BILL ANALYSIS �
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CONSENT
Bill No: AB 2093
Author: Grove (R)
Amended: 5/13/14 in Assembly
Vote: 21
SENATE ELECTIONS & CONST. AMEND. COMM. : 4-0, 6/17/14
AYES: Padilla, Hancock, Jackson, Pavley
NO VOTE RECORDED: Anderson
ASSEMBLY FLOOR : 74-0, 5/19/14 - See last page for vote
SUBJECT : Petitions: filings
SOURCE : Author
DIGEST : This bill permits a statewide initiative or
referendum petition, if the last day to file a petition is a
holiday, as defined by existing law, to be filed with the county
elections official on the next business day.
ANALYSIS :
Existing law:
1.Provides that the initiative is the power of the electors to
propose statutes and amendments to the California Constitution
(Cal.Const.) and to adopt or reject them.
2.Provides that a referendum is the power of the electors to
approve or reject statutes except urgency statutes, statutes
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calling elections, and statutes providing for tax levies or
appropriations for usual current expenses of the state.
3.Requires a petition for a proposed statewide initiative to be
filed with the county elections official not later than 150
days from the official summary date, and also prohibits a
county elections official from accepting a petition for the
proposed initiative measure after that period.
4.Requires a petition for a proposed statewide referendum to be
filed with the county elections official not later than 90
days from the date of the enactment of the bill, and further
prohibits a county elections official from accepting a
petition for the proposed referendum after that period.
5.Prohibits a petition for a proposed initiative or referendum
from being circulated for signatures prior to the official
summary date.
6.Requires the Legislature to provide the manner in which
petitions must be circulated, presented, and certified, and
measures submitted to the electors.
7.Permits an act to be performed upon the next business day if
the last day for the performance of any act provided for or
required by the Elections Code (ELEC) is a holiday, as
defined.
This bill:
1.Permits a statewide initiative or referendum petition, if the
last day to file a petition is a holiday, as defined by
existing law, to be filed with the county elections official
on the next business day.
2.Provides that this bill shall not be construed to affect any
matter pending in the courts of this state on the date this
bill is enacted.
3.Provides that it is the intent of the Legislature, in enacting
this bill, to preserve the people's rights of initiative and
referendum by clarifying that, in those instances in which the
final day to submit a petition falls on a holiday, the
proponents of the initiative or referendum measure may submit
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the petition on the next business day following the holiday.
Background
Existing state law requires a petition for a proposed statewide
initiative to be filed with the county elections official not
later than 150 days from the official summary date, and
prohibits a county elections official from accepting a petition
for the proposed initiative measure after that period. Cal.
Const. Article II Section 9 requires a petition for a proposed
statewide referendum to be filed with the county elections
official not later than 90 days from the date of the enactment
of the bill, and state law prohibits a county elections official
from accepting a petition for the proposed referendum after that
period.
In 2013, the Legislature passed and Governor Brown signed AB
1266 (Ammiano, Chapter 85, Statutes of 2013), which amended the
Education Code to allow pupils to participate in school
activities and use facilities based on gender identity.
Petitioners sought to qualify a referendum asking voters to
reject AB 1266 and the petitioner filed a request for title and
summary for a referendum of the statute. The referendum filing
schedule stated that the last day to file referendum petitions
with the county elections officials was Sunday, November 10,
2013. However, the 90-day requirement was complicated in this
instance because the 90th day fell on a Sunday and the following
day, November 11, was a holiday (Veterans Day), when county
offices were not open. Due to the holiday and the closure of
county offices, referendum petitions from Mono and Tulare
Counties were not submitted within the 90-day deadline.
Consequently, the Secretary of State (SOS) refused to accept
petitions submitted to Mono and Tulare Counties on the grounds
that the petitioner's filings were untimely and submitted after
the November 10 deadline.
Earlier this year, a lawsuit was filed against the SOS
challenging the rejected referendum petition signatures and
requesting the court to require the SOS to accept, file, and
process, as timely, the petitions delivered to Mono and Tulare
Counties. In its ruling, the state Superior Court directed the
SOS to accept, file, and process as timely the petitions
delivered by the petitioner to Mono and Tulare Counties. In the
ruling, the judge cited a 1915 decision by the state Supreme
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Court which stated that referendum power "should be liberally
constructed and should not be interfered with by the courts
except upon clear showing that the law is being violated."
(Laam v. McLaren (1915) 28 Cal.App.632, 638.) The SOS has since
appealed the court's ruling and this issue is still pending in
the courts.
Statewide initiatives and referenda have distinctly different
petition filing deadline requirements. Existing state law
requires a petition for a proposed statewide initiative to be
filed with the county elections official not later than 150 days
from the official summary date, and prohibits a county elections
official from accepting a petition for the proposed initiative
measure after that period. Additionally, ELEC Section 15
permits an act to be performed upon the next business day if the
last day for the performance of any act provided for or required
by the ELEC is a holiday, as defined. As a result, it has been
the longstanding practice that when a deadline for a proposed
initiative measure falls on a weekend or holiday, the deadline
rolls forward to the next business day. However, this only
applies to dates set in statute in the ELEC, not to deadline
dates set forth in the Cal. Const.
Because the deadlines for statewide referendum are in the Cal.
Const., it is unclear whether the Legislature, by state statute,
can extend deadlines established by the Constitution. As a
result, it has been the longstanding practice for the SOS,
should a filing deadline fall on a weekend, to request county
registrars to briefly open their offices on the weekends.
According to SOS's court filings, at the request of the
petitioner, the SOS coordinated a conference call with 17 county
registrars requesting them to briefly open on Sunday for the
filing of the referendum petitions. The petitioner did not
request Sunday filings for Mono and Tulare Counties. By not
making the same request of Mono and Tulare Counties, the
petitioner assumed the risk that petitions would not be timely
filed in those counties.
FISCAL EFFECT : Appropriation: No Fiscal Com.: No Local:
No
SUPPORT : (Verified 6/18/14)
Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Association
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ARGUMENTS IN SUPPORT : According to the author:
[On] January 3 of this year, a Superior Court Judge ruled in
Gleason v. Bowen that the Secretary of State violated
California law by refusing to count petition signatures for a
referendum filed in two counties which had refused delivery of
petitions or were closed on the last business day before the
90-day filing deadline. The court ruled that by attempting to
deliver petitions to county registrars within the 90 days,
supporters had substantially complied with their legal
requirements, and that the real deadline in this particular
case should have been the following Tuesday due to the
intervening holiday weekend?
An initiative or referendum effort should not be hindered and
reduced merely because the final day to submit a petition
happens to land on a holiday. By passing AB 2093, this point
will be expressed clearly in statute, reducing the possibility
of additional confusion and disagreement over initiative and
referendum petition dates.
ASSEMBLY FLOOR : 74-0, 5/19/14
AYES: Achadjian, Alejo, Allen, Bigelow, Bloom, Bocanegra,
Bonilla, Bonta, Bradford, Brown, Buchanan, Ian Calderon,
Campos, Chau, Ch�vez, Chesbro, Conway, Cooley, Dababneh,
Dahle, Daly, Dickinson, Donnelly, Eggman, Fong, Fox, Frazier,
Beth Gaines, Garcia, Gatto, Gomez, Gonzalez, Gordon, Gorell,
Gray, Grove, Hagman, Hall, Harkey, Roger Hern�ndez, Holden,
Jones, Jones-Sawyer, Levine, Linder, Logue, Lowenthal,
Maienschein, Medina, Melendez, Mullin, Muratsuchi, Olsen, Pan,
Patterson, Perea, John A. P�rez, V. Manuel P�rez, Quirk,
Quirk-Silva, Rendon, Ridley-Thomas, Rodriguez, Salas, Skinner,
Stone, Ting, Wagner, Waldron, Weber, Wilk, Williams, Yamada,
Atkins
NO VOTE RECORDED: Ammiano, Mansoor, Nazarian, Nestande,
Wieckowski, Vacancy
RM:k 6/19/14 Senate Floor Analyses
SUPPORT/OPPOSITION: SEE ABOVE
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