The Traveler

Issue date: 11/7/08 Section: News

Media Credit: Larry Ash Supporters of Sen. Barack Obama embrace at an election watch party hosted Tuesday at the Fayetteville Town Center.

As people across the world, from Nigeria to London, watched the presidential election Tuesday, UA students also tackled state and local ballot measures as they voted in what may be the largest presidential election since 1964, the same year the Civil Rights Act was passed.

"First and foremost, I'm glad it's over," recent graduate Teija Kearney Ramos said. "I'm shocked and happy of course, too. I thought that race would be much more of an issue than it ended up being."

Spanish professor Marlene Beiz Latorre, a Chilean native, said people in Latin America and across the world think President-elect Barack Obama "is a good change for the relationship between the U.S. and the world. People received his message: yes, we can."

However, not everyone was so enthusiastic.

"I don't like the results, but the people have spoken," sophomore Alex Sittig said. "The Republicans separated the economic base from the social base over the past eight years, and I'm not surprised with what's happened. People were upset."

Other than the presidential election, several ballot measures were voted on, including the Lowest Priority Initiative spearheaded by Sensible Fayetteville, which makes marijuana the lowest priority for Fayetteville law enforcement.

Senior Eliot Shaw Schaffer was ecstatic over the passing of the measure.

"The marijuana initiative was the most impressive outcome out of the measures and had the biggest effect on me," he said.

Schaffer acknowledged that although state law supersedes city law as far as the criminal status of marijuana, "it says a lot, and it could initiate further legislation."

The controversial Initiative Act 1 ballot measure was passed, and unmarried couples, both heterosexual and homosexual, will now no longer be allowed to adopt or foster children in Arkansas, which has 1,100 foster homes to provide for, and on any given day, 3,700 foster kids in the state's system.

Sarah Lewis, who was elected to the Fayetteville City Council Tuesday, said the act's passing was "just terrible."

"It will just have to be brought back to the table," Lewis said.

Senior Samantha Lee Sturm said she didn't agree with the passing of Arkansas Act I.

"There are plenty of children who need good parents and role models," Sturm said. "If these couples, whatever their orientation, are willing to provide safe, positive, and loving homes for these children, who are we to stop them?"

It's "just disappointing and a loss for all those children who could benefit," she said.

The proposal for a state lottery also passed by a wide margin, providing the legislature with the means to establish a state lottery that Lt. Gov.

Bill Halter said would pump $100 million yearly into state grants and scholarships for college students in certified two-year or four-year schools.

The Fayetteville mayoral race will go into a runoff set for Nov. 25 between incumbent Dan Coody and City Councilman Lioneld Jordan, who garnered 38 percent and 28 percent of the vote in the Nov. 4 election, respectively.

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