Bringing the perspective of an ASSU outsider and an experienced senator to the election, senior Mikey Lee and junior Dylan Mefford say they are ready to fully devote themselves to executive office. Lee, the presidential candidate, is a current Senior Class president. He wants to use his fifth year at Stanford to address important issues like special fees, cost of living and ASSU accountability. He is also a former editor at The Daily. Mefford, an ASSU senator and the former president of the Stanford Democrats, says he is committed to helping his running mate enact serious changes at the Undergraduate Senate. A detailed description of their proposals can be found online at http://www.leemefford.com.

The Daily: With so much leadership experience in the ASSU and elsewhere, are you worried that students might perceive you too much as being insiders?

Mikey Lee: Definitely not. Dylan and I bring both sides to the table. This is my fourth election, I ran for sophomore class president, and we lost. As a sophomore I ran for junior class president and we won. And last year I ran as senior class president and won.

For the last three years I have not been serving in the ASSU Senate or the executive, I’ve only been doing class president stuff. Obviously there are ties between the two organizations, but I come as an outsider. My real experience with the ASSU is as a student. If you look at another slate that is running, the only experience they have is within the ASSU. They say, “We will work to do something,” and we say, “We are already working to do something.”

Dylan Mefford: I think we fit the model that has been elected to the ASSU executive the last couple of years, where you have an outsider at the top of the ticket, being Mikey, who certainly does have leadership experience but not within the ASSU, and then you have an insider, someone on the ASSU Senate, and that would be me.

TD: At least in the last couple of years, what do you think are the things that the ASSU has done well and the things it has done poorly?

ML: The ASSU does a lot of things well — they’re tackling advising, they started the book buy-back program, they opened the Blender to increase student space, they made huge headway with special fees — but I met with Nadiya Figueroa last week and her quote was that “a lot of the things we do are behind the scenes.” My argument to her was, “How are you, as the leaders of the association, doing things behind the scenes?”

How does the ASSU expect to have a good reputation with students when in a lot of ways it has no reputation with students? Accessibility is the first step to a solution for a lot of the problems we’re perceived to have.

DM: One of the things that can definitely be improved in the ASSU is the functioning of the Senate and the committee system and just the amount of stuff that actually gets done there. One of my fellow senators, Jason Sinocruz, resigned last quarter, and he said, “I’ve been here over two quarters and I still don’t know what the Undergraduate Senate does.” Then he asked a rhetorical question, “If it were to disappear what would be lost to the student body?”

TD: What has been your strategy in approaching this campaign?

ML: We have our flyers up, we have our banner up and we’re trying to get out issues out there, but we need people to go to the Web site and look at our content. It’s a place where you can sit down alone and look at what we’re doing. If you compare our Web site with our opponents’ Web sites, their proposals pale in comparison to ours in both quality and actual realistic proposals.

DM: One other thing about our campaign that distinguishes it from others is the grassroots nature of what we’re doing. Mikey and I have already personally contacted over 500 students and we already have a list of over 100 volunteers who believe in our vision for improving Stanford.

TD: So what about your campaign slogan, “Getting Stuff Done”? Can you explain how that originated and how it exemplifies your current campaign?

ML: Another campaign slogan after looking at our opponents could be “realistic and effective leadership.” Our drive is very product-driven. We want results. It’s not about how we’re going to work with you and for you, it’s about how to get stuff done.

I come as an outsider. Class-presidency has no legislation. If I have an idea, we implement it, it gets done.

TD: What are your ideas for solving the special-fees problem?

ML: There are two main ways to solve special fees. First, we hope to use Absolute Fun as matching grants — seven $1,000 matching grants and 15 $500 matching grants per quarter — through an application process.

As far as the actual solution to special fees, we think it’s satisfaction with the ASSU. What we hope to bring is financial responsibility on the part of the ASSU so that we will tell you where you money is going. People will not take their special-fees money back if they know that it is going towards something good.

If people don’t know what we know as leaders, how can they understand the decisions we make?

TD: Do you think your candidacy has particular appeal to any groups on campus?

DM: We are the only candidates who have made a financial commitment to communities of color. We’ve set aside $10,000 in matching grants to ethnic and cultural groups that promote diversity at Stanford. It’s easy to talk about diversity, but until you’re willing to make a financial commitment, you’re not truly caring about diversity.

We’re trying to reach out to every single student. That said, if you look at our opponents, what they’re doing basically is mentioning every group in a very superficial way.