Florida Hometown Democracy Initiative Appears to Qualify, but Distribution Requirement Plus Signature Revocations Could Derail It

On June 8, the Florida Secretary of State finished checking an initiative petition, and said the initiative appears to have enough signatures statewide. The proposed initiative would require a popular vote on new housing development approvals. The initiative needed 676,811 signatures to appear on the November 2010 ballot, and has 691,896 valid.

However, Florida has a distribution requirement for statewide initiatives, and the initiative lacks enough signatures in one district. But, the initiative does have enough signatures even in that one district, if it wins a pending lawsuit in the Florida Supreme Court. The lawsuit concerns a 2007 law that makes it possible for people who have signed the initiative to later remove their signatures. The State Court of Appeals had struck down that procedure on April 23, 2008. The state had appealed to the Florida Supreme Court, which heard the case on January 8, 2009. The case is Florida Hometown Democracy v Browning, SC08-884.

The proponents of the initiative are hoping that the Florida Supreme Court issues its ruling quickly, so that it knows whether it must collect more signatures or not. If it must collect more signatures, people who signed that petition more than four years ago will not count. Also people who signed it more than four years ago are not permitted to sign it again.


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