Posted on 07/02/2003 9:58:18 PM PDT by 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 Californias 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.
Reeds 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 circulators name is either absent, indicated only by initials, changed, typed or is the name of a person who is not a registered voter; --the circulators 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. Shelleys 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
(Excerpt) Read more at sacbee.com ...
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!!!
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