Iowa

Iowa

Privacy issues are the focus of a first-in-the-nation petition bill in Iowa City, Iowa, which seeks to curb automated law enforcement in the form of red light cameras, license plate readers and drone aircraft used to catch traffic violations.  The petition was originally a referendum against the red light cameras and was sponsored by the citizen group “Stop Big Brother” as well as the ACLU of Iowa. The referendum was later expanded to include plate readers and drones.

A “proactive” move, says “Stop Big Brother” member Aleksey Gurtovoy since Iowa City currently does not utilize the plate readers or drones.

When we talk about initiatives and referendums we have a tendency to think of issues on a state level. We often hear about issues that influence states such as California, Colorado, and Oregon to name a few states that have had recent state-led votes on issues that people want to see changed within those states. But people-led issues aren’t limited to just states ”” they also apply to local issues at the city level.

Read more: here

The citizens of Manly, Iowa have apparently had enough of their city clerk. Earlier this week they collected signatures and presented them to the town council urging them not to reappoint the official:

Opponents of a proposal to raise Iowa City’s bar entry age have begun a petition to do just the opposite. Organizers filed papers Monday with the city to petition for a public vote that would lower the bar entry age to 18 after 10 p.m. They hope the move will thwart the possibility of the city council changing the current ordinance, which allows bars to admit 19-year-olds, to only grant entry to those 21 or older.

Read the story from the Iowa City-Press Citizen

Voters across Iowa head to the polls today to decide who will serve on local school boards. They also will decide other ballot issues such as whether to renew physical plant and equipment levies and how to spend money from the sales tax for schools.

Read the story from the Des Moines Register

Tensions flare as a new petition calls on state lawmakers to ban bicycling on certain roads. The Citizens for Safety Coalition of Iowa started circulating the petition about a month ago. Their 525 or so supporters want legislators to support a ballot initiative banning bikes from 30 thousand miles of state and county roads in Iowa. Those supporting this new petition are concerned about the safety of bicyclists using county roads.

Read the story from KCRG 9

Bernie McKinley was Waterloo’s mayor when voters first approved a local option sales tax for street repairs in 1991. He returned to the City Council chambers Monday to lobby unsuccessfully against plans for a ballot measure to broaden the use of the tax revenues. “This fund cannot afford this (other) stuff,” McKinley said. “We’re not free of potholes; we’re not free of failed streets yet. “This fund and the trust of the people that voted for it should be left the way it was,” he added.

Radio Iowa is reporting that a group calling itself the “Citizens for Safety Coalition of Iowa” is asking people to sign a petition that asks the legislature to create a ballot initiative for the November 2010 election that would ban bicycles on farm-to-market roads.

Read the story from The Austin American-Statesman

In 1904, I&R advocates began making headway with an endorsement from the Prohibitionist Party, followed in 1906 by the support of the Socialists and Populists and, in 1910, that of the Democrats. An amendment by Republican State Representative David E. Kulp calling for statewide I&R reached the floor of the lower house of the legislature in 1911, but it was…(Read More)

Winneshiek County residents won’t be voting on the method for electing supervisors this year. A petition had been circulated calling for a vote on matter but it failed to garner the 1,129 signatures (10 percent of the votes cast in the last general election) required. The deadline for obtaining the signatures was Monday.

Read the rest of the story from Decorah Newspaper

History

Mon, Feb 16 by Anonymous

In 1904, I&R advocates began making headway with an endorsement
from the Prohibitionist Party, followed in 1906 by the support of the
Socialists and Populists and, in 1910, that of the Democrats. An
amendment by Republican State Representative David E. Kulp calling for
statewide I&R reached the floor of the lower house of the legislature in
1911, but it was defeated 58 to 42.

Grade

Mon, Feb 16 by Anonymous

Ballot Qualifications & Schedule

Mon, Feb 16 by Anonymous

State Balloting Process

Mon, Feb 16 by Anonymous

Article X
Amendments
Sec 1. How proposed—submission.
Any amendment or amendments to this constitution may be proposed in
either house of the general assembly; and if the same shall be agreed to
by a majority of the members elected to each of the two houses, such
proposed amendment shall be entered on their journals, with the yeas
and nays taken thereon, and referred to the legislature to be chosen at
the next general election, and shall be published, as provided by law, for

You have no statewide Initiative & Referendum rights.

Poll:

See the results of a poll on support for statewide initiative & referendum here.

Grade: F

Click here to view Iowa’s individual report in Of the People, By the People, For the People: A 2010 Report Card on Statewide Voter Initiative Rights.