The Whitewater Student Government (WSG) held debates on Wednesday, April 2, in the University Center (UC) as the group nears its election. The debate featured the two tickets running for president and vice president.
Orin Smith with his running mate Nick Petreikis is on one ticket, while the other is current WSG president Douglas Bradley III and his running mate Parker Boehm.
Meet the Candidates
Orin Smith is the current Director of Intergovernmental Affairs at WSG. He has been part of WSG for two years and also sits on the City of Whitewater’s Common Council as the alderman for the city’s second district.
Smith is currently a senior studying electronic media and women’s and gender studies. Next year, Smith will be working toward a master of science for higher education leadership.
Alongside Smith is Petreikis, a junior who studies public policy administration. Currently, he serves as the Deputy Speaker of the Senate at WSG. He is also the current vice chair of the Segregated University Communication Allocation Committee.
Smith and Petreikis are challenging Bradley and Boehm. Bradley is the current WSG president. Prior to that role, he was the Director of Student Affairs. He is the longest active-serving member of the government. The junior studies public policy administration.
Bradley is joined by fellow junior and current vice president Boehm. The marketing sales major is a member of the American Marketing Association. He also studies Spanish and has volunteered time to the Whitewater Unified School District to be a translator.
The debate
During the debate in the UC’s Down Under, candidates kept things formal by engaging in discussions posed by an audience question. One talking point was about reducing fees while continuing the high level of access that Whitewater students are accustomed to.
“One part of my role is working with Brenda Jones, our Vice Chancellor of Administrative Affairs,” Bradley said. “We had quite a deficit last year, and it was scary for students, student government folks, folks who work on campus. We have millions and millions of dollars that are set aside, positions that we haven’t filled in five years and that contributed to our deficit.”
On the flip side, Smith’s running mate is looking ahead to a surplus that will help whoever wins the WSG presidential election.
“They are going to have a surplus coming up to support the brand new presidency leadership coming forward,” Petreikis said. “The most important thing we can do, especially in a student government’s role, is responsible management of that health fee and excess, that may be collected as well as our contingency fund and I think it means it wouldn’t reduce costs, but we can reduce a dramatic increase in costs.”
Smith said that looking for creative solutions to approach solving this is going to be directly impactful on students.
“We historically saw in the student government,” Smith said. “The Student Life Advancement Act solved a lot of issues when it comes to access to the Williams Center. That was great work done by the previous administration. I think more things like that are some things we should look at.”
Boehm touched base on the importance of transparency in student managing fees and maintaining high-quality services. Some things the WSG is looking at are things like online textbook fees and whether it’s looking at options for dining.
The WSG executive election will be held April 15 and 16. Students from both the main and Rock County campuses can vote via a link that will be emailed out on the first day of the elections.