By Laura Rodell

The Student Government Association held an informational meeting on Friday to announce that SGA vice president, Russell Akiyama, will not be able to complete his term in office or seek a new one in the 2007 election due to registration complications. SGA also took the opportunity to revise the timetable for election-related activities.

Matriculated undergraduates with a minimum 2.5 G.P.A. are eligible to run for and to serve as vice president, according to the SGA Constitution. Students who do not meet this criterion are automatically removed from the race and/or the position.

“There was a problem with my registration last semester that turned into a problem with my registration this semester and it’s something I’m currently working out,” Akiyama said.

Akiyama had already largely decided against seeking office after the other half of his ticket, SGA president Peter DiSilvio, ran into a separate eligibility issue a couple of weeks earlier.

“I graduate next year, so I’m not going to have the same kind of time as I did this year,” said Akiyama. “I was actually telling people that this was maybe even a little blessing in disguise because there are a lot of post-graduate things I need to take care of right now if I want to have [them] finished by the time I graduate.”

Since DiSilvio and Akiyama’s re-election bid had been unchallenged – though they would still have needed roughly 850 signatures and 350 votes to assume office – at least one new ticket is required in order to hold an election.

SGA held a second candidacy declaration meeting (the first having been a month ago) on Tuesday, during which any interested and qualified undergraduate students could declare their intent to run. Relevant information was posted on the University’s portal and on Facebook groups.

“The biggest debate that we had in senate was over how to balance running an efficient election with trying to get it open to and noticed by the student body,” said Kathleen Hunker, the SGA fundraising committee chair.

Hunker added that the declaration meeting was initially slated for last Friday, but was pushed back to Tuesday in order to give potential candidates more time to prepare. At the time, it was unclear whether DiSilvio would be able to run, and students were reluctant to declare their candicacy until DiSilvio’s issue was settled.

“We thought that there were going to be very few, if any, people declaring at that meeting because no one was sure what was going on,” Hunker said. “A lot of people agreed with [DiSilvio’s] stances on issues and liked what he did in office, others might have been hesitant to run against him because he has such popularity. A lot of people at that point were also waiting to see if Russell was planning to run because he had a lot of support as well.”

SGA also approved a new set of dates for signature gathering, campaigning, debates, the presidential/vice-presidential election and the election of cabinet chairs. Students can vote for president and vice president through Blackboard from May 2 at 12:45 p.m. until May 3 at 5 p.m.