Without public explanation, the president and vice president of Student Government have temporarily stepped down.
In an Aug. 11 email to SG members, SG representatives said president Ziya Kardas and vice president Gina Rotunno had taken “a temporary leave of absence.”
The representative called it “a routine step pursuant through established university practices for reviewing certain university matters,” which they did not explain.
Kardas, a graduate student in the Kate Tiedemann College of Business, did not respond to messages on email and Facebook. Rotunno, a mass communications major, declined an interview.
Laraine Ruiz, a business management major who was Student Senate president, is now acting SG president. She said she was surprised to be thrust into the job.
“In shock is the only way I can describe it,” Ruiz said. “But as a senator I work for the students. The president’s role is very much the same, so I feel like my responsibility continues to be for them.”
Student Government at USFSP is a powerful group on campus because it controls the activity and service fee budget, which in the 2016-2017 fiscal year was more than $3 million, according to SG’s website.
The $3 million included $1.6 million for the University Student Center, $605,450 for the Campus Recreation department, $119,303 for the Harborside Activites Board and $50,155 for The Crow’s Nest.
Despite SG’s importance, student elections have received scant attention in recent years.
In the spring 2015 presidential election, only 536 students voted in the first round and 660 in the runoff.
Last spring Kardas became president without opposition.
He and his running mate, Alexis Germaise, drew no opponents for president and vice president. Under SG rules, their names were the only ones on the ballot and they had to receive more than 50 percent of the vote to be elected.
Only 340 students out of 4,401 students voted, according to the USF InfoCenter, and 77 percent of them yes to the Kardas-Germaise ticket.
Germaise did not serve for long, however. She stepped down and was replaced by Rotunno.
Student Government members held their annual retreat last week. On Friday, they visited the Great Escape Room in Tampa as a team building exercise. On Saturday, they gathered in the USC Ballrooms to discuss a strategy for the new year.
While Kardas did not attend the retreat, a lot of his goals and policies were discussed, Ruiz said.
“I hope Ziya comes back,” she said. “We had a shared vision to coordinate our two branches (executive and legislative) and right now we will still be moving forward. Him coming back would only serve to strengthen our drive toward those objectives.”
Ruiz is moving with the support of James Scott, a graduate student and seasoned veteran of student government. Scott, the Senate president pro tempore, is temporarily replacing Ruiz as Senate president.
Scott said hopes Kardas and Rotunno return to their roles in SG.
“Everything that was being implemented is still in the pipeline,” he said. “We plan on still moving all of that through.”
Featured Image taken by Nick Perkins / USFSP Connect
