They Rewrote Your Petition. Help Us Defend Your Vote.

3 to 5 DougCo

Sep 11

2 min read

20,434 Voters Qualified This Issue for the Ballot.

3 Commissioners Are Trying to Tank It.

The Douglas County Commissioners rewrote the ballot language of the 3 to 5 Petition and added a separate, competing ballot question of their own in an effort to prevent district-based representation and accountability for our future county commissioners. Kyle Clark of 9News summarized it this way.

"Douglas County’s Republican commissioners are facing a threat to their current absolute power. So you can’t blame the guys for pulling out all the stops to block it. Citizens gathered enough signatures for a ballot question to expand the board from three to five members. That could lead to a Democrat possibly winning a seat in that traditionally conservative county. So the GOP commissioners reworded the citizen measure to tank it. Those organizers appealed, and today the DougCo commissioners were like, “Nah. We agree with us.” ~ Kyle Clark

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WHAT HAPPENED? (THE 2-MINUTE UPDATE)

The Victory: On August 12, the Clerk certified 20,434 valid signatures from Republican, Democratic, and Unaffiliated voters across Douglas County.

The Overreach: On August 28, the Board added a 22-word fiscal preamble containing an inflated $1.3M figure, despite internal staff documents placing baseline commissioner costs at $481,708 (as we advertised in our campaign materials and website).

The Confusion Strategy: On August 31, the Board added a competing, non-standard referral measure designed to compete with the expansion options.

Our Response: We filed formal protests, preserved our rights, were denied and are now taking our message directly to Douglas County voters.

Legal Pushback: Rep. Bob Marshall filed a legal challenge to block the commissioners' competing measure from the ballot and remove the subjective financial language added to the question you signed. The court hearing is Friday, September 11, at 1:30 PM.