By Chanceller Clift
Although 3,000 students registered with BYUSA''s VoteProject, some of those students are finding that their registration forms or absentee ballots never left BYU in time for voter registration deadlines.
An e-mail sent out by Max Hunsaker, student advisory council executive director, informed some students that their registration forms were mistakenly placed in a file cabinet and were not found until Tuesday, Oct. 26.
Hunsaker also stated in the e-mail that all of the student''s county election offices were contacted to see if an exception to the deadline could be made, but were told an exception was not possible.
'We know that we made a mistake and we have done everything we can to correct the problem,' said Jason Smith, BYUSA executive director for public relations. 'We have called every single student involved. If we couldn''t reach them by phone, than they were e-mailed.'
Smith said that 96 registration forms were misplaced from students who registered at Battle of the Bands, the kick-off to VoteProject, last September. Not everyone who registered there was a BYU student.
VoteProject was designed to get college-aged students registered to vote and get them involved with the political process.
Jeremy Peterson, 23, a biology major from Vernal, attended the BYU Battle of the Bands, registered to vote at the booth near the entrance and recently received the e-mail from BYUSA.
'It''s so wrong,' Peterson said. 'If they would have called and let people know when they couldn''t find the papers a couple of days before the deadline, it''s understandable. But they didn''t. They''re robbing so many students of their right to vote.'
By the time Peterson read the e-mail, it was too late to re-register to vote.
'I thought being fair and honest to your fellow men was part of the Honor Code,' he said. 'I guess it doesn''t apply to BYUSA.'
The e-mail sent out only affects those who registered at the booth in Battle of the Bands, but other students are finding out that their forms never made it to their county either.
Aaron Fox, 27, a graduate student, registered in the Wilkinson Student Center at the VoteProject table.
'I registered at the voter registration booth in the Wilk as an absentee ballot in Syracuse, New York, where I was going to school,' Fox said. 'I got a letter back today from my county in New York saying I was never registered. Since it''s New York, my vote really counts there.'
BYUSA recently switched from Rock the Vote to VoteProject, both non-partisan voter registration organizations.
'Our goal is to get people to actually vote,' Hunsaker said. 'People can still call us if they have questions or problems. We want people to know that they have our support and our goal is to get them to the voting booth.'
BYUSA is happy to speak to individual students and to help resolve their concerns, Smith said.
'Because voter registration process is complicated, there are mistakes that are made every year,' said Heather Jacques, vice president of student advisory council. 'In the year 2000, 1.5 to 3 million registration forms were not registered successfully nationally. BYUSA successfully registered 97 percent of the students who registered during VoteProject registration week.'
One problem with the forms that were sent out by BYUSA could be that they were mailed to the wrong county, which is a common problem every election year.
'What typically happens is that we get a few from out of county and out of state and we have to turn around and mail those to the right counties,' said Sandy Hoffmann, elections specialist for Utah County. 'We mail out 75 to 100 different locations each month.'
Right now, there is not much that can be done except re-registering with the right county and eliminating outside entities like the postman, Hoffmann said. Most state deadlines for registration by mail passed within the past few weeks.
Hoffmann also suggested students contact their county clerk to make sure registration forms are processed immediately, instead of relying on the registration forms passing through a couple of different hands.
Another problem that has occurred is that the mail is slow in arriving to the county election office.
Natalie Williams, 21, public relations major from West Linn, Ore., also registered with VoteProject, and her county received her registration forms later than expected.
'I appreciate BYUSA for pushing the idea of voting by helping students to register and holding forums and lectures,' she said. 'I''m only sorry I had to be a victim of poor planning or poor mail service.'
She called her county clerk in Oregon after she hadn''t received any word on her form and was told that her form never made it and so she registered in Utah. Last week, she called again and her forms had arrived and she was registered with an absentee ballot being sent to her in the mail.