specify the donations limit on all campaign expenditures, and to clarify the appeals process for candidate/referendum group to use in the assessment of a penalty.

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THEREFORE BE IT ENACTED by the Legislative Council of the University of Colorado Student Union, THAT,

SECTION 1:    From Article VI, Section 10.1, the sentence, “Any executive ticket as well as any representative candidate shall only be allowed to have 50% of their spend budget donated to them,” shall be deleted from the UCSU Election Code, and instead the sentence, “Total monetary value of campaign donations shall be limited to $525 for any executive ticket and $175 for any representative candidate,” shall be inserted in its place.

SECTION 2:    From Article VI, Section 13.1, the phrase, “and may be appealed to the UCSU Appellate Court,” shall be deleted from the UCSU Election Code.

SECTION 3:  This bill takes effect upon passage by 2/3 of the entire Legislative Council.

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Vote Count

9/21/06                                                Passed 2nd Reading                          15-0-0

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                                                                                           Joe Martinez                     

Legislative Council President