After being bombarded for nearly a week by colorful fliers and e-mails encouraging them to vote in SU’s student association’s funding referendum for the NYPIRG, enough students had turned out to the polls by Saturday night to put an end to the voting.

‘We’re very happy to see that students came out in large numbers to vote,’ said Sean Vormwald, project coordinator for the Syracuse University and State University of New York College of Environmental Science and Forestry chapter of New York Public Interest Research Group.

The first question on referendum, which asked students whether NYPIRG should continue receiving funding from a direct fee of $6 per year from each students, passed with 73 percent of students in favor and 27 percent against.

The second question, asking students whether those $6 should be added to the general student activity fee should the first question fail, was voted down with 56 percent of students against funding shift and 44 percent in favor. These results had no effect, however, because of the passage of the first question.

Almost 27 percent of SU and SUNY ESF students went to the polls for the referendum, a large turnout when compared with general SA elections. Only 12 percent of students voted in November’s general election. SA codes require 10 percent of students to vote in an election in order for the results to be valid.

‘NYPIRG did a great campaigning job,’ SA President Drew Lederman said. ‘I didn’t agree with all their tactics, but they did a great job getting out the vote.’

Lederman said that the group misrepresented some facts regarding the referendum in its campaign materials. In a letter to The Daily Orange, former SA President Andrew Thomson raised concerns about paid NYPIRG employees participating.

Vormwald acknowledged that members from other NYPIRG chapters came to campus to help campaign but said that those members were not paid.

‘The people who came here felt compelled to campaign because the question was misleading and did so on their own time,’ Vormwald said.

Although the referendum is over, SA will continue its push to make NYPIRG accountable for its spending by seeking to renegotiate the group’s contract, Lederman said.

‘I think that we need to have some provisions in there to have them give us a detailed break down of their finances,’ Lederman said.

NYPIRG officials maintain, however, that the financial information the group currently gives to SA, including an expense report for the local chapter and an independent audit for the statewide group, is sufficient.

‘We will continue to do what we have always done,’ Vormwald said.

For now, some SA officials hope relations between the groups will return to normal.

‘I’m glad to see the whole thing resolved,’ SA Comptroller Maggie Misztal said. ‘It’ll be good to get back to the norm. I wish NYPIRG luck.’

Published on February 15, 2004 at 12:00 pm