Concordia Student Union To Now Run Elections Through Online Voting

New Councillors, Fee Levy Changes Also Approved in By-Election

NewsElaine Genest — Published January 20, 2019

Out of almost 37,000 eligible student voters 2699 voted, giving the CSU a 7.4 per cent participation mark. This year’s by-election turnout showed a 90 per cent increase of participation compared to the March 2018 elections, which had 1424 voter participation.

Chair of the CSU committee mandated to research online voting Patrick Quinn said the result exceeded his expectations. “I thought the result reflected how passionate the Concordia community can be, when you propose the right ideas to students. Online voting was one of them.”

CSU Finance Coordinator John Hutton said he was pleased with the turnout. “The elections went off quite smoothly. Actually there was some concern with the implementation of online voting being a tight timeline, but we managed to persevere and get it done.”

“Never in my wildest dreams did I expect 96 per cent of voters to back online voting,” Quinn continued.

A referendum on restructuring the CSU’s fee-levy also passed, which means decreases will be made to the CSU’s Student Space, Accessible Education, and Legal Contingency Fund fee-levy to increase the fees collected for their advocacy centre, operating fees, and clubs. The change won’t create any increased fees for students.

“I’m personally really excited that the fee levy referendum passed, because we didn’t change what the students are paying overall,” said Hutton. He also said the passing of the fee levy referendum means that these services will have stable funding in the future, allowing the CSU to reduce their deficit.

Results for the CSU Council of Representatives

Student’s elected to open seats on the CSU’s council of representatives were also announced.

Arts and Science Representative:

Jane Lefebvre Prevost — Elected
Yes: 303

Victoria Bolanos Roberts
Yes: 258

Elliott Boulanger
Yes: 184

Esther Morand
Yes: 168

Anne-Marie Porter-Laporte
Yes: 71

John Molson School of Business Representative:

Samuel Miriello — Elected
Yes: 273

Lee Alejandro Boswell — Elected
Yes: 255

Arad Andrew Banis — Elected
Yes: 240

Victoria Pesce — Elected
Yes: 191

Danielle Vandoldes-Beaudin — Elected
Yes: 180

Engineering and Computer Science Representative:

Eduardo Malorni — Elected
Yes: 225

Patrick Lavoie — Elected
Yes: 218

Salman Fahim Syed
Yes: 207

Raphael Yeung
Yes: 201

Carl Abou Jaoude
Yes: 151

Mohamoud A. Mohamed
Yes: 44

Malik Ayhiles Tahir
Yes: 25

Gonzalo Noriega Argandona
Yes: 14

Fine Arts Representative:

Eliza McFarlane — Elected
Yes: 95

Pat Jouryan Martel
Yes: 55