Well they did it. The SGA finally passed a referendum. Congratulations to everyone in SGA on your hard work and dedication.

However, the simple truth is I voted down the referendum. Why? Well there are many reasons.

The number one reason was because I don’t think SGA has shown they possess the ethical fortitude of one who wants control of who gets extra money.

SGA has assured that the council in charge will deal out the money in a fair way. President Calvin Stafford went so far as to even include “The Hawkeye” in one of his letters to the editor, as though we felt our paper’s funding would come under fire.

Forgive me if his words do nothing to sway me.  How can we trust SGA to be fair with our money when they can’t even be fair with their own elections?

Imagine my surprise when I saw a campaign video supporting the referendum on the ULM website page students were told to go to in order to vote.  I’d like to point out here that SGA did not break any current rules by posting the video.

But posting that video on the landing page is nothing short of electioneering. Just because the rules are not up to date with the technology does not mean the principle doesn’t apply. It would be ghastly if SGA had set up a video near a polling place (something that is against the rules). But there are no rules against it, so why not.

I get it. I understand. SGA wanted to leave a legacy. They wanted to be able to say they did something to benefit the students. And kudos to you all. But it would have spoken volumes about all of you had this referendum been better organized from the start.  Why were senators taking classes on the referendum in the weeks leading up to the vote? Shouldn’t they have already known about it since they passed it and all?

Why was there hardly any debate on the necessity of the referendum?

We go to a university with the only public pharmacy school in the state, but we have no chemistry major. Faculty is being cut left and right. And every college, school and program is taking a hit.

And though all of that is no fault of SGA, was it in good taste to initiate a fee increase on a student body that’s already paying $3 for every $5 in the budget? And for what? So VAPA might get a little more money than the couple of dollars they get now?

If you remember only one thing from this semester let it be that instead of choosing a legacy of uncompromising integrity, SGA decided to institute more fees in hopes of accomplishing where the last two administrations failed—passing something.

If SGA is any indicator of the types of leaders we have coming up in Northeast Louisiana, then God help Northeast Louisiana.

These folks are set to become leaders of the state, and so far the only leadership I’ve seen out of them is when they play follow the leader out of the door after 15 minutes of something that somewhat resembles a meeting.

So President-elect Jana Robinson, can we count on you to initiate some kind of ethical reform of SGA?

Can we look forward to fair elections that not only follow the written rules but the standards of election practices essential to a just democracy?

Can we look forward to meaningful debate in the SGA about things that will affect the students instead of roll calls and social gatherings?

I hope we can.