USG delayed in implementing referendum on recommendations

The USG elections managers are “slightly behind schedule,” chief election manager Tony Xiao ’12 said on Sunday evening.

Two candidates said that they were not asked whether they will choose to sign the pledge until they recieved an e-mail from the USG at 12:25 p.m. on Sunday. The referendum requiring the statement was first submitted by Eric Kang ’10 in spring 2009.

At Sunday evening’s USG Senate meeting, Xiao reported that roughly 80 percent of candidates had responded to the question and that these responses had been posted on the USG website. The remaining 10 candidates, he said, would be contacted by phone for their responses to the pledge. Candidates who had not yet responded were listed on the website as “pending.”

At midnight, the candidates listed as pending were Laura Pedersen ’12, Hanna Tian ’13 and John Allen Zumpetta ’11. Of the candidates who had responded, 25 said they would sign the pledge and 22 said they would not.

The USG also did not post both referenda scheduled to appear on the ballot by midnight the day of the election.

“We’re going to be working on that tonight,” Xiao said on Sunday evening. “We’ll announce the list tomorrow to the school.”

The referendum that had been posted calls for the Honor Committee to make its three alternate members regular members on the committee, bringing its membership to 12. The text of the referendum was posted on the USG website by Honor Committee chair Peter Dunbar ’10 on April 13. Dunbar and Class of 2011 president Alex Rosen ’11 publicly supported the referendum in a guest column in The Daily Princetonian last month.

The second referendum’s place on the ballot has been guaranteed since its first appearance in spring 2008, when it was proposed by Kyle Smith ’09. The referendum, which surveys student opinion about top-level University administrators, includes a final question asking whether the survey should appear on the following year’s ballot. In 2008, 73 percent of respondents voted to approve the recurrence, while it passed with 75 percent approval in 2009.

Referenda appearing on the ballot are submitted by the general student body or members of the USG Senate, or are “self-perpetuating,” reappearing due to approval on the previous year’s ballot.