In a landslide victory, sophomore Blanca Garcia and junior Krista Heiden will be the new president and vice president, respectively, of the Student Government Association.

With 67 percent of the vote, Garcia and Heiden defeated the ticket of senior Hannah Kurtzweil and sophomore Samantha Cook, which received 33 percent of the vote.

Garcia and Heiden more than doubled the raw vote tally of Kurtzweil and Cook, 488 votes to 240.

“We feel very privileged; we worked so hard for this,” Heiden said. “There is a long list of things we want to do.”

Garcia said the pair has a lot of work to do to represent students’ interests.

“Right now, Krista and I need to sit down and develop a plan of what they want to work on first so they do not have to back track,” Garcia said. “We will focus first on the students and start a plan and we will start it before the end of the semester.”

When she is officially sworn into office, Garcia will become the first junior to serve in the position since Lucy Garcia, who served as president during both the 2002-2003 and 2003-2004 academic year.

Total voter turnout appears to be  down 25 percent from last year. This year’s election had an estimated 770 voters as opposed to the 2009 election, which had 1,052. However, there were also five competitive races last year as opposed to just two competitive races this year.

Kurtzweil and Cook also did not begin campaigning until six days into the campaign cycle.

“We got off to a slow start,” Kurtzweil said. “I went on a trip with my class for a week during Easter break. In all honesty, Krista and Blanca will be great presidents and vice presidents next year.”

The Student Government Constitution and Student Bill of Rights also passed with more than 85 percent in favor. This was the first year a constitutional referendum was put in place since 1999.

The only other contested race was among three candidates vying for the two sophomore senate positions. Olivia Bouree and Andrew Guerrero won the spots with 38 percent and 34 percent of the vote, respectively. The third candidate, Fremen DeRuvo received 28 percent of the vote. All three are currently serving as freshman senators.

The new SGA officers will take office May 1 and will be officially sworn in when the fall 2010 semester begins.