Problems in the [Gray Davis recall] petitions

Sac Bee ^ | 7/2 | Dan Weintraub

[ambrose]

Problems in the petitions

If you want a glimpse of how Gray Davis might litigate to stop or slow the recall, a hint might be in a letter sent Monday to Secretary of State Kevin Shelley by the president of California’s county clerks association. The letter from Shasta County Clerk Ann Reed looks as if it could be a roadmap for anyone who wants to challenge the validity of the signatures gathered so far by the recall campaign.

Reed’s letter lists a half dozen issues that have come up in multiple counties and then outlines the steps elections officials will take to deal with them. The problems, which are common to every ballot measure campaign, include:

--the county in which the petition was circulated is not listed or was changed; --the circulator’s name is either absent, indicated only by initials, changed, typed or is the name of a person who is not a registered voter; --the circulator’s address is not listed, is only a PO box, or has been crossed out and replaced by a different address; --the information for the date circulated and the community in which the petitions were circulated is blank, incomplete or changed; --the box for when and where the petition was “executed” is blank, incomplete or was changed; --the box for signatures is blank, or the names were typed or only initials were used.

In most cases, Reed wrote, the clerks intend to count those signatures that can be verified as coming from voters in their counties, even if some part of the form is incorrect or incomplete. This would include cases where the circulator or some other person wrote in the address of the voter after the voter signed the petition.

“We want to give the benefit of the doubt always to the voter, or the signor,” Reed told me in an interview.

Reed said the clerks will not count petitions on which the date of circulation is not written or has been changed, because the law allows only a set period – 160 days in this case – to gather the signatures. The clerks also do not intend to verify and count names where the signature was typed or only initials are present.

Reed said the letter was sent to Shelley one day before the secretary of state sent the clerks and registrars a memo outlining his view of the verification calendar. Shelley’s memo did not respond to the clerks’ questions but referred the elections officials to previously prepared verification guidelines.

Posted by dweintraub at 04:09 PM

[ambrose]

ping

[mdittmar]

Flashback
Democrats send out document explaining how to protest Military Overseas Ballots.

Same M.O..

[dalereed]

The forms are simple, anyone not filling them out properly has to be totally brain dead!

[dalereed]

That's why all petitions should be returned to the RecallGrayDavis.com organization, any of these kind of errors are caught and the petitions returned to the circulator for correction before submitting them to the County Register of Voters for verification.

[TheSpottedOwl]

The forms are simple, anyone not filling them out properly has to be totally brain dead!

The instructions are clear, and warnings have been given about these issues Miss Ann has raised.

Hey Annie, you're next after Kevin Shelley!

Lets flush these rats down the toilet!!!

[Ernest_at_the_Beach]

Thanks for the ping!

calgov2002:

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[Carry_Okie]

This must be the sixth or seventh time I've posted this. Here's the law: California Constitution, Article 2, Sec 14(c):

(c) The Secretary of State shall maintain a continuous count of the signatures certified to that office.

The SOS doesn't have the room to delay the count within that law if the Counties send him the certified signatures. It's up to us to lean on our county officials.