The Associated Students Inc. Judiciary ruled Feb. 25 that people filing a petition to recall ASI student executives must be degree-earning students who pay ASI fees.
A petition to recall and remove ASI President James Ahumada, Vice President Lucy Nguyen and Treasurer Jameson Nyeholt was first made available for students to sign Jan. 3. Jason Aula, a spokesperson for the anonymous group that authored the petition, is not a student at Cal State Long Beach, according to Rick Gloady, media relations director.
Aula said the main reasoning for the recall stems from an October Daily 49er article showing ASI pay structure and ASI’s proposal of OrgSync, a pricey web-based platform that would be made available to student organizations on campus.
Lucy Craig, chair of the Board of Elections, requested the ASI Judiciary render a decision regarding non-students filing for recall petitions.
In a unanimous decision, the court ruled, “An individual must have standing as a current student the semester in which the petition was submitted, in order to use the by-laws, and its effects.”
In addition to the ruling, the court also authorized the Board of Elections to create “recall procedures to be used for an ASI elected officer removal.”
“The Court strongly asserts that any petition submitted for recall of an elected officer by an individual who is not a currently enrolled student is declared invalid,” the court ruling stated.
Chief Justice of the ASI Judiciary Jeff Yutrzenka said the ruling was not in response to the recall petition.
“I am aware of the petition and its intentions, but I don’t know all the details and the reasoning behind it,” Yutrzenka said via e-mail.
According to ASI Executive Director Richard Haller, a special election may be held if a recall petition gathers 15 percent of the officers’ student body, or 5,000 signatures.
According to Yutrzenka, no petition has yet been filed to the dean of students.
Jeffrey Benson, a volunteer collecting signatures for the petition, said Aula has collected more than 2,000 signatures but does not know who out of the anonymous group will file the petition.
Attempts to reach the anonymous group and Aula were unsuccessful.
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