In a rare show of dissent on the Colorado Mesa University campus, a banner was quietly hung from the roof of Confluence Hall Wednesday night that declared “KOKOPELLI 4EVER” to all who passed by.
Kokopelli was the original name for Confluence Hall, CMU’s new engineering building, before it was scrapped due to alleged election hacking.
In Native American culture, Kokopelli is a fertility deity usually depicted as a humpbacked fluteplayer adorned with feathers. Coincidentally or not, he is also known as a trickster god.
While notable figures and politicians of Colorado rubbed shoulders at Confluence’s grand opening, the likely trickster(s) made their way to the building’s roof and hung the multi-piece banner.
The banner, which was hung from the 7th Street side of the building, also includes two depictions of Kokopelli himself.
Back in October, CMU said Kokopelli won by a suspiciously wide margin relative to CMU standards, 1,663 votes. For comparison, only 784 students participated in last year’s student government election. The second most voted name was “Redlands Hall,” which received 583 votes.
In an email in October, Foster said the results “might have involved some innovative voting behaviors, that could have influenced the outcome.”
The survey was originally put out on SurveyMonkey in hopes to receive alumni vote along with current students and staff, but administration believed the results were not clean due to the lopsided numbers.
While CMU spokesperson Dana Nunn did not want to speculate motive for the alleged rigging, the iPads being offered as prizes for the winning name may have been enough incentive.
“It is probably futile to speculate on motive. Do they just love their chosen name so much? Did they nominate that name to increase the likelihood of winning an iPad? I don’t know,” Nunn said in October. “I’m not sure what anyone’s incentive would have been to hack the system, an iPad is only worth $329, and to be honest we were planning on giving away more than one.”
CMU utilized online polling for both Escalante Hall and Dominguez Hall.
After another failed election attempt, which supposedly used stricter security, the school picked the name “Confluence Hall.”
Foster explained in a school-wide email the name represented the partnership with CU, the partnership with the McConnell Math & Science Museum and the obvious reference to Grand Junction’s naming “because it is located at the junction or confluence of the Colorado and Gunnison rivers.”
In order to hang the Kokopelli proclamation, the banner-hangers had to have reached the roof, which is likely not open to the public and required entry through closed stairways.
It is unknown how seriously the university will take the act and if surveillance footage will be inspected, but for now, the perpetrators got their wish. While likely fleeting, CMU’s newest building has been inscribed with “Kokopelli.” Whether it will see tomorrow’s light of day is another question.
