EXTRA, EXTRA, READ ALL ABOUT IT. Commissioner Madore now is concerned that the sky will fall with the referendum provision in the new Charter. Section 7.4 of the Charter spells out the Referendum process. Essentially, a person has 10 days after an ordinance is passed to collect 100 valid signatures from registered voters, known as a referendum petition or proposal. Once he or she files this proposal with the County Auditor, the ordinance or section of ordinance in question is suspended. He or she (or group) then has 120 days to collect signatures representing 10 percent of those who voted in the last gubernatorial election and submit the petitions to the County Auditor for verification. If there are enough valid signatures, the ordinance or section of ordinance is placed on the ballot. If there arent enough signatures, the petition fails and the suspended ordinance or section of ordinance can take effect. Im attaching a comparison of Clark Countys charter to a few other Washington Charter counties, for the referendum process. The bottom has not fallen out of any of these counties. If you compare ours to theirs, ours fits right in the middle and seems pretty fair. Note that in several counties, it only takes one person to request a referendum and thus, suspend an ordinance. In Clark County, it takes 100. Or roughly one-sixth of our groups membership.
Posted on: Thu, 13 Nov 2014 03:51:37 +0000