SGA’s fast-approaching presidential and vice presidential elections won’t be a hard decision this year.
The candidates for each are running unopposed, according to current Vice President Madigan Balfe. Riley Mahon, SGA’s recently elected president pro-tempore (PPT) and Sienna Wraith, its parliamentarian, are running for president and vice president respectively.
The deadline to file for election passed about two weeks ago, and no one but Mahon or Wraith signed up to run for head office.
“It’s not ideal,” Mahon said of his running without an opposing candidate. Wraith echoed that sentiment.
“I would have preferred to be running against someone,” Wraith said, “to bring in alternate perspectives and…have more diverse viewpoints represented in [the] elections. That way people can vote for the candidate who represents them most.”
Both candidates have been active members of the legislature for the majority of their time at Point Park. They both said their main initiatives are aimed at getting more students involved in SGA’s decision-making.
The first will be a “mega survey” aimed at collecting concrete issues from the student body, Mahon said.
“I have noticed that a lot of the time when people tell us about problems on campus they’re kind of general about it,” he said. “Like they say they want us to improve the Wi-Fi or something, but it’s difficult for us to work with that if we don’t know what they mean.”
Mahon, who also heads the Young Eco-Socialists club, added that he’d like to have at least four or five students raise issues at each of SGA’s weekly meetings, and that he’d advocate for solar panels, less “attempts to shoehorn AI into everything” and more opportunities for students across disciplines to meet each other.
Wraith agreed with the idea of getting more students involved in SGA, and said they are behind Mahon.
“Unless there’s some sort of food involved, people don’t want to come to things,” Wraith said.
They also said they’d like to work with the international student body to refine the university’s policy regarding Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) on campus.
“The school is like, yeah, we’ll basically cooperate,” Wraith said, “which they legally have to do, but isn’t the most helpful to international students — and doesn’t make them feel any safer on this campus.”
They added they’d advocate for more overall support for Arts and Sciences from the university.
Voting closes this Friday, March 6 at 11:59 p.m.
A town hall to address student concerns after the election is scheduled tentatively for March 18 from 5 to 7:30 p.m., according to Tatum Lucero, SGA’s communications director.
At the beginning of this week’s meeting, three new senators were sworn in.
Elizabeth McKinney, a freshman theater production major; Bryanna Stout, a freshman dance major; and Liliana Ohm, a freshman political science major, all took an oath of office along with Black Diamond II, who was also present at the meeting.
Devin Frank, the director of Downtown engagement (DDE), said he was interested in exploring the possibility of enabling university meal swipe use in nearby restaurants.
He specifically outlined La Gourmadine, a bakery on Forbes Avenue, and SoFresh, a restaurant on Third Avenue near PPG Plaza, as potential candidates.
Michael Gieseke, dean of Student Life, previously told The Globe that getting meal swipes accepted at outside businesses would be difficult.
He said at the meeting that he would be open to it, but that the small number of students at Point Park — compared to other Pittsburgh universities — might not be enough of an incentive for businesses to be on board with the idea.
“We just don’t think we have the numbers; the student power,” Gieseke said. “…We’ve been having this discussion for 15 years.”
If a business were interested in accepting Point Park’s meal swipes, the decision is ultimately up to CFO Tracy Claybaugh, Gieseke said. The Globe did not reach out to Claybaugh for comment.
The second round of spring funding for student clubs is now open, according to Sam Fehl, SGA’s treasurer.
Beyond that, no new business was discussed this week.
The next SGA meeting will be on Monday, March 16 at 3:15 p.m. in the Professional Career-Readiness Center.
