petition

If you have signed a petition to put an initiative measure to a statewide vote Nov. 4, your signature may be among thousands that state officials check against voter registration records.

Then again, your signature may not be checked.

Under Oregon’s verification process, sampling is used to determine whether supporters have gathered the minimum 87,213 signatures required to qualify an initiative for the statewide ballot. The number changes every four years, because the Oregon Constitution specifies that it is 6 percent of the total votes cast for governor. For a proposed constitutional amendment, the threshold is 8 percent.

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A group that wants to install a tornado shelter in every public school in Oklahoma spent the holiday weekend gathering signatures to get its initiative petition on an upcoming ballot.

This isn’t Take Shelter Oklahoma’s first attempt to collect 155,000 signatures, but the group is giving it another shot.

Supporters of Take Shelter Oklahoma stood on the porch of David Slane’s Oklahoma City law office last week to celebrate the launch of their second signature gathering campaign.

Read (and listen to) more: here

Nebraska voters may get a chance in November to vote on whether the state’s minimum wage should be increased. Organizers of a petition initiative say they turned in 134,899 signatures to the Secretary of State’s office, in hopes of putting the measure on the ballot. If enough signatures are verified, this would be the first petition initiative to be put to voters since 2008.

“To qualify a statutory measure for the ballot, circulators must collect signatures from at least 7 percent of registered voters,” explained Secretary of State John Gale. “Those signatures must include at least 5 percent of registered voters from 38 of the state’s 93 counties.”

Beyond fireworks, American flags and barbecue, be prepared for another sight at Arkansas’ Fourth of July festivals and parades this weekend: Someone asking for signatures.

Supporters of efforts to raise the state’s minimum wage, legalize medical and recreational uses of marijuana and expand alcohol sales are making a last push to gather signatures over the holiday weekend as they near the deadline to submit petitions to the state.

Proponents of a statewide initiative to regulate the commercial production and retail sale of marijuana have turned in 145,000 signatures to the Secretary of State’s office. The total is almost twice the number of signatures from registered voters necessary to place the measure on the 2014 electoral ballot.

State officials have until August 2 to verify the signatures.

A group of residents, upset by the city’s plans to construct a new parking lot downtown and remove a ballfield, is circulating a referendum petition that it hopes will put the issue on the November ballot.

“We would like to see no loss of recreational space,” said resident Rita Scott, who is spearheading a committee of 12 residents who are circulating the petition. “There are lots of options for parking.”

Mayor Ann Womer Benjamin believes the Kiwanis-Moore Playground project, which consists of a parking lot, walkway, field improvements and landscaping, “is a first step toward improving Town Center, which can be the core of growth and activity that benefits everyone.”

Supporters of a referendum to put Seattle’s $15 minimum wage to a public vote have turned in what they are confident will be enough signatures to qualify the measure for the November ballot.

Forward Seattle co-founder and Seattle small business owner Kathrina Tugadi tells KIRO Radio’s Jason Rantz show they have gathered nearly 20,000 signatures, far more than the 16,500 signatures required to qualify the referendum.

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Sixteen years ago, D.C. activists gathered signatures to let voters decide if the District should be among the first in the nation to legalize medical marijuana. Then Congress stepped in, and city officials were not even allowed to count the ballots that voters had cast.

Supporters of a voter initiative to legalize marijuana for recreational use in Oregon said they submitted more than enough signatures to state election officials on Thursday to qualify the measure for the November ballot.

Only two U.S. states, Washington and Colorado, currently allow recreational marijuana, which remains illegal under federal law, while voters in Alaska are slated to vote on legalization in November.

In heavily Democratic Oregon, where voters rejected legalization two years ago, New Approach Oregon said it turned in 145,710 signatures to the Secretary of State’s Office on Thursday afternoon, well above the 87,213 needed to qualify.

Supporters of an initiative that would jettison Oregon’s partisan primaries said they submitted 140,045 signatures to the secretary of state on Monday — appearing to give them enough to earn a spot on the November ballot.

The Every Oregon Voter Counts Petition Committee collected the signatures in just a little over five weeks in what the group said was the fastest effort to collect initiative signatures in Oregon history.

Sponsors of proposed ballot initiatives are scrambling in the final days before a Friday deadline to gather enough signatures to put their issues to Montana voters on the Nov. 4 ballot.

The Montana Secretary of State’s office has approved a dozen initiative petitions for signature-gathering after they passed legal reviews by the attorney general. Officials on Monday did not know how many — if any — would make the deadline.

“We’re just kind of waiting,” said spokeswoman Terri McCoy. “It’s not unusual for all those signatures to come in at the last minute.”

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Robin Warren is a middle school student from Las Vegas who is better known as “Wild Mustang Robin” because of her work in advocacy for wild horses.

Warren first started collecting signatures to save horses and burros in July of 2010. Three years later she had collected nearly a quarter million signatures from supporters all over the world on Change.org.

On June 13, the student filed her first petition that will be officially recognized: “The Wild Horse and Burro Initiative.” If she is able to collect more than 100,000 signatures then Warren’s initiative petition will appear on the 2016 Nevada ballot.

Measure 1, a constitutional amendment that moves the initiative petition deadline up 30 days – to just before the North Dakota state fair, so that initiative sponsors lose that very important meeting place for gathering signatures – passed narrowly yesterday in a very low turnout primary election.

State legislators introduced the amendment as HCR 3034 and passed it at the request of long-serving Secretary of State Al Jaeger, who argued his office needed more time to review petitions and that more time was also necessary to accommodate legal challenges to ballot measures.

Paid and volunteer initiative petition circulators gathered in midtown Lincoln on Friday morning, getting ready for a day of work.

Mosquito repellant and sun screen spray filled the room on the third-floor office at 3130 O St. for a few moments, before workers were to break into groups to memorize and practice their statements to potential petition signers.

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Signatures are being collected in hopes of legalizing medical marijuana in Oklahoma.

At a kickoff petition drive Wednesday, supporters called on lawmakers to join their cause to allow voters to decide the issue.

Dozens of people gathered on the south steps of a quiet Capitol Building Wednesday afternoon. A few people arrived as early 10:30 a.m. Many of those in attendance made the trip to Oklahoma City from the Tulsa area.

Disabled veteran Eldon Lunsford of Nowata recently returned home from Denver’s 420 Rally. Lunsford told News 9 he can’t wait to return to his “mile high.”

Read more: here