After weeks of delays and revotes, the new Binghamton University Council Representative has been selected.

Last night’s Student Association (SA) Congress meeting saw the confirmation of Nora Monasheri, a senior majoring in business administration, as the BU Council Representative-elect. This confirmation follows a string of grievances and revotes that occurred after the initial election for the position on Sunday, March 12. The position serves as a liaison between the student body and University administration, and is elected by the voting bodies of both the SA and the Graduate Student Organization (GSO).

According to Christopher Ribarić, the chair of the Elections and Judiciary Committee and a sophomore majoring in accounting, the process of conducting the BU Council Representative election is more complex due to coordinating with the GSO.

“This makes running the election slightly more tedious, as you have to be in constant contact with your [GSO] counterparts and make sure that they are abiding by the rules of the Joint Committees that are set up for this particular race,” Ribarić wrote in an email.

Monasheri won the seat in a three-person race. Running against Victoria Barics, a senior double-majoring in psychology and philosophy, politics and law, as well as Sophia Yazdi, a freshman majoring in economics, Monasheri secured 1,034 first-place votes. Barics came in second with 731 first-place votes, while Yazdi trailed behind at 416.

Monasheri described her experience campaigning, praising the candidates she competed against.

“While I won, [Yazdi] and [Barics] are both amazing candidates inside and out, and I know that they have the brightest futures ahead of them,” Monasheri wrote. “The experience while running was super fun, and I was able to connect with so many students. This is just the beginning. Civic engagement is important, and I’m glad that more students this year were able to get involved and learn more about my platform.”

One of the major delays in determining a winner came from the GSO’s election. Ribarić explained that all races containing multiple candidates must implement a ranked-choice voting system, however, when GSO conducted their election, the organization ended up implementing regular voting instead. This discrepancy led to GSO holding a revote on March 23 and 24.

The rationale behind the decision was described by Pradeep Kumar Ramesh, the chief elections officer for the GSO and a second-year graduate student pursuing a masters in computer science.

“Regarding the use of a ranked-choice voting system, we had initially planned to use this system for the election,” Ramesh wrote in an email. “However, in last year’s election, we faced some technical issues with the system. Since the election was held on a Sunday, there would be no technical support available to address any issues that may have arisen with the ranked-choice voting system. Therefore, we had to make the difficult decision to use a regular voting form instead.”

For future elections, Ribarić called upon the GSO to implement an overseer for their elections and operations.

“We at the SA are very fortunate to have the presence of someone like Matt Johnson, our assistant director,” Ribarić wrote. “He has helped not only guide me, but various other members of Congress and SA [Executive Boards]. Unfortunately, the [GSO] does not have someone like this, which means that they don’t have a person to go to when rules and situations become confusing and unclear. I believe if the [GSO] created a position dedicated to the role [Johnson] plays for us, we would never have an issue such as this one arise again.”

With all of the election results officialized, next year’s SA E-Board can begin their processes of training for their roles and taking on responsibilities.

Now confirmed in her new role, Monasheri gave her thanks to the Joint Elections and Judiciary Committee.

“Even with the delays in results due to the GSO reelection and a grievance, the wait was so worth it,” Monasheri said. “Rules are rules and the decision for GSO to redo elections was important to fully abide by the elections code and their bylaws. Also, I’d like to recognize the Election and Judiciary Board for their extra diligence in the entire process. Running elections like this isn’t easy, but they were clear and kept us in the loop every step of the way.”