City of Boulder Ballot Issue 2B (2023)
YES / FOR. I am voting Question 2B to improve the administration of direct democracy and petitions in the City of Boulder.
City of Boulder Ballot Issue 2B
Elections Administrative Charter Cleanup
Elections Administrative Charter Cleanup Shall Sections 27, 37, 39, 46, and 57 of the city Charter be amended pursuant to Ordinance 8587 to: · remove the requirement that signers to petitions appear personally before the city clerk; · clarify that state law governs the process for charter amendments; · change the timing provisions of filing a petition to 160 days before an election instead of 150 days; · change the number of days that the city clerk has to approve a petition to 15 days from 10 days; and · change the number of days that the city clerk has to verify petition signatures from 10 to 15?
YES / FOR. As someone who has filed a lawsuit against the city for their handling of petitioning election laws, I do appreciate these changes are getting some attention.
Question 2B has a number of small changes that I will outline and submit a few comments on:
1. Remove the requirement that signers to petitions appear personally before the city clerk
I presume the desire to remove this in-person requirement relates to the City of Boulder’s online petition system, Boulder Direct Democracy Online, which would not meet this requirement.
2. Clarify that state law governs the process for charter amendments
This provision is exactly what the Bedrooms Are For People lawsuit was about. The City of Boulder did not clarify exactly how the city’s election laws and charter provisions interacted with the State of Colorado’s rules about changes to the city charter. This change clarifies that state law should be used.
3. Change the timing provisions of filing a petition to 160 days before an election instead of 150 days
Currently, petitions are typically due at the beginning of June, and will now be due closer to the end of May. This is not a reduction in the time allowed to get a measure on the ballot, as petitioners still have 180 days total for that process to collect signatures (which currently requires about 3,500 valid signatures).
4. Change the number of days that the city clerk has to approve a petition to 15 days from 10 days
When putting a measure on the ballot, the city clerk works with the city attorney’s office to determine if a measure meets various legal requirements and has a ballot question that clearly reflects the intent of the petition. This provision will increase the amount of time the city has to process those requests.
5. Change the number of days that the city clerk has to verify petition signatures from 10 to 15?
The city clerk must manually verify each signature turned in for a petition. While some campaigns have started using the City’s of Boulder’s online petition system, due to difficulties with the system, most campaigns do not collect more than 10-20% of signatures online. That means that the remaining 80-90+% of signatures must be painstakingly checked against voter records on name and address, which takes many days.
Read Shay Castle at the Boulder Beat who outlines the exact changes to the City Charter described above: