Undermining initiatives

State legislators have introduced several bills to regulate the right of initiative and referendum. Each bill is packaged in a way to make it appear public-spirited, and some may be. Each, however, makes it more difficult to qualify a measure for the ballot.

Most egregious is the bill that would make it a crime to pay signature gatherers per signature, but allow payment per hour. We have already registered our opposition to that one, which is simply a measure to raise the cost of circulating petitions. Of the others, the most obviously pointless is House Bill ', introduced by Rep. Joe McDermott, D-Seattle, which would require that paid signature gatherers (but not volunteers) have a state permit and wear it in public view. If gatherers took on a new petition, they would have to obtain a new and separate permit. Paid gatherers (but not volunteers) would have to have state-approved training. If any of their petitions had even one fraudulent signature, a paid gatherer (but not a volunteer) would have to be fired.

It is not necessary to impose a permit-and-training runaround on people making a living collecting names and addresses. The rules are simple, and signature gatherers know what they are. The permit-and-training requirement is simply a measure to discourage people, by adding unpaid work, from collecting signatures. The penalty of being fired for a fraudulent signature would seem to allow opponents to knock out a signature gatherer by slipping in one bad name.