The ASUA Elections Commission will conduct a recount of votes for two candidates vying for a seat on the Undergraduate Senate.

The Associated Students Supreme Court delivered a 4-1 decision last night in favor of a recount in response to a complaint by Madison O'Neil, communication junior, about the high margin of error that can occur in a close race.

O'Neil lost by two votes to Kim Montanaro, history and political science sophomore, when the second round of votes were tallied on April 3 by Pima County Elections machines. The count was 849-847.

The court said the commission must now count the ballots until it gets the same number of votes for each candidate three times.

"I was hoping for a run-off election, but this method will hopefully give us a result with less of a margin of error," O'Neil said.

Jennifer Haber, ASUA elections commissioner, said the recount will probably be on Monday and will cost ASUA between $100 to $150.

Holding a run-off election would have cost ASUA about $1,500.

O'Neil said he questioned the results when the commission informed him that he had lost by one vote when the votes were first tallied and then by two votes when an automatic recount was completed.

"Why wasn't another count done to get a repeat of my loss by two?" O'Neil said in his presentation to the court.

Haber said the commission acted according to the elections code, which says when there is a 1 percent margin between votes for the eighth senate seat, there should be an automatic recount.

"We did a recount and there was no change in any position, there was only a change in the numbers," Haber said.

Haber said the number of votes can change each time the ballots are counted because people often do not punch their choices hard enough.

This causes the vote-counting machine to misread the holes punched because some of the paper punches stick to the ballots.

Haber said that is why ASUA members who help with the ballots must wipe each ballot off before it is counted.

"We went through every ballot before to find chad (the term used for the paper slots that stick to the ballot), and a few chad flew out," Haber said. "Each time ballots run through the machine they get cleaner and cleaner."

She said the commission will do an electronic recount because of the amount of time and human error a manual recount would involve.

O'Neil said the appeal was in no way a personal issue, and added that he believes in the qualifications of both Montanaro and himself.