by Caleb Fort
Daily Lobo
There are more candidates in this year's ASUNM spring election than either the 2004 or 2005 elections.
Three students are running for president, three for vice president and 32 for senate - 27 people ran for office in 2005's spring election and 14 in 2004.
There are three slates and five independent candidates.
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The number of candidates is a good sign, said Debbie Morris, director of the Student Activities Office and ASUNM adviser.
"In recent history, this certainly is the largest election," she said. "I'm very excited. It's great to see that this many students want to get involved."
The candidates spoke at a forum Wednesday in the SUB. Almost all of the candidates said they wanted more students to be involved in student government and campus groups.
Bryan Evans, a vice presidential candidate on the Progressive Action Coalition slate, said ASUNM funding should be more evenly distributed among student groups.
"Making the operations of the student government more transparent and looking at the ways that funding is allocated to try to open up that funding to more groups - those would be excellent ways to increase student function within our student government," he said.
About 65 percent of this year's ASUNM spring budget, unanimously passed Tuesday, went to ASUNM and its branches.
Matt Beck, an ASUNM senator running for vice president on the Voice slate, said he would like to see more advertising for student groups.
"I'm really coming to understand what UNM's all about, and ways we could get more students involved," he said. "I think that these organizations aren't publicized nearly enough, and that's something I would like to see changed."
Brittany Jaeger, the incumbent presidential candidate on the Boom slate, said she has done her best to make it easy for students to participate in ASUNM.
"In the past year we have seen students come up to the Senate and voice their opinions about what they'd like to see changed," she said. "I think that I, as president, have been very open to questions and students' opinions."
A slate is a group of candidates with similar priorities who campaign together. However, voters must still vote for each candidate individually.
The Boom slate's top three goals are making more Fair Trade products available on campus, installing wireless Internet service across UNM and improving campus safety by installing lighting on Johnson Field and updating the fire alarms in the residence halls.
The Progressive Action Committee has several priorities, including getting more students to participate in activities, creating a newsletter to inform students about ASUNM's activities and creating a better recycling system on campus.
The Voice slate's goals are improving traffic flow and comfort at South Lot, decreasing bike theft on campus and creating a freshman spirit week as part of orientation.
Matthew Duran, an independent candidate, said he would like to see ASUNM advertise regularly in the Daily Lobo.
Apollonia Trujillo, an independent candidate, said she wants to speak out on behalf of students against tuition increases, one of the Progressive Action Committee's goals.
"Deciding about tuition increases and having a voice for the students is really important," Trujillo said.
Morris said having many students with different ideas running for office will be good for the entire undergraduate community.
"I think the more students are out there spreading their ideas - that's always good," she said. "It creates a healthy environment to have this many students who want to be involved."
The April 5 election will choose a new president, vice president and 10 new senators, who will hold office for one year. The Senate has 20 members. The other 10 are chosen in the fall election.
