The Michigan Daily - michigandaily.com
Monday, December 10, 2012 - 5A
The Michigan Daily - michigandailycomMonday, December iD, 2D12 - 5A
CSG ELECTIONS
From Page 1A
"In the past, even in the smaller
November elections, we've had
way more candidates than there
are seats," he said, attributing the
lack of candidates to poor adver-
tisement of the election.
Walser argued that voter turn-
out for the CSG elections could
be attributed to other student
governments on campus rather
than to CSG itself.
"A lot of the turnout was the
result of the work of the LSA
Student. Government and other
student governments across
campus," Walser said. "It was
really embarrassing to me to
have CSG do virtually nothing
to advertise the election - that's
just a terrible precedent going
into the March election."
Walser said he also tried to
find an application a few days
before the election and couldn't.
"I imagine for students not
well versed with CSG, (getting
registered) would have been
virtually impossible unless they
were involved with a party," he
said.
In addition to problems cre-
ated by a lack of time, issues
concerning the Rackham and
LSA-SG representative ballots
were "unexplainable," Walser
said.
The Rackham ballot only
allowed voters to vote for one
person, despite eight seats being
up for grabs. That problem even-
tually led organizers to extend
the election 48 hours and release
an entirely new ballot for Rack-
ham students.
The LSA-SG representative
ballot allowed voters to choose
three candidates when only two
seats were open. In the end, the
third place finisher lost 531 to
436 total votes and 1,321 to 1,196
weighted votes, which are cal-
culated based on how students
ranked a candidate.
"I think it's a terrible prec-
edent because this election was
clearly not really fair and demo-
cratic," Walser said.
Wasler said staff from the Uni-
versity's Information and Tech-
nology Services assured student
government officials that tech-
nological problems with the bal-
lot didn't affect the results, but
argued that the ballot still had
errors.
"ITS claiming that (problems
with the LSA ballot) didn't affect
the election results to me is not
sufficient because there was
clearly a mistake on the ballot,"
Wasler said.
Walser said ensuring a proper
election needs to a be a higher
priority for CSG president Man-
ish Parikh and CSG vice presi-
dent Omar Hashwi.
"These ideas of longer library
hours, a 24-hour cafe are great,
but the administration also has to
focus onthe basics and getting the
fundamentals down," Walser said.
"I think they need to reflect on
their priorities and make sure that
they're getting the fundamentals
down as well as the external stuff
they're working on."
Wasler is a member of MFor-
ward, which supported candi-
dates in the election in which
Parikh and Hashwi were elected.
Walser added that it is impor-
tant that CSG start looking for
a director and election commis-
sion position for the upcoming
March election immediately to
avoid similar problems in the
spring.
Law student Jeremy Garson,
CSG's November election direc-
tor, acknowledged the problems
with the elections, but said they
lived up to the necessary bench-
marks, especially if the time con-
straints placed on the election
are taken into consideration.
"The election went about as
well as it could under the cir-
cumstances," Garson said. "The
importantthingwith anyelection
... is you need to make sure every-
one who has the right to vote is
able to vote, everyone who wishes
to run can run and when the votes
are counted, there is no fraud."
Garson also disagreed with
Walser's point, affirming his
belief that the LSA elections
were an accurate reflection of the
wishes of LSA students.
"From talking to ITS, from
talking with other people that
have more experience, I'm con-
fident that we were able to get
the wishes of the electorate to be
properly represented," he said. ,
Garson explained that his own
health. caused additional chal-
lenges into an already tumultu-
ous election.
"I tip my hat to my team," Gar-
son said. "I was sick on the night
of the election; I had to go to the
hospital next day."
Garson credited CSG student
general counsel Lukas Garske, an
LSA senior, in particular for the
election's success.
"Everything that went right,
went right because of (Garske),"
he said.
With the March election now
ahead, Garson said the lesson
learned from this election is that
time is invaluable.
"Going into the future, it's
just a matter of getting all the
pieces into place so that we can
do advertising in a more system-
atic way rather than having to
scramble against the firm clock,"
Garson said.
Garske echoed- Garson when
he wrote in an e-mail that sev-
eral factors affected CSG's abil-
ity to hold a timely and efficient
election. Because the all-campus
constitution maintains that the
elections must be held in Novem-
ber, the election dates chosen
were placed as late in November
as possible in order to facilitate
the difficult time constraints CSG
faced, Garske wrote.
"The presence of the Thanks-
giving break added another ele-
ment of complication to this," he
wrote. "Overall this meant that
when the Election Code passed
we had 28 days to prepare for the
elections if you include holiday
time and weekends; if you remove
holidays and weekends we were
left with 15 days. "
Despite these missed dead-
lines, Garske said the only per-
son who could file a complaint
alleging injury from the election
would be a candidate and even
then the statute of limitations on
filing that complaint has already
passed.
Garske also highlighted the
new election code, saying that
while it added stress to this elec-
tion, it would ease tension in
upcoming elections.
"The creation of a new, com-
prehensive Election. Code is the
most important development here
as it will ensure elections run
smoothly in the future," Garske
wrote. "We could have rushed to
put an Election Code in place as
quickly as possible, but believed it
was more important that a strong
framework be built upon which
future elections could rely consis-
tently."
Rackham Student Government
President Michael Benson said he
too had problems with CSG's han-
dling of the election. Benson said
he called the CSG front office sev-
eral times throughout September
and October to find out when CSG
had scheduled its elections so
that RSG could schedule its elec-
tions to coincide with CSG's.
"Given how not put together
CSG was this-time-around with
their elections I'm not sure if
we're going to overlap with them
truthfully," Benson said. "If they
can't hold one of their smaller
elections to the quality and stan-
dard that they have in the past ...
I'm not sure if I feel comfortable
leaving those details to them."
LEO
From Page 1A
educating the future of the
state of Michigan and we know
who is doing that here; it's our
lecturers doing the bulk of this
work."
LSA senior Ian Matchett, the
founder of the Student Union
of Michigan, also spoke at the
event and said that a good edu-
cation isn't the result of "fancy
buildings" or "administrative
pay." While SUM is dedicated to
freezing tuition costs, Matchett
said that shouldn't come at the
expense of lecturers.
University lecturer Lila
Naydan, a LEO spokeswoman,
said in an interview after the
event that raising the wages of
lecturers does not automati-
cally mean that tuition will
rise.
"It would be very easy for the
University of Michigan to do
this without raising tuition,"
she said. "Tuition for (stu-
dents) would not have to go up.
We don't want tuition for (stu-
dents) to go up."
MYFAB5
From Page 1A
ni Omeid Seirafi-pour, Calvin
Schemanski and John Gulbron-
son, MyFab5 utilizes a restau-
rant ranking system instead of
the typical star-rating system
used by other similar sites.
"With a typical star system,
you give a business a rating from
bad to good," Seirafi-pour said.
"One star is really bad, five stars
is really good. On our system
you don't ever rate a business. In
fact, on our platform you never
talk about bad businesses. All
you do is talk about your favorite
businesses."
Users select their "Fab Five"
in different categories of restau-
rants and bars, and the possi-
bilities for rankings are endless
because, unlike other sites,
MyFab5 has an infinite selec-
tion of subcategories in which to
rank different establishments.
Instead of a generalized blan-
ket ranking for one type of res-
taurant, MyFab5 allows users to
get specific,-for example giving
them the option to rank certain
types of dishes.
"You go to any number of
websites to find a great restau-
rant, but then you have to do
some research to figure out why
it's so great," Seirafi-pour said.
"With us, we can give you that
information much quicker.
"It also gets quirky and ran-
dom because people can create
their own categories," Ruff said.
"If you want to find a place for
good pickles, we actually have a
category for that."
MyFab5 seeks to open up the
restaurant website to be more
socially oriented and to give
users more control. In turn,
they'll get a better view of what's
going on in their city. With the
design, people will be able to
show other users what they like
about a business, along with
each business's unique style and
qualities that keep them coming
back to their favorite spots.
MyFab5 hopes to make the
restaurant-hunting experience
more organic, as users can see
what makes each restaurant
special - from the street-food
inspired burgers of Frita Bati-
dos to the late-night magic of a
slice of South U Pizza.
With Ann Arbor's bustling
restaurant scene and tech-savvy
population, the city seems like
a natural choice to be MyFab5's
first city of operation - not to
mention its University con-
nection, Seirafi-pour said. The
project is based out of TechArb,
a University start-up accelera-
tor supported by the Center for
Entrepreneurship that aims to
help University students bring
their ideas to life and build via-
ble ventures in an educational
experience.
Seirafi-pour said Ann Arbor's
start-up environment was a
draw to the city.
"There's access to people to
collaborate with (and) access to
socially engaged students," he
said. "The one thing that Ann
Arbor can do right now is really
show that we are a community
that supports people."
That's not to say that creat-
ing a start-up company from
scratch didn't have its obstacles.
"I enjoy- running into dif-
ficulties, because if you don't
run into difficulties ... you're
probably not pushing yourself
hard enough," Seirafi-pour said.
"We fail a lot, but the important
thing is we've been learning a
lot. If you ask us why we're the
most excited, it's because we
know this next month is going
to be the best month and the
month after that is going to be
even better."
He added that failure is part
of the start-up formula.
"You have to learn from your
mistakes, you have to adapt," he
said.
The developers don't plan to
stop at just ranking Ann Arbor
restaurants. With the goals for
expansion, they hope MyFab5
could eventually rank every-
thing from sushi places to Gucci
laces.
"The long-term mission could
be - imagine ranking your top
five rap songs, top five albums in
2012, top five places for suits,"
Ruff said. "The opportunities
are endless."
MPOWERED
From Page 1A
police.
Small said he plans to use the
grant money to help outsource
development or design elements
of the app if he can't do them
himself.
"I had this idea, I've been
wanting to make it happen, and
I figured hey, I may as well enter
it into the competition," Small
said. "It was nice to see how
other people felt about it."
The Web & Software award
went to LSA junior Jessica
Ruiz, the creator of Family
First, a social networking-type
website where users can con-
nect to family members across
the nation, in the vein of Google
Plus.
Ruiz said she plans to apply
for more grants in order to
finance her endeavor, as well
as put a team together. She said
she was required to apply to the
competition as part of an entre-
r-
preneurship class and didn't
initially give much thought to
winning.
"I'm happy I won, obvious-
ly," Ruiz said. "It's a good foot
in the door for future entrepre-
neurial activities."
LSA sophomore Max Gilles,
the marketing director of
MPowered, said the event
showcased exceptional Univer-
sity talent and that he's looking
forward to continuing the com-
petitions next year.
"It was really great to see the
enetgy and the passion from
the students here," Gilles said.
"It was really great to see all
the speakers too, the past win-
ners."
Student entrepreneurs will
have at least two more chances
to win grant money to further
their startup ideas. At the end
of the ceremony, Thomas Zur-
buchen, the University's asso-.
ciate dean of entrepreneurial
programs, announced he will
host another entrepreneur-
ial competition this coming
March, with a payout of $5,000
to one winner.
MPowered also announced it
is hosting another competition
in January in association with
Start Garden, a $15-million'
fund that invests in two busi-
ness propositions each week.
During the competition, select-
ed students will participate in
a live "Shark Tank"-style pitch
contest - a format based on
the' ABC reality show "Shark
Tank". Two students will each
win a prize of $5,500 for their
enterprise.
1000 Pitches is one of several
annual events held by MPow-
ered. The club also hosts career
fair, a Startup Weekend where
students pitch and develop a
business plan in 54 hours, and
a two-week trip to Kenya in
which University students aid
Kenyan high school students to
develop businesses.
All pitchvideos and addition-
al information on the winners
can be found on MPowered's
website.
MARKLEY
From Page 1A
cy room at the University Hospi-
tal.
University Police spokeswoman
Diane Brown said the man was
"significantly" injured, but has
since been released from the Uni-
versity Hospital. Due to privacy
laws, the man's name is not being
released at this time, and his cur-
rent condition and specific inju-
ries sustained during the incident
are unknown.
The man was visiting from
Ohio, Brown said, and University
Police believe that his hosts may
have been sleeping in the room at
the time of the incident.
Brown noted that police do not
think there were any witnesses
and are investigatinghow the man
fell from the window.
"It's a personal injury inves-
tigation to determine what hap-
pened including if there was a
crime committed, but at this point
we have no evidence to indicate
anything other than this being an
accident," Brown said.
The campus community was
not notified because the incident
did not pose a public safety risk,
she added.
Brown said window ,limiters,
which prevent a window from
opening fully, were in place and
functioning at the time of the inci-
dent. University students com-
monly keep windows open, even
in winter, as it allows-for tempera-
ture control without individual
thermostats.
"It's a veryunfortunate circum-
stances but there have been a lot
of people who have lived in these
residence halls and stayed in these
residence halls and sometimes
these accidents will happen,"
Brown said. "(We) try to minimize
those and try to prevent them."
In a similar incident in 1998,
then-LSA freshman Courtney
Cantor died when she fell out of
her sixth floor room in Markley.
Cantor had allegedly been
consuming alcohol at a Phi Delta
Theta fraternity party prior to
the fall, and an autopsy report
revealed traces ofGHB, a Schedule
I controlled substance, The Michi-
gan Daily reported at the time.
Cantor's family suedthe fraternity
and the University, which eventu-
ally agreed to pay $100,000.
r a
i
Daily Opinion.
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FREE drop-in education and support groups
for any U-M student with Depression,
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Understanding
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When: Tuesday, December 11
5:30-7:00 p.m.
Where: North Campus
Room 133,
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Visit www.campusmindworks.org
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