Citizens in Charge

I am writing to provide an update on the CB58-2008 referendum petition drive that started last November after the Howard County Maryland Council approved a 300% zoning increase for the size of grocery stores in Turf Valley.You may recall that citizens gathered over 9,300 signatures to place this legislation on the ballot for voters to decide in the 2010 election.

Despite providing repeated guidance for citizens who were collecting signatures, the Howard County Board of Elections (HCBoE) changed their 30 year old signature verification procedures in March, four months after the petition drive had started and two months after certifying the initial submission of signatures. The HCBoE’s abrupt reversal nullified 87% of the submitted signatures (many for lack of a middle initial) and disenfranchised the citizens of Howard County by effectively stripping us of the County Charter’s right to referendum. Within days of the HCBoE’s decision to nullify the signatures of registered voters, Howard County Citizens for Open Government filed an administrative appeal with the Howard County Circuit Court.

Below is a scan of two signature pages from the HCBoE (you can view them in PDF format by clicking here). The first is an original petition page, with HCBoE staff notations indicating all ten signatures were valid (all ten have ‘OK’ written beside them):

The second page includes the voter registration information for these ten voters. Utilizing the new procedures, the HCBoE invalidated eight (80%) of the previously accepted signatures:

Some of the reasons for their rejection include:

•    Using ‘Wm.’, rather than William, to print/sign their name
•    Not including their middle name in the print and/or signature columns
•    Using ‘Lisa’, rather than ‘Elisabeth’, to print/sign their name
•    Using ‘Chris’, rather than ‘Christopher’, to print/sign their name

Given the insurmountable challenge of knowing that the BoE’s new rules will statistically disqualify more than 75% of registered voters from ANY petition (including ballot issues, candidates for elected office and new political parties), the citizens of Maryland have been disenfranchised from executing their Constitutional voting rights to petition the government. Maryland stands alone as the ONLY state in the union to require a “triple match” for acceptance of a petition signature – demanding a far higher standard of validation than is required to vote on election day.

On Friday the 13th at 9am, the citizens of Howard County will have their first opportunity to challenge the HCBoE decision by attending the Court proceedings in Ellicott City.

In addition to protecting our voting rights (guaranteed by the state constitution and county charter), Friday will be a reaffirmation of the high school lessons we were taught in Government/Civics class. Please plan to attend with your friends and family to respectfully send the message that it is a violation of democracy for political appointees on the Board of Elections to deny our constitutionally guaranteed voting rights.

Marc Norman is co-founder of Howard County Citizens for Open Government.