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untanglingwebs
El Supremo
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CHANNEL 2 NEWS PREDICTED THIS RESULT AND SAID THE ISSUE WILL END UP IN THE REPUBLICAN BIASED MICHIGAN COURTS!
Deadlocked vote on petitions allows Michigan emergency manager law to stay in place
Published: Thursday, April 26, 2012, 12:01 PM Updated: Thursday, April 26, 2012, 1:26 PM
By Dave Murray | dmurray@mlive.com
LANSING, MI – Michigan’s emergency manager law remains in effect as state canvassers that petitions to overturn the act were disqualified because writing was too small.
Canvassers voted to a 2-2 deadlock, erupting the Lansing Center meeting room into angry screams, songs, prayers and chants of “Treason!” and “Shame! Shame!”
Attorneys reppresenting the group circulating the petitions said they will fight the decision in court.
"I'm very disappointed, but I'm not surprised," said Herbert Sanders, representing Stand up for Democracy.
"We know that some people put their party above justice and democracy. We've even seen that in our court decision. But we're not deterred, we're determined. I'm hopeful we will get a panel of judges who are keen on upholding the law and not just serving their party allegiance."
Had the petition been certified, Public Act 4 would be suspended and Gov. Rick Snyder's administration says the law would revert back to its previous version, Public Act 72, which doesn't grant as much authority to emergency managers.
Group members said they turned in about 226,000 signatures, far in excess of the 161,300 signatures needed.
Board chairwoman Julie Matuzak, who joined member James Waters in voting in favor of certifying the petitions, said the volume of signatures presented showed here that people were interested in voting on the question.
“I think the courts in the past have showed us it’s better to err on the side of letting people vote,” she said.
Emergency Manager ballot petitions rejectedThe State Board of Canvassers rejected the petition to place the Emergency Manage proposal on the ballot due to the wrong font size.Watch video
But board members Jeffrey Trimmer and Norman Shinkle said the law regarding the petitions is clear, and they must follow it to the letter.
Attorney John Pirich, representing Citizens for Fiscal Responsibility, did not dispute whether Stand Up For Democracy collected enough signatures to get their question on the Nov. 6 ballot.
But they said that headlines in the petitions were not published in size 14 print, and that the board did not have the authority to certify them.
Pirich said petitions in the past have been rejected because they were missing a word or other details. He said he has been involved with many petition drives over the years and always had elections workers review petitions before sending them to printers to avoid such problems.
Sanders argued that even if the size was off, the group was in “substantial compliance” with state law.
But Sanders also argued that the size was adequate, said attempts to discredit his group’s efforts are “minimally disingenuous and borderline perjury.”
Melvin “Butch” Hallowell, general counsel for the NAACP in Detroit, called the act “the Michigan dictator law” and said the challenge to the font size is “frivolous, desperate and politically motivated.”
About 140 people attended the hearing, including Edith Lee Payne, one of the 28 plaintiffs on the suit challenging the emergency manager law. She compared the fight to defeat the law to Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.'s marches to protect voting rights.
Others questioned the reason for the law regarding letter sizes. Dave Frederick, who collected petitions in the Muskegon area, said he understands the law dictates a size so people can read the petitions and not be tricked.
He demonstrated that the size was adequate by taking off his reading glasses and reading the petitions.
Frederick said he and other volunteers had spent hundreds of hours collecting signatures.
"All of our efforts will be nullified by a bogus challenge," he said.
E-mail Dave Murray: dmurray@mlive.com and follow him on Twitter at twitter.com/ReporterDMurray |
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Thu Apr 26, 2012 2:56 pm |
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untanglingwebs
El Supremo
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SOME ARE NOT AS OPTIMISTIC AS GEORGE, HOWEVER AN APPEAL IS ANTICIPATED NO LETER THAN MONDAY.
THE GOP ALSO IGNORED THEIR OBVIOUS CONFLICT OF INTEREST!
GEORGE
This is gonna get reversed pronto by the Courts. Trust me.
"It is well established by both statute and case law that petitions need only substantially conform to the statutory requirements. MCL 168.544d (petitions shall be on forms that are “substantially as provided in sections 482 ...”); see also Charter Twp. of Bloomfield v. Oakland Co. Clerk, 253 Mich.App. 1, 22-23, 654 N.W.2d 610 (2002). In Newsome v. Bd. of State Canvassers, 69 Mich.App. 725, 729, 245 N.W.2d 374 (1976), this Court held that “[c]onstitutional and statutory initiative and referendum provisions should be liberally construed to effectuate their purposes, to facilitate rather than hamper the exercise by the people of these reserved rights.” Id., citing Kuhn v. Dep't of Treasury, 384 Mich. 378, 183 N.W.2d 796 (1971). In Settles v. Detroit City Clerk, 169 Mich.App. 797, 802-803, 427 N.W.2d 188 (1988), this Court reaffirmed the general rule that “all doubts as to technical deficiencies or failure to comply with the exact letter of procedural requirements in petitions ... are resolved in favor of permitting the people to vote and express a choice on any proposal subject to election.” Thus, even if the additional language in the “ introduction” on the back of the petition could be considered a defect, we do not find it a fatal one." -- Coalition to Defend Affirmative Action & Integration v Bd of State Canvassers, 262 Mich App 395, 405-406; 686 NW2d 287 (2004) |
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Thu Apr 26, 2012 3:19 pm |
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untanglingwebs
El Supremo
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UPDATED: Denying a quarter million Michiganders a political voice was NEVER about the fonts
By Eclectablog on April 27, 2012in Emergency Manager Law
If you think elections just don’t matter, this should wake you up
Yesterday, two Republican men denied a quarter million Michiganders their political voice, a voice guaranteed by the constitution of the state and firmly-rooted in the basic tenets of our democracy.
Two men.
It’s astonishing that our system is set up to give two men this much power.
The excuse that both men gave was that, because the the heading on the petition was too small, the petitions were invalid.
But this was not and never should have been about the fonts.
During the hearing yesterday, the Board of State Canvassers heard from font experts about how you cannot measure the capital letter “N” in order to determine font size (as their opponents “experts” did.) They heard about how the law doesn’t govern which font to use and how different fonts are differently sized for a given point size. They heard about “leading” and about how to fonts are actually measured.
But none of that was important. In fact, none of what I have written here at Eclectablog about comparing fonts has been important.
After all of the testimony that the Board heard yesterday, only one person’s testimony mattered. That was the testimony of Bruce Hack of Inland Printing. Bruce Hack is the man that printed the petitions. He has signed a sworn affidavit saying that the font was 14 point and gave testimony yesterday confirming this. He even brought them screenshots to prove his veracity.
In other words, the petitions WERE PRINTED IN THE CORRECT FONT. This really wasn’t a matter for discussion. The fonts were correct. They have the Printers Affidavit and his testimony to prove it.
And, yet, because friends of the two Republicans on the Board — a coworker for one of them! — raised the question, it gave them what they seemed to feel was room to vote “no”.
But remember this: their votes were based on a completely fabricated lie.
Much of the testimony that was given yesterday was about people engaging in the democratic process and having a political voice as granted them by the state constitution. They talked about how hard they had worked to exercise that right. They talked about a quarter million voices that deserved to be heard.
And in the end, all of that was wasted breath as two men, in collusion with people with a vested financial interest in the outcome, swept it all aside based upon a lie.
The election in Michigan in November is — without any question or hyperbole — the most important election in my lifetime. What we saw in Room 102 of the Lansing Center yesterday is the direct result of one party have every bit of power in our government. If we do not wrest at least some of the control of our government back from the Republicans, the system of checks and balances will remain in tatters on the side of the road as they steamroll their agenda over our state.
Michigan Democrats must become energized to get Democrats elected to the state House and Senate this year. What happened yesterday was a clarion call. We do not have the luxury of being complacent or of wasting the summer and early fall ahead. Now is the time for action.
UPDATE: Just to show you how wrong some of the paid media types are on this, I offer up an example. Yesterday on Michigan Radio, Michigan Information Research (MIRS) journalist Susan Demas said this about the failure of the Stand Up for Democracy group to get their petitions pre-approved:
“You know, we do have rules in place for a reason and, ya know, I guess I think back to what I tell my nine-year old, uh, which is, “You know, if you’re not following the directions, you’re going to get going to get the assignment wrong. So you might want to take care of business first.”
(Audio is HERE)
Here’s what’s wrong with that: First, getting petitions pre-approved is not a “rule”. It’s an OPTION. Second, and much more importantly, THEY DID FOLLOW THE RULES. The font size WAS correct and they have proof of it. The rules were ignored by the two Republicans on the Board. THAT is the story here and THAT is the story that our mainstream media outlets are missing.
Here’s the response to yesterday’s charade from the Stand Up for Democracy coalition:
CITIZENS ACROSS STATE OUTRAGED AT PARTISAN ATTACK ON DEMOCRACY AS EM REPEAL HEADS TO COURT
Stand Up for Democracy statewide coalition proves petition meets state law requirements as Republican operative’s phantom experts fail to show at hearing. “The masterminds of this scheme will be held accountable in the court of law for their shenanigans,” says lawyer.
Detroit – Citizens from around the state of Michigan continue to express outrage in the wake of a decision by Republican appointees at the State Board of Canvassers meeting rejecting expert testimony, physical evidence and scientific evaluation showing a petition to repeal the emergency manager law was in compliance with the legal font-size as required by law.
“This partisan attack on democracy will not stand,” said Herb Sanders, director of the coalition. “People are outraged at the bold faced hypocrisy displayed by Republican members of the State Board of Canvassers who rejected expert testimony, physical evidence and scientific measuring means presented to them in favor of affidavits signed by other alleged printing experts that didn’t even bother to show up to the hearing.”
The fact that no experts testified to the legitimacy of claims made that the font size was incorrect calls into question whether the affidavits are little more than pieces of paper signed by “ghost” printers.
“No one would be surprised to find that in politics some people are just dirty, lying cheats who will stop at nothing to get their way,” said Sanders. “One thing is for sure, they will show up in court or the masterminds of this scheme will be held accountable in the court of law for their shenanigans.”
The partisan attack came on the heels of news that the Stand Up for Democracy Coalition had officially received notice reporting the group had collected 203,238 valid voter signatures needed to place the repeal of Public Act 4 (aka the Emergency Manager Law) on the November 2012 general election ballot. The group exceeded the 161,305 valid signatures needed by more than 40,000.
On Thursday, April 26, 2012 the members of the State Board of Canvassers met in Lansing to decide if the petition would be placed on the November general election ballot. They also reviewed a memo from the Secretary of the Board of State Canvassers that largely dismissed the challenges of a Republican group seeking to prevent voters from deciding the fate of PA 4.
At the hearing, the font size on the petition was determined to be correct after physical evidence and expert testimony was presented to the board and several hundred citizens in the audience. Still, two Republican appointees to the board ignored the evidence before them and voted not to place the issue on the ballot to the outrage and disbelief of other Republican, Democratic and independent voters attending the hearing. The matter heads to the Michigan State Court of Appeals next week.
For more information go to www.standup4democracy.com or call 1-866-306-5168 to volunteer.
[CC image credit: Blood for Oil]
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Fri Apr 27, 2012 3:51 pm |
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untanglingwebs
El Supremo
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Report: Font expert says emergency manager law petitions had correct size
Published: Friday, June 08, 2012, 9:48 AM Updated: Friday, June 08, 2012, 9:48 AM
By Kristin Longley | klongley1@mlive.com
MLive.com file photoFlint emergency manager Michael Brown speaks to a group of residents gathered at the Flint Public Library in February.
A graphic design expert from Michigan State University says the font size on petitions calling for a referendum of Public Act 4 was correct, according to a report by Lansing station WILX.
The size of the font on the petitions was a key issue in a tied 2-2 vote by the Board of Canvassers, which prevented the controversial emergency manager law from going before voters in November for possible repeal.
State law says the font has to be a size 14, and experts on both sides of the issue argued their cases to members of the board before they deadlocked, with two Republicans saying the font was too small and two Democrats saying it was correct.
The statewide coalition behind the petition circulation, Stand Up for Democracy, appealed the vote to the state Court of Appeals, and a decision is pending. Several members of Stand Up hail from Flint and Genesee County.
MSU Professior Chris Corneal reviewed the petitions and told WILX that the petitions were in compliance with state law:
"'I determined that it was calibri bold set at 14 point,' he says, demonstrating with a measurement tool...
"'Simply measuring the heighth of the capital letter will not give an accurate point size. It should include the cap heighth, plus the depth of the descender [the lower part of, say, a g], plus a little buffer area that is different for different cap heighths,' he says." |
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Fri Jun 08, 2012 3:11 pm |
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