In reversal, state finds Sizemore union-dues initiative lacks signatures

07/26/02

JEFF MAPES, Oregonian 

The Oregon secretary of state's office reversed itself Thursday and said an anti-union initiative sponsored by tax activist Bill Sizemore does not appear to have enough valid signatures to win a spot on the November ballot.

The action by elections authorities came after a union-financed watchdog group found additional problem signatures that had been missed by county clerks. Sizemore, the nation's most prolific sponsor of citizen initiatives, said he'll fight the action, but he faces the strong prospect of not having a single measure on Oregon's ballot this year for the first time since he started in 1994.

The initiative, similar to Sizemore measures that voters defeated in 1998 and 2000, is aimed at curbing unions' political power by limiting union-dues deductions for political purposes.

It would require unions to get annual written authorization from members to deduct dues used for political causes, something Sizemore says is fair to workers but unions argue is designed to make it hard for them to collect dues for a wide range of political and lobbying activities.

Unions spent more than $8 million fighting Sizemore's union-dues measures in the past two elections, and they were gearing up for another big battle again. Labor officials say they may now be able to shift money to other causes, although they conceded it also may mean less national union money will flow into the state.

Secretary of State Bill Bradbury had announced Monday that a sampling of the signatures Sizemore turned in showed the initiative barely qualified for the ballot -- with just 125 signatures more than the 89,048 needed from registered voters.

But John Lindback, the state elections director, said Thursday that the Voter Education Project -- the union-backed group that has scrutinized the petitioning process this year -- told him it had found two duplicate signatures missed by county clerks, who keep voter records. The group has been conducting its own audit of the signature verification process.

With the state's sampling procedures, those two duplicates in Jackson and Marion counties have a powerful impact. Using a formula developed by an Oregon State University statistician, each duplicate found in the sampling process negates roughly 400 signatures. The counties agreed they missed the duplicates, and Lindback said Sizemore's initiative is now 671 short of the required number.

Lindback said he expected Sizemore to search for any errors in the verification process that would increase the valid number of signatures, something he has until Aug. 2 to do.

"I'm not making any predictions" about whether the initiative will qualify, Lindback said, noting that no one had ever monitored elections officials before as they have verified signatures. He said this is the first time elections officials have reversed themselves after announcing a petition had enough signatures to qualify.

"This is a very unusual year," he said. "This is an unusual year in that it was so close."

Sizemore said the Voter Education Project should not have been allowed to challenge the work of elections officials.

"I think this is the most blatantly political act by a secretary of state that I have seen," Sizemore said. "One couldn't help but think the secretary of state and the unions are colluding to get this measure off the ballot."

Marian Hammond, a spokeswoman for Bradbury, the Democratic nominee for the U.S. Senate against Republican Sen. Gordon Smith, referred all questions to Lindback.

Although he kept Bradbury informed, Lindback said, he made the decision based on legal advice to ask the counties to check the problems uncovered by the Voter Education Project. "If you can correct an error, you should correct an error," he said.

Patty Wentz of the union group said Sizemore would have a hard time finding errors that would allow his initiative to qualify. She said duplicate signatures, once found, are hard to disprove. And even if some signatures initially ruled invalid are allowed, they have much less of an impact in the sampling process.

Sizemore qualified a record six initiatives for the ballot in 2000 and played a significant role in a seventh. Only that last measure, dealing with private property rights, was approved by voters.

This time, he tried to qualify the union-dues initiative and another one that would curb income taxes. But the income-tax measure is given little chance of qualifying because it has only a small cushion of extra signatures. Reach Jeff Mapes at 503-221-8209 or jeffmapes@news.oregonian.com.