On Nov. 7, a special election will be held in certain parts of Missouri to fill vacant state legislature seats and to vote on special propositions.

Special elections are held separately from regular elections in the case of a vacancy in a government position or when there is a bill that needs voting on. In Missouri, there are currently three districts voting in the special election to fill a state legislature seat. The most controversial of these is in District 8, where the current state senator left to accept a position with Governor Greitens’ administration.

Here in St. Louis, a special election is being held to new Alderman for the city’s 2nd Ward, and to vote on the controversial Proposition P. Proposition P is a proposal to raise the city sales tax by ½ of 1 percent. The extra revenue would amount to almost $20 million annually, most of which would then be spent on the Saint Louis Police Department, raising salaries among other measures.

This is a very controversial issue—especially due to the increased tensions between police and the African American community in St. Louis, which were heightened even more recently by the Jason Stockley verdict earlier this year. St. Louis mayor Lyda Krewson has come out in support of Proposition P, stating that will level the playing field for officers in the area, after St. Louis County recently passed their own version of the proposition. Supporters of the proposition cite the pay disparity between county and city cops (rookie county cops can sometimes make thousands more than their city counterparts) as a large factor in the lack of recruitment of good city cops.

Opponents of Prop. P disagree with this reasoning, saying that the tax hike will hurt communities that are already struggling to make ends meet, and who they believe have been let down by the city police department already.

The special election on Nov. 7 will allow St. Louis voters to make their decision on Proposition P.

Special elections typically do not receive the attention that regularly scheduled elections do, however, according to Robert Lasky, Executive Board member of SLU College Democrats, they are very important.

“These elections aren’t as fancy as Hillary Clinton versus Donald Trump, [but] they’re important. Prop P will have a serious effect. It really affects a lot of people,” said Lasky. “Every voice matters regardless of how you vote on it.”

Many people never hear about special elections, much less vote on them. At SLU, groups of students such as SLU Dems and Political Round Table have looked to change that by registering people to vote, and by helping them get to their polling places. Both Lasky and Denish Jaswal, the president of SLU Political Round table emphasized the importance of voting, and especially on local issues.

“I would emphasize that voting is not only a civic duty, but one of the easiest (for most cases) and most important things one can [do to] enhance democracy,” said Jaswal. “I would also especially emphasize that local elections matter quite a bit, and in the past year, our mayoral election was decided by a span of just a few thousand votes.”

SLU Dems and Political Round Table have teamed up in the past to register SLU students to vote. They are seen throughout the year on West Pine and in the BSC, among other places, urging students to register. Jaswal said that setting up a registration drive is a lot of work, taking usually about two weeks to plan, but that the outcome is worth it, especially in years of large political interest. Last year, leading up to the 2016 election, Jaswal said the drive registered over 2000 people to vote. Lasky agreed, saying that the last election increased interest in politics.

“People have started to realize that politics really affects them,” said Lasky, “They realize that it isn’t just something abstract that happens in Washington D.C.; it happens in our backyards.”

As much as there has been an increase of interest in politics, the issue with special elections is that many students don’t feel the urgency to vote if the election isn’t a national one.

“Given the hype of the presidential election last year, I do think there was an increase in students voting,” said Jaswal. “However, now that the hype has died down, I think that less people are interested in voting. We’ve successfully registered a few people to vote this year, but the matter does not seem as pressing, even though it is.”

Many people who would normally vote may sometimes not due to lack of transportation or information about a special election. Fortunately, here at SLU, this should not be a problem for students. Lasky said that for this year’s special election, College Dems will be offering a shuttle for students from SLU to the local polling place.

“Myself and our treasurer will be shuttling people over,” said Lasky, “All they need to do is RSVP to our Facebook event on the College Dems page.”

With the special election coming up, Lasky, Jaswal and their groups wanted to remind people that voting in local elections is incredibly important, and that everyone should try and stay up to date on local politics.

“I think the biggest thing I’d like to communicate is how important it is to be active in local politics,” said Jaswal. “Local politics affects day to day lives and the community in which one and their loved ones inhabit. Being involved at this level is not only the most likely to impact to individual concern, but is also important in expanding one’s concern from outside their immediate bubble.”

The special election on Proposition P is being held on Nov. 7. Polling places and rides to and from can be found online.

UNews spoke to DPS Capt. James Moran, a former officer of the St. Louis City Police Department for 37 years who has been at SLU for four. Capt. Moran explained what a typical day for DPS looked like here at SLU.  

“We have a staff of 80 officers, and on most days, we have from 12 to 15 officers on each shift patrolling the campus,” said Moran. “We are licensed by the security division of the St. Louis City and County police departments,” he continued, “so we are only permitted by our license to patrol campus property. We patrol the streets, but other than the section of Laclede between Grand and Spring Halls, the streets technically are not on our campus.”

However, obviously the job of DPS officers isn’t always incident-free. In the midst of the Stockley protests in September, a group of protesters peacefully marched at SLU. Many of these protesters were SLU students and marched on campus and into the Grand Dining Hall. Of course, DPS was there to monitor the situation and had to make decisions about how to handle it.  

“Events like that you can’t really plan for, because you don’t know exactly what is going to happen,” said Moran. “We increased our staff just to have ourselves prepared for something that might need a little more attention. We knew that tensions would be higher.”  

SLU Freshman and Black Student Alliance member, Diana Wulu, said that the initial reaction from some students to the higher security was not a positive one.  

“When they first sent out the email about upping the security, some students were a little put-off. Like, okay, so you’re going to send out an email sounding the alarm and making everyone scared but not talk about what happened?” said Wulu.  

During the march, only SLU students were permitted to protest on campus, and Wulu said she understood that decision. While Wulu said that she believes that DPS has to protect students in the best way they can, the general feeling from many students is that there is still some work to be done.  

“We’ve spoken about it in meetings and about how many African American students, especially male students, have been stopped and asked for their ID on campus,” said Wulu. “DPS needs to get to know us, and know who the students are.”  

Moran agreed with this statement, acknowledging that there was dialogue that was happening and needed to continue with the African American community among other students.  

“We have had conversations with the African American community about how they may feel less welcomed. We have a liaison in our office that works with them that they can contact, and we want to have conversations with them and continue to communicate with them better,” said Moran. “I encourage my officers to meet as many students as possible, to get to know them, and I hope that the students will do the same.”  

DPS continues to focus on their day-to-day job of keeping students safe. Over approximately the last six weeks, students at SLU have received around ten notifications from DPS  concerning incidents or events occurring on or near SLU’s campus.

Captain Moran explained the normal protocol surrounding responses to calls and how they are reported to the SLU community.  

“Each call is evaluated by our dispatchers, and if it is a serious call, usually two officers and a supervisor would be sent out. If it is a valid crime, we contact the St. Louis City Police Department,” said Moran. As far as notifying the campus, Moran said they evaluate each situation individually.  

“There are two types of alerts that we send. The first is the emergency alert, which means that there is an immediate threat on campus of a serious nature, that we need to alert students of so they can do something to keep themselves safe,” said Moran. “The second is the timely warning, which is sent out after an event that has occurred and ended and was of a serious nature.”

Moran said that overall, DPS just aims to keep students safe the best they can.  

“If I could say anything to SLU students, my first message would be to just remember that my officers are human beings, too. They’re not robots, and they have the same human characteristics as everyone,” said Moran. “Our mission is to keep this campus safe for all students and for visitors.”

    With the topic of sexual assault becoming more and more prevalent around the SLU community, many people have been hearing the words “Title IX”. While almost every student hears a rough overview of Title IX during orientations and information on the Title IX office is included on every syllabus, many students don’t understand Title IX completely. Title IX was implemented in the 1970s and prohibits sex discrimination, making it mandatory for schools to protect against sexual violence, among other provisions.  

    Earlier this year, the new Secretary of Education, Betsy DeVos, announced that changes would be made to the Title IX guidelines, the set of recommendations sent by the Department of Education to schools that advises institutions how to best implement the Title IX law. Secretary DeVos rolled back several guidelines and rescinded the “Dear Colleague” letter instituted during the Obama administration.  

    Marcia McCormick, Professor of Law and Associate Dean for Academic Affairs at the Saint Louis University Law School, spoke to UNews about the changes that the guidelines are undergoing.  

    “It’s important to note the law itself is not changing,” McCormick said, “just the guidelines sent from the Department of Education on how to implement it.”  

    While the DOE rescinded the guidelines from the Obama era, they have not replaced them with anything new, instead sending out a question and answer document that gave an outline of possible changes.

    Anna Kratky, SLU’s Title IX coordinator, said that even though there have been proposed changes to Title IX guidelines, schools are unlikely to see any certain guidelines changes for another nine to 18 months. Kratky said that the proposed changes are going through a “comment period” where schools and the Department of Education will review the ideas and provide feedback. Perhaps a comforting idea to SLU students is that the university itself is participating in the review of Title IX.  

    Changes to the guidelines begin with the standard of proof used in cases of sexual violence. The proposed guidelines could allow schools to choose whether they want to use the “Preponderance of the Evidence” standard that is currently being used, or a new, higher standard of proof, known as Clear and Convincing evidence. The courts of law in the US use the Burden of Proof standard, which means that it must be proven “beyond a reasonable doubt” that an accused party is guilty.  The Preponderance of the Evidence standard states that it must be proven that the evidence is more likely to be true than not so. The standard indicated in the new guidelines is in the middle of the two. It is slightly less demanding than that used in a criminal trial, but substantially more than the Preponderance of the Evidence.  

    McCormick said that the Clear and Convincing standard of evidence is being used to compel schools to treat cases of discrimination and sexual violence more like criminal cases used in the court of law, which could possibly change the outcomes of sexual violence cases. Students that would have been found guilty under the Preponderance of the Evidence standard may not be found guilty under the Clear and Convincing standard.     

    “The archetype of sexual violence is the stranger in the dark alley,” said McCormick. “However, the less a situation looks like the archetype, the harder it will be to prove any guilt. The courts tend not to see victims as credible, especially when the parties have been drinking and if there are no outside witnesses, which most often there are not. Without witnesses, it will be hard to meet this higher standard of evidence.”

    Another proposed change to the Title IX guidelines is the removal of a fixed time period in which schools must respond and complete a Title IX investigation. During the Obama administration, the amount of time schools had to complete investigations was 60 days, prompting quick responses from institutions. Under the new guidelines, schools would not have a specified time to complete an investigation, but are simply urged to work promptly. McCormick said that this change is not necessarily good nor bad, but depends on the school.  

    Making the process longer not only makes it harder to prove guilt, says McCormick, but it makes life harder both parties. “If the process takes a long time, the accuser might still have to live on campus with the person who assaulted them or sit next to that person in class,” said McCormick. Similarly, the accused parties do not get a remedy until the process is over either. “If an accused student is eventually found not guilty, they won’t know they are off the hook until the whole process is over.”

    One of the motivations behind the proposed changes is the idea that Title IX does not do enough to protect the students who are accused of sexual violence or discrimination. Because Title IX is a law that prohibits discrimination on the basis of sex, it supposedly already protects accused students from being discriminated against. Accused students are already allowed to find out the allegations made against them, and to present their side to the decision-making group.  

    The proposed guidelines could also allow schools to not only allow appeals of their decision but to also choose if both parties can appeal or if only the responding party are allowed to appeal decisions. It also urges that both public and private schools need to provide due process to both parties in an investigation, following the process of any other school policy violation investigation.  

    Kratky said that, either way, the SLU Title IX office is in good shape. “We already use the same process for school policy violations, and offer both parties the same resources in an investigation,” said Kratky.  

    Another proposed change is the idea that mediation should be offered to both parties in an investigation. Mediation is the process of sitting down with both parties to talk out what happened. Mediation is not typically deemed appropriate for sexual violence cases and is not used in a Title IX investigation at SLU. Kratky said that this is a very highly contested and debated part of the new proposed guidelines.  

    It could be a while before the proposed changes are judged as positive changes or negative ones, but McCormick expressed concern that if the new changes make the process longer and more challenging, it could possibly discourage students from using the Title IX offices. However, the proposed guidelines should in no way scare any students right now, and it will be a long time before anything is set in stone.

     “This is just the beginning, and there is a long way to go,” said Kratky. “It is too early to tell if these will be positive or negative changes, but I want to assure students that SLU is committed to serving all of our students, and making sure they can receive an education free from discrimination. We will be open and transparent the entire way through.”