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January 26, 2007

Washington State grapples with banning paying by the signature for initiatives

On the other side of the Columbia River, Washingtonians are beginning to tackle something we Oregonians dealt with a number of years ago: banning the practice of paying initiative signature gathers by the signature.

In November of 2002, Oregonians passed Measure 26, a constitutional amendment banning the "pay by signature" initiative process.

The bill in Washington had a committee hearing today in which testimony was taken from a raft of folks who are in no mood to have their gravy train of pay by signature halted:

Word is that the hearing room is packed with opponents of the bill, a crowd organized by Tim Eyman and his signature gathering contractors at Citzens Solutions. Of course they’re crowding the hearing room. This isn’t democracy or free speech that’s at stake for them, it’s their livelihood.

And apparently their arguments on the topic are as shallow as their motives for appearing:

There are really only two arguments against HB 1087. 1.) There is no evidence of signature fraud in WA state, and thus this bill is an unconstitutional restriction on free speech; and 2.) this bill is intended to destroy the initiative process.

The "no evidence of fraud" argument has also been buffetted by Oregon's own initiative scammer Bill Sizemore:

Before Measure 26, when initiative sponsors were allowed to pay circulators by the signature, Oregon had a small problem with petition signature forgeries. During a typical election cycle, two or three forgers would be caught; the other 99 percent of petition circulators played by the rules. Professional circulators knew that they would be blackballed if they were caught forging signatures -- their careers would be over.

Measure 26, on the other hand, has attracted a whole new breed of petition circulators. During this election cycle, nearly 20 signature forgers have been caught and turned in. That's approximately 10 times more forgers than when petition sponsors were allowed to hire professionals who were paid by the signature and had reputations to maintain.

The problem Sizemore (and Eyman in Washington) have is the phrase "were caught". Prior to Measure 26, it was the campaigns who were scrutinizing their signatures. Once people were caught from outside the campaigns forging the signatures, then it became obvious that the "pay by signature" was simply feeding that beast. Oregon's Attorney General has said as much. The 9th Circuit Court of Appeals happens to agree.

Its laughable for Sizemore to make the argument that pay by the hour is bringing in more forgers. The reason more people are caught is because of the scrutiny that M26 has brought to the process. Grassroots organizations are paying much closer attention.

Posted by Carla at January 26, 2007 03:35 PM