Meg Banks
News Reporter

Some candidates in this week’s Humber Student Federation election think a new campaign rule has turned the election into a beauty contest.
“It’s an explosion of posters everywhere,” said Stephanie Butler, running for VP Administration at North Campus. “It’s a bit of a popularity, beauty contest sometimes.”
The new rule means for the first time candidates have been given free rein on their posters and where to put them up.
Butler said the rule made it hard for candidates to get their point across.
Presidential candidate Bryan Tran, who is the current VP of Campus Life for Lakeshore, was part of the team to introduce the change, but said the new rule is unfair.
“You shouldn’t have an advantage just because you have more access to print stuff,” he said.
“It just doesn’t make sense.”
Tran said he preferred the old system, with HSF-created posters that promoted platforms over pictures. “Then you don’t get these stupid, waste of paper, 20-foot things that don’t give you any information, it’s just someone’s face,” he said.
In the past, candidates provided a picture and a written profile to the HSF, which would be printed and posted in designated areas. This year, candidates can post whatever they want, wherever they want, without HSF approval.
HSF executive director, Ercole Perrone, said the decision to change the policy was based on discussions with past candidates.
“There was a willingness to allow the candidates to express themselves perhaps a little more freely than the policy had allowed them to in the past,” said Perrone.
He said he hoped the visibility of the posters will get students to the voting booths this week.