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May 09, 2008 Providing legal resources and election news to California election officials and the attorneys who represent them. |
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« August 2005 | Main | October 2005 » September 30, 2005 "Samuelson Clinic Submits Comments to U.S. Election Assistance Commission"From the Samuelson Clinic website: "On September 30, 2005, the Samuelson Clinic submitted to the United States Election Assistance Commission a public comment on behalf of A Center for Correct, Usable, Reliable, Auditable and Transparent Elections (ACCURATE), and ACCURATE affiliates, regarding the proposed 2005 Voluntary Voting System Guidelines. ACCURATE is a multi-institution, interdisciplinary, academic research project funded by the National Science Foundation’s (NSF) “CyberTrust Program.” ACCURATE is conducting research aimed at investigating software architecture, tamper-resistant hardware, cryptographic protocols and verification systems as applied to electronic voting systems. In addtion, ACCURATE is evaluating system usability and how public policy, in combination with technology, can better safeguard voting nationwide." You can ACCURATE's extensive comments here. Posted by Randy Riddle at 04:02 PM | Permalink. . . "Instant runoffs instantly persuasive"You can read the article here. Posted by Randy Riddle at 02:04 PM | Permalink. . . September 29, 2005 Secretary of State to Explore Open Source Software for Voting SystemsIn a recent letter, Secretary of State Bruce McPherson indicates that he is forming a task force to exlpore using open source code -- as opposed to propriety computer source code -- in voting systems used in California. You can read more about the background of this issue here. Posted by Randy Riddle at 09:47 AM | Permalink. . . September 28, 2005 "Voting machines near certification, but paper ballots to be used Nov. 8""Twelve paper jams and 21 screen freezes are the reasons why voters will once again use paper ballots during the Nov. 8 election. Despite county efforts to get its 96 electronic-voting machines certified this summer, several glitches - that have reportedly been fixed but still need certification - will keep the machines in storage until at least next spring, San Joaquin County Registrar of Voters Deborah Hench said. Hench will discuss the voting machines today with the board of supervisors. The county bought 96 TSX Voting System machines from manufacturer Diebold in 2002. They were used, successfully, for the first time in the March 2004 primary election. But the following month, the Secretary of State's Office decertified all e-voting machines in the state and mandated that that all machines have a paper audit trail. The audit trail is a print-out that a voter looks at to make sure everything is OK, but the voter does not take the form; it is kept as information for future audits. Last July the, the Secretary of State's office asked the county to test the entire system in a practice election. "This test had never been done before and there was no measure of passing or failing," Hench said. The results answered important questions such as how many rolls of paper were needed for the audit trail and what to do in case a machine fails. A study also discovered that nine machines could have had a paper jam, which meant that out of more than 700 virtual votes, the print-outs on 12 might appear smudged. However, that would not have affected the vote itself, she said. "The Secretary of State's Office thought that it was not good enough," she said." You read the rest of the article here. Posted by Randy Riddle at 11:27 AM | Permalink. . . "Two Dixon leaders could face recall""Dixon's top two elected officials soon could be facing a recall vote. Mayor Mary Ann Courville and Vice Mayor Gil Vega were served at Tuesday night's city council meeting with a notice that a petition to recall them would be circulated soon. Courville's 2004 mayoral rival and outspoken critic Michael Ceremello delivered sealed envelopes to Courville and Vega containing notice of intent to circulate a recall petition, but said he was not solely responsible for the recall push and would not identify immediately others involved." You can read the story here. Posted by Randy Riddle at 08:46 AM | Permalink. . . "Are instant runoffs the future of elections?"You can read the article here. Posted by Randy Riddle at 08:27 AM | Permalink. . . September 27, 2005 "Supreme Court to decide campaign-spending limits""he You read the Reuters article here. Posted by Randy Riddle at 09:19 AM | Permalink. . . September 26, 2005 "California must retain election transparency"You can read the editorial here. Posted by Randy Riddle at 08:32 AM | Permalink. . . "November election's costs weigh on counties' officials""County election officials say they are struggling to front the extra cost of staging the Nov. 8 statewide special election and worry they'll never get reimbursed by the state. Many counties were planning on paying for some local elections on Nov. 8 anyway. But having to absorb the $44 million extra cost to count ballots countywide and perform other tasks to deal with eight state ballot initiatives has forced many to borrow against their budgets for next year, with the assumption that the money will be repaid. Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's proclamation calling the special election says counties should be repaid by the state in the next fiscal year. But county officials fear the reimbursement could turn into a political tug-of-war between the Republican governor and the Democratic-controlled Legislature, which must approve the reimbursement and is at odds with Schwarzenegger over the election and the governor's initiatives. "All 58 counties are going to be in a world of hurt if we have to go without anything reimbursing us," said Conny McCormack, Los Angeles County registrar and president of the California Association of Clerks and Elections Officials. "County budgets were not built for this. Deficit spending is not an option for county budgets." You can read the entire article here. Posted by Randy Riddle at 08:29 AM | Permalink. . . September 21, 2005 "Pressure Builds in Maryland for Voting Machines Paper Trail""A recommendation from a national bipartisan commission is putting new pressure on Maryland officials to revise the state's electronic voting machines system to provide a paper trail. The commission headed by former President Jimmy Carter, a Democrat, and former Secretary of State James Baker, a Republican, issued a report Monday with 87 recommendations, including the recommendation that states should use machines that leave a paper trail as a way of increasing voter confidence in the election system. A spokesman for Governor Ehrlich says the governor "is receptive to the idea of a paper trail" and will soon appoint a commission to review Maryland election laws." You can view the article here. Posted by Randy Riddle at 05:08 PM | Permalink. . . "Some counties still holding out for paper ballots""Volusia County on Florida's east coast and Leon County -- Tallahassee -- may temporarily violate federal and state deadlines for the purchase of electronic voting machines that meet disabled access guidelines until certified new equipment that provides paper ballots for manual recounts becomes available. Sarasota County spent $4.7 million to meet its disabled access obligations in 2001 with the purchase of 1,615 Elections Systems and Software iVoltronic touch-screen machines that don't provide paper ballots for manual recounts. June 23, the Omaha, Neb., company announced it has been cleared by federal elections authorities to sell a new product called the AutoMARK, an electronic voting machine that scans ballots and accommodates all voters, including the disabled and visually impaired. Unlike the touch-screen iVoltronic machines, which do not provide a paper ballot for manual recounts, the AutoMARK machine optically scans ballots in a way that provides the privacy, accessibility and paper verification many voters' organizations have called for. While Florida elections officials have not certified the new ES&S AutoMARK machines, counties that held out on new equipment purchases because they want ballot paper trails that can confirm computer results will push to have them cleared. Inexplicably, the only state-certified touch-screen machines that currently meet disabled accessible standards are the ES&S iVoltronic machines, which Miami-Dade County has threatened to scrap because of operational problems and the absence of a paper ballot." You read the rest of the story here. Posted by Randy Riddle at 05:05 PM | Permalink. . . "Software bugs stall voting system""Wisconsin will not meet a federal deadline to have a uniform voter registration system in place by Jan. 1 because of problems with a new computer program, but that shouldn't stop residents from voting on Election Day.
You can read the article here. Posted by Randy Riddle at 05:03 PM | Permalink. . . "Bill would require all electronic voting machines to verify votes have been recorded correctly"The article on Senator Bowen's SB 370 can be found here. Posted by Randy Riddle at 04:57 PM | Permalink. . . September 20, 2005 "Counting of paper ballots bases confidence on transparency""Voting machine custodian Maureen McGurn, foreground, joined by supervisor Pat Urbanski, uses sample ballots to test optical scanner. Erie County Board of Elections officials demonstrated confidence in their paper ballot tabulation system Monday, even if some candidates remain wary of the potential for irregularities. Because county budget cuts left the board without enough funding to support machine technicians, roughly 25 percent of county voters - residents of 13 towns - were forced to use old-fashioned paper ballots. Now elections officials begin to count those ballots, with results in the District 1 race for the County Legislature expected late today. In the meantime, Republican Elections Commissioner Ralph M. Mohr and Democratic Deputy Commissioner Alonzo W. Thompson conducted a test on absentee ballots to strengthen public confidence in a system they say will prove fair and impartial. And after beginning their official count Monday of more than 85,000 ballots cast on paper in last week's primary elections, they said voters should have as much confidence as in machine ballots." You can read the rest of the article here. Posted by Randy Riddle at 08:24 AM | Permalink. . . September 19, 2005 "Suit filed against Georgia's voter ID law""The debate over a law in Georgia requiring voters to show government-issued photo identification at the polls moved today to a new battlefield: the federal courts. The state's new requirement that voters show government-issued photo identification at the polls poses an "undue burden" on the right to vote and violates federal law, and the Georgia and U.S. constitutions, said a lawsuit filed in U.S. District Court in Rome. The lawsuit, filed on behalf of two African-American registered Georgia voters and several groups including Common Cause/Georgia, the League of Women Voters of Georgia, the NAACP and the Georgia Legislative Black Caucus, also calls the photo ID requirement an illegal "poll tax" that disproportionately affects blacks, the poor, the sick, and the elderly. Gov. Sonny Perdue signed into law earlier this year a bill passed by the General Assembly requiring voters to show one of seven forms of government-issued photo identification when voting. The U.S. Department of Justice, which has to review any changes to voting laws in Georgia, approved the new law in August." You can read the entire article here. Posted by Randy Riddle at 02:32 PM | Permalink. . . "Secretary of State Bruce McPherson Issues Directives to Counties For Special Statewide Election"The directives, which appear to be modeled on those issued by the Secretary of State's office for the March 2004 election and November 2004 election, can be found here. Posted by Randy Riddle at 10:41 AM | Permalink. . . Baker-Carter Commission: Require Paper Audit Trail, Voter IDsCNN has this summary. You can review the full report here. Update: Rick Hasen has this analysis of the report. Dan Tokaji offers these views about the report's VVPAT and voter ID recommendations. Posted by Randy Riddle at 08:46 AM | Permalink. . . September 14, 2005 "GMO ballot lawsuit""Citing problems with the Sonoma County auditor-controller's impact analysis and the opposition's argument in the ballot pamphlet, supporters of Measure M, a ballot initiative seeking to prevent agricultural and environmental contamination from genetically engineered organisms, filed a lawsuit in Sonoma County Superior Court on Friday. "The (Sonoma County) Farm Bureau has had their facts wrong all along, so their ballot statement was no surprise," said Dave Henson, the main author of the measure, and executive director of Occidental Arts & Ecology Center. Proponents of the measure, which will appear on the Nov. 8 ballot, want to halt printing of the ballot measure until the language is revised. The first ballot pamphlets are scheduled to be distributed to registered absentee voters on Oct. 10. Opponents of the ballot pamphlet previously filed a lawsuit, objecting to the language used in the proponents' ballot statement." You can read the article here. Posted by Randy Riddle at 04:00 PM | Permalink. . . "Faith in voting"The Riverside Press Enterprise offers the following editorial in support of the Governor signing SB 370: "Public confidence in the integrity of elections is worth taking the time to cultivate and maintain. So Gov. Schwarzenegger should sign SB 370, which provides a sensible way to verify the accuracy of electronic voting machines. Yet the California Association of Clerks and Election Officials, supported by Secretary of State Bruce McPherson, has urged a veto. The group says such verification would be time-consuming and inaccurate. But those claims pale against the need for voter confidence in touch-screen machines' precision. California law requires elections officials to conduct a manual recount of 1 percent of the ballots to ensure the accuracy of machine-counted vote totals. But touch-screen voting systems have typically lacked paper ballots that can be used in such a recount. By 2006, all touch-screen machines in California must print out voters' choices, so that voters can verify their accuracy. SB 370, by Sen. Debra Bowen, D-Marina del Rey, would use this voter-verified paper trail for the recounts. The county election officials say the voter-verified printouts can't be trusted for accuracy. The printouts do not distinguish provisional ballots or identify pre-Election Day votes by precinct. That means the voter-verified tally would differ from the computer results, the officials say. But surely firms that design complicated voting software can handle the simple challenge of identifying precincts or provisional ballots on a printout. The election officials group even argues that the printer system could be programmed to provide a different result than the computer's internal audit trail. Raising questions about faulty or malicious programming makes an odd argument for not insisting on the strictest accuracy checks available. What better way to verify the accuracy of touch-screen tallies than by comparing them with the printouts voters approved? The computer tallies do have a backup record that can be printed out, but that is like comparing a photocopy to the original. Randomly testing voting devices, a past practice, also fails to check the machines against a record of ballots actually cast. SB 370 does mean extra time and expense for registrars, but giving voters confidence in elections more than repays that investment." Posted by Randy Riddle at 03:55 PM | Permalink. . . "June initiatives already in play""Election-weary California voters have yet to weigh in on November's special election ballot measures. But special interests have already launched dozens of initiative efforts aimed at next year's election. About two dozen ballot measure bids are listed with the secretary of state's office to be circulated for signatures to qualify for the June ballot or are awaiting approval to circulate. Initiative efforts are under way on topics ranging from restricting political contributions by corporations and creating a new state police force to patrol the Mexican border to expanding preschool. And even more initiatives are likely to follow." You can read the complete article here. Posted by Randy Riddle at 08:44 AM | Permalink. . . September 13, 2005 "Donna Frye" Bill Sent to the GovernorThe Legislature has passed SB 1050. If enacted, that bill would allow votes for qualified write-in candidates to be counted even if the voter does not blacken the oval next to the line for write-in candidates. However, the election official would not be required to count such votes unless he or she determines that the number of votes cast for the write-in candidate counted by the voting system, combined with the total number of undervotes cast for that same office, is equal to or greater than the total number of votes cast for the candidate receiving the greatest number of votes for that office. In other words, election officials will be required to undertake the task of examining each individual ballot only if it is conceivable that the write-in candidate has a chance of prevailing in the race. As explained in this Senate Analysis, SB 1050 stems from last year's San Diego Mayor's race: "Donna Frye was a qualified write-in candidate for mayor in the city of San Diego at the November 2004 General Election. When the official canvass of election results was completed, it showed Frye finishing second to incumbent mayor Dick Murphy by 2,108 votes. A recount, requested by media organizations and Frye supporters, uncovered a total of 5,551 ballots in which voters wrote-in Frye's name on the ballot in the correct location but did not darken the oval next to the write-in space. Had those ballots been counted for Frye, she would have won the election by 3,443 votes. However, the registrar of voters in San Diego County refused to count those votes, citing state law that requires the oval to be filled-in, in order for a write-in vote to count." Various lawsuits were filed as a result, including one on behalf of Donna Frye's supporters, arguing the 5,551 ballots in which voters wrote-in Frye's name, but didn't darken the oval next to the write-in space, should be counted. The trial court judge ruled against Frye's supporters but an appeal is currently pending. The decision of the trial court judge was based on the plain meaning of the statute which requires that the voting space be marked in addition to writing-in the candidate's name." Posted by Randy Riddle at 10:24 AM | Permalink. . . September 12, 2005 Bill to Prohibit Text Message Political Advertising Sent to the GovernorSB 582 would generally prohibit a candidate or political committee from transmitting a text message political advertisement to a mobile telephone, a pager, or a 2-way messaging device. Posted by Randy Riddle at 12:05 PM | Permalink. . . Legislature Sends Voter Registration Bill to the GovernorThe Legislature has sent SB 1016 to the Governor. This bill would make changes to form of voter registration affidavits to obtain voter ID information required by HAVA, and provide privacy protections for new voters. Posted by Randy Riddle at 09:57 AM | Permalink. . . Governor Vetoes Absentee Ballot BillThe Governor has vetoed AB 1096, which would have permitted specified family members other than a voter's spouse to pick up and deliver an absentee ballot on behalf of the voter, and would have eliminated the requirement that the voter be ill or physically disabled before a family member could return the voter's absentee ballot. Posted by Randy Riddle at 09:30 AM | Permalink. . . "Elections officials caution about fraud in paper records""Elections officials across California are waging 11th-hour opposition to using paper records for verifying electronic ballots, partly arguing that the printouts -- as well as the electronic voting machines themselves -- are vulnerable to fraudulent programming." The full article is available here. The association is opposing SB 370, which the Legislature recently approved. The Secretary of State has expressed his opposition to SB 370, which requires the voter verified paper audit to be used for the one percent manual recount required by law, and in any recount where the paper audit and electronic results differ. Update: Kim Alexander offers this response to the position of the Association on SB 370. Posted by Randy Riddle at 09:07 AM | Permalink. . . September 09, 2005 Legislature sends AB 783 to the GovernorAB 783 provides that expenses incurred on or after January 1, 2005, and before January 1, 2006, for elections proclaimed by the Governor to fill a vacancy in the office of Senator or Member of the Assembly, or to fill a vacancy in the office of United States Senator or Representative in the Congress of the United States, are to be paid by the state. Where the election is consolidated with a local election, the state would pay only those additional expenses directly related to the election proclaimed by the Governor. The bill would take effect immediately as an urgency matter. Posted by Randy Riddle at 11:10 AM | Permalink. . . "Voting research center opens""The Johns Hopkins University, in partnership with the National Science Foundation, announced in August the opening of A Center for Correct, Usable, Reliable, Auditable, and Transparent Elections (ACCURATE), which will blend public policy and computer science in an attempt to create stronger and more accurate voting technology. ACCURATE, funded by the National Science Foundation and in cooperation with the help of five other research institutions, will be based at Hopkins and seek to assuage mounting concern about the increasing use of electronic voting machines. In a statement released by Hopkins, Avi Rubin, who will be directing ACCURATE, said, "This center will develop the fundamental science necessary for secure, accessible, trustworthy and transparent voting." You can find the newsletter article here. Posted by Randy Riddle at 10:49 AM | Permalink. . . California Secretary of State: Election paper-trail bill should be vetoed"As California's secretary of state, I see my top priority as ensuring voter confidence and the integrity of each vote. State law requires that after an election, officials randomly select and manually recount 1 percent of the ballots cast, as a check against voting machine malfunction and fraud. At issue is how to gather the voting records used for verification. A Mercury News editorial Aug. 31 endorsed a bill, SB 370, that would require the sample recounts to use the paper printouts generated by electronic voting machines. This bill is flawed and should be vetoed by the governor. It creates major technical and legal flaws that must be resolved before becoming law. My biggest objection in using the paper trail to check voting machine performance is that it denies many in the disabled community the ability to have the same level of confidence in the process that all other voters enjoy." You can read the complete op-ed piece here. Posted by Randy Riddle at 10:43 AM | Permalink. . . September 08, 2005 "Records show candidate registered in 3 parties""State Assembly candidate Dr. Mary Jo Ford was once registered in San Diego as a Democrat, voter registration documents show, further eroding her contention that she has been a lifelong Republican and raising new doubts about her political background. San Diego County voter registration forms obtained Wednesday by the Daily Breeze show Ford was registered there as a Democrat in 1992. The revelation comes on the heels of a controversy over records that show she was a registered member of the American Independent Party when she moved to Manhattan Beach. Though she originally denied she was ever registered with that party, her spokesman on Wednesday acknowledged Ford's AIP registration in Los Angeles County but claimed the document was fraudulent." You can find the story here. Posted by Randy Riddle at 02:40 PM | Permalink. . . Governor vetoes fair campaign pledge bill"Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger has vetoed a bill that would have required candidates who sign a code of fair campaign practices to refrain from using negative references to a person's sexual orientation or gender identity. Assemblyman Leland Yee, D-San Francisco, said his bill was needed to discourage political campaigns that create fear and intimidation and could lead to violence. But Schwarzenegger said signing the campaign code is voluntary and that there would be no way to enforce the bill except through the ballot box." You read the Sacramento Bee article here. Posted by Randy Riddle at 12:39 PM | Permalink. . . "Governor vetoes signature-gatherer bill""Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger vetoed a bill by Assemblyman Joe Nation yesterday that would have required people who are paid for gathering initiative signatures to wear a badge. "I am dismayed the governor decided to veto a voter-oriented, good government piece of legislation," said Nation, D-San Rafael. "However, I understand this bill would have adversely affected his govern-by-initiative approach by forcing paid signature gatherers to reveal their true identity to voters." You read the complete article here. The vetoed bill is AB 738. Posted by Randy Riddle at 08:47 AM | Permalink. . . "Future elections will be closer, McPherson says""Secretary of State Bruce McPherson told regional water and political officials on Wednesday that future California elections would be decided by the slimmest of margins. The chief elections officer of the state said he predicts ballot measures and political campaigns could hinge on a few hundred, or even a few dozen, votes." You can read the rest of the article here. Posted by Randy Riddle at 08:44 AM | Permalink. . . September 07, 2005 Ohio election reform measures certified for ballotFour proposed constitutional amendments to dramatically overhaul Ohio's election system were certified yesterday for the Nov. 8 ballot even as a court hearing looms tomorrow that could change that. Secretary of State Ken Blackwell certified that Reform Ohio Now, a Democrat-leaning coalition of watchdog groups, garnered 353,094 valid signatures of registered voters statewide, 30,000 more than required. The petitions had also cleared the hurdle of getting enough signatures to equal 5 percent of those who voted in the 2002 gubernatorial election in at least 44 counties. The petitions cleared that hurdle in 72 counties, according to Mr. Blackwell. The four ballot questions would ask voters to: - Remove the process of redrawing congressional and state legislative districts after each U.S. Census out of the hands of elected officials and hand it to a new board on which no elected official could sit. - Strip the secretary of state of his election oversight authority and give it to a new statewide elections panel. - Allow voters to cast absentee ballots up to 35 days before an election without having to state a reason. - Revamp campaign contribution limits." The article is here. Posted by Randy Riddle at 08:12 AM | Permalink. . . September 06, 2005 Expect a Flurry of Election Bills Passed This WeekThis Friday, September 9, is the last day for the Legislature to pass bills this year. There are a number of pending election bills on final reading. I will provide a summary of the bills passed and sent to the Governor at the end of the week. Posted by Randy Riddle at 09:25 AM | Permalink. . . September 05, 2005 "Georgia Voter ID Lawsuit"You can read the short article here. Posted by Randy Riddle at 11:13 AM | Permalink. . . September 04, 2005 ""NFL debate goes to Internet""The decision to publish the text of a proposed NFL ballot initiative on the city-owned Web site has raised eyebrows among those who oppose the measure and sparked an internal debate in the city over the precedent it sets. This set off a flurry of e-mails between city spokeswoman Ann Erdman and City Manager Cynthia Kurtz, both of whom expressed grave reservations about having the raw text of a non-city ballot proposition posted on the site. "This certainly sets a new precedent that makes me nervous," Erdman wrote to Kurtz on Aug. 17. "Was this authorized to be posted on our Web site?" You can read the full story here. Posted by Randy Riddle at 10:02 AM | Permalink. . . September 02, 2005 "Feds revise stance on AZ voter ID requirement""Arizona voters may be able to obtain at least a provisional ballot at polling places even if they don't show required identification despite the ID requirement in a ballot measure approved by voters last year. Whether that provisional ballot gets counted is another question. The U.S. Justice Department in January signed off on election-law changes made by Proposition 200 itself. And a top department official in April signaled that the state would not run afoul of federal law if it put into place procedures to implement the ballot measure's voter ID mandate. However, a different department official on Thursday wrote the state, saying it was "necessary to clarify our earlier interpretation in order to ensure an accurate representation of the Justice Department's views." Acting Assistant Attorney General Bradley J. Schlozman's letter to a state official said the federal Help America Vote Act of 2002 requires that a person claiming to be an eligible voter and willing to sign a statement to that effect be given at least a provisional ballot. However, HAVA leaves it up to states to decide whether a person who casts a provisional ballot is actually eligible to vote and therefore whether a provisional ballot should be counted, Schlozman wrote. Therefore, the state is free to prohibit the counting of a provisional unless the voter produces proper identification on or after election day, Schlozman added." You can read the full story here. Posted by Randy Riddle at 07:12 AM | Permalink. . . "Sponsors of ban to appeal 'domestic partnership' title""Sponsors of an initiative that would amend the state Constitution to ban both same-sex marriage and marital rights for domestic partners said Thursday they will appeal a ruling requiring them to gather signatures under a state-approved heading that emphasizes the measure's effect on domestic partners. Attorney General Bill Lockyer's title -- "Marriage. Elimination of Domestic Partnership Rights'' -- and a 100-word summary are the first words that will be seen by voters deciding whether to sign petitions to place the measure on the ballot, or to support it if it qualifies. The initiative is one of two that have been proposed for the June ballot by groups of religious conservatives. They want to derail pending legal challenges to California's statutory ban on same-sex marriage and override a new law that gives domestic partners most of the rights of married couples." You can read the complete article here. Posted by Randy Riddle at 07:10 AM | Permalink. . . September 01, 2005 Developments in the Overseas Faxed Ballot CaseAs previously noted, the Sacramento Superior Court issued a writ of mandate prohibiting the counting of overseas ballots returned by fax pursuant to Elections Code section 3103.5, concluding that the statute violated the secret ballot requirement of the California Constitution. The Secretary of State appealed that order, and has taken the position that the appeal stays the effect of that order. The petitioner filed an application to transfer the appeal to the California Supreme Court. Yesterday, the Supreme Court denied the application, stating that "[t]his court's order in Bridgeman v. Shelley (S128311), filed October 15, 2004, ordering the Secretary of State to show cause before the Sacramento Superior Court, constituted a transfer of the proceeding to the superior court for all purposes, and the Court of Appeal accordingly has jurisdiction of the appeal from the ensuing judgment of the superior court." You can read more about the matter here. Posted by Randy Riddle at 01:57 PM | Permalink. . . "Judge cuts numbers from Measure P argument""Just one day ahead of the Registrar of Voters' printing deadline, a Superior Court judge decided Tuesday to strike two statements in the Redlands Association's ballot argument in favor of its slow-growth initiative, Measure P. In a one-hour hearing that ran more like an arithmetic lesson, Judge Bob N. Krug agreed with the Redlands Coalition that the Redlands Association must drop claims that city spending has increased 74 percent over five years and that the initiative would not impact income from the "doughnut hole." Krug's decision went against his own initial suggestions that he take until this afternoon to decide or that the Redlands Association be allowed to modify the statements. "The statement should use the years involved and numbers involved, so the public could do the math themselves," Krug said. "After listening to you people, I don't have any clue what you're talking about." You can read the complete story here. Posted by Randy Riddle at 08:25 AM | Permalink. . . |
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