The Student Court of the Missouri Students Association found MSA presidential slate Greg Loeffler and Lauren Damico guilty of a minor infraction Thursday night.
The Loeffler-Damico slate was issued a minor infraction for posting campaign materials in the Arts and Sciences building bulletin boards within classrooms and the bulletin strips above chalkboards within classrooms.
The Board of Elections Commissioners originally issued the Loeffler-Damico slate with a major infraction on Monday. The issue regarding the placement of the slate’s campaign materials was brought to the attention of the BEC by another slate, Loeffler said.
The BEC was notified of the Loeffler-Damico slates illegal placement of campaign materials within classrooms in Arts and Sciences on Oct. 26 and 28th, according to the Student Court ruling.
“What happened was we put flyers up in the Arts and Sciences building somewhere that we thought was a public place,” Loeffler said. “The placement of our flyers were illegal according to Arts and Sciences rules and not against the BEC Handbook.”
According to the ruling, the reason why the court decided this infraction was minor was because there are discrepancies between the policies of the M-book, which contains building policies, and the BEC Handbook.
The M-book states that students must contact the building coordinator to post any materials on interior bulletin boards, whereas the BEC Handbook states that slates only have to contact the building coordinator if they would like to post materials in locations other than a bulletin board within a building.
“The BEC Handbook and the M-book clearly conflict,” Loeffler said. “We acted on the BEC Handbook, not the M-book.”
Although the BEC issued the Loeffler-Damico slate with a major infraction, BEC chairman Thomas Bourneuf said that he supports the Court’s ruling.
“Although (the slate’s) actions are not on the same level as (a major infraction), their actions did not fit the definition of a minor infraction that we were given in the Handbook,” he said.
Bourneuf said that the BEC thought that the slate’s actions best fit within the major infraction definition given in the BEC Handbook.
Loeffler said that this will not effect the turnout of the election.
“This was a simple technicality that another slate cited us for,” he said. “It is no way a reflection of the Loeffler-Damico slate and will not effects our slate come Monday’s election.”
Loeffler and Damico must remove the illegally placed posters by Friday at 8:34 p.m. exactly 24 hours after receiving the Court’s ruling.