Lathrop Vice President resigns

Katie Barnett Guest Writer

The Lathrop House vice presidency was declared vacant on Sunday, Sept. 3 at the Vassar Student Association (VSA) Council meeting. Lathrop House will vote for a new vice president for 2006-2007 in general elections later this fall (for more on VSA fall elections, see page 5).

Robertino Lim ’08 announced his resignation to the Lathrop House team over the summer, before they met for training in mid-August.

“I chose to resign from the Lathrop Vice Presidency because I was concerned about my ability, time-wise, to fulfill the commitment,” said Lim in an e-mailed statement. “Events over the summer made me realize that I need to focus more of my efforts on preparing for life after college and presently working on academics and other extracurriculars.”

Lathrop House President Amalia Sax-Bolder ’08 said that Lim’s resignation has neither affected the House team’s dynamic nor prevented its members from starting off the school year well.

“There hasn’t been much of a difference,” she said. “The House team is ...off to a wonderful start and it’ll be interesting to see who comes in [to fill the position].”

Lim won the Vice Presidential election in the spring by one vote; the second-place candidate, Nicole Bravo ’09, intends to run in this fall’s election.

Last year, Lathrop House experienced two presidential resignations. In spring 2006, elected Lathrop President Doug Dalessandro ’07 resigned from his position. VSA Council voted to fill the position by appointment, and appointed Kyle Giunta ’08. The following week, Giunta resigned and Council appointed then-Lathrop Vice President Sax-Bolder to the position of House president. Sax-Bolder said the Lathrop House team had been unhappy with Council’s decision to appoint a new president without first consulting the team about who their choice would be.

At Sunday’s meeting, the VSA debated whether the now vacant vice presidency should be filled by appointment or election. Filling the position by appointment would mean that the Council would accept applications and vote on a new Lathrop vice-president, and Lathrop residents would not vote.

During the Council meeting, Sax-Bolder urged the VSA to vote in favor of an appointment instead. She expressed concern about a lack of manpower to organize campus-wide events early in the semester, and questioned how well an elected vice-president would work with a house team that had been together for two weeks.

However, Strong House President Heidi Genrich, who was on Council in 2005-2006, said, “there have been so many problems in the past with appointments.” Several other Council members agreed that a democratic solution would be the best route for avoiding a rift between Lathrop residents and the VSA, and supported an election over appointment.

At the end of the discussion, 14 Council members voted in favor of election and eight in favor of appointment.