The Government of the Student Body is currently without an election commissioner after the GSB Senate voted against seating Steve Skutnik for the position at last week’s meeting. The GSB constitution states that seats for college and residence constituencies must be determined by the end of the semester when the Senate adjourns, and that can’t happen without an appointed election commissioner.

As a result, GSB is faced with a constitutional crisis, and two lawsuits have been filed in the wake of the debacle. GSB Attorney General Chris Wisher filed suit against the Senate, charging them with failure to uphold their duty. The second suit was filed by the Senate, charging the same against the appointment committee for failing to nominate an applicant in time to give the bill enough consideration.

Did all of this need to happen? Didn’t GSB have an exceptional candidate for the election commissioner position in Steve Skutnik?

Yes, they did. Skutnik was the only person to apply for the position since mid-September, when the appointment committee began its recruitment. Skutnik was a person of utmost qualifications and unquestionable experience for the duties of election commissioner.

Skutnik is a Daily columnist; in fact his column appears in today’s Daily alongside a letter from GSB Sen. Jonathon Weaver stating his reasons for voting against Skutnik’s appointment. But his position on staff at the Daily has no influence in the opinion taken by the editorial board. If it was anyone else with similar qualifications vying for the same position, the Daily Editorial Board would have came to the same position.

Alex Rodeck, off-campus senator and one of the six senators to vote against appointing Skutnik, told the Daily that Skutnik wasn’t the right candidate for the job, lacking “the integrity to be election commissioner.” Skutnik is an associate justice in the GSB Supreme Court, a former GSB senator, member of the rules committee, and member of the committee that researched and looked into implementing electronic voting. Last year, he served as IRHA election commissioner, and the election produced record voter turnout. Rodeck’s claims that Skutnik is not the right candidate are ludicrous. His findings appear based solely on personal issues, which coming from an elected official claiming to be serving his constituents should be frowned upon.

By not appointing Skutnik as election commissioner, GSB portrayed a layer of unprofessionalism and a lack of accountability that rivaled junior high student council antics. Jennifer Ray, minority senator who voted against Skutnik, declined comment to the Daily. An elected official making a controversial vote at a public meeting should provide a rationale for her decision. And Rodeck said he didn’t think Skutnik could put his personal politics aside as election commissioner. Apparently Sen. Rodeck doesn’t think the same applies to him. “I think there is somebody better out there,” he told the Daily, adding, “We’d like to find them.”

Well, Rodeck and GSB better find them quick, considering GSB now faces two lawsuits that came as a result of an unprofessional and seemingly personal decision to not appoint Skutnik to a job he is overwhelmingly qualified for, based on baseless questions of his integrity.

GSB is elected to serve the student body, and appointing an election commissioner is one of those duties that will play an immense role in the way GSB is run in the future. A senator should recognize a qualified candidate and suppress whatever personal feelings they may have toward him or her. They’re there for their constituents, to provide the best person for the job, not to fall victim to personal opinions and their own sense of self importance.

editorialboard: Andrea Hauser, Tim Paluch, Michelle Kann, Zach Calef, Omar Tesdell