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hi I'm Scotty Bowman I've been involved in petition efforts on a number of levels before I was the chair of a statewide ballot access effort for political party which was successful I've also kept participated as a signature collector on a variety of different ballot issues and I have signed petitions for candidates for seeking political office now today I'm going to talk about how petitioning can help you become an active player in our political process whether it is getting a political party on the ballot changing a law putting a new law on the ballot getting someone that you like on the ballot to run for office or recalling someone from office the petitioning effort is the first step this is the way in which the voters first take something from your efforts out there on the street and get it into something that is there in the ballot box when people go to vote on Election Day once you have a petition your rage is circulated you first need to kind of place is do your petition and of course you need to come for Paris make sure you have at least two clip or it's multiple copies of the petition and have some pens ability preferably and black or blue in that red next when you seek out a place to petition wanted to be a place where you're allowed to position now one surefire place where you will be allowed to petition is in front of your neighborhood close guards the reason you can petition in front of the local post office it's because it falls under a category which courts have decided that they cannot deny your rights of addition in frenzy post office so you can just get your quick get your clipboard have your pen ready have your papers out as long as you're not obstructing someone stabbed through the door you can ask them for their signature and another other place that's good to petition of course is that private property where you have the property owner now this of course requires participation as a property owner you discuss in the stands that's a little stricter than simply walking out in front of the post office but it may provide you to be closer to a group of people that are interested in the particular issue or cause that your petitioners finally there are the public venues where it is outdoors and people are waiting for something we do great places to Tishman foods where people are waiting in line they're waiting take a look go in someplace we're waiting to get something and they have nothing to do when they're waiting in line we're usually staring at their food looking up we don't know people in front or behind and you can just start going down the line asking people one at a time if they interested in say when you got the petition make sure to prepare make sure grades at least a couple clipboards multiple copies of the decisions at least a couple tens because you never know when some of them dry up and it's also good to have a little handout describing what you're petitioning for these people have a lot of questions you want to get through that quickly now now you have to find a place to petition and one surefire placed a petition where you know you can get away with it it's out in front of your friendly neighborhood post office courts have rule that it is um illegal for the post office to stop you from petitioning out front you don't need to go in and ask anybody you just get your materials wait out there for a postal customer to arrive and um proceed to introduce them to your petition now there are there are some restrictions like you don't want to block their pathway through the door besides getting them angry and that would also be breaking the rules so just don't block your path and otherwise you're free to petition front of the post office which is great outdoors on a sunny day so one big place that you can petition if you're an outdoor public setting is when there's people waiting in line because they can be waiting in line for refreshments or food certified tickets for something get on a ride walk up near the front of the line and work your way back so that in that way the people who are otherwise without anything to do now if something is you you can have their complete undivided attention and they're not going anywhere they don't want to lose their place in line and introduce them to your petition so that's one good ways because people are not there hurry passing between their car and a doorway for instance as we might as year that's now another case where you could find waiting where they're not really going anymore is that Tiger Woods because people are up there staring at the sky waiting for something to happen and meanwhile just trying to pass the time and it's usually they'll be out on the grass somewhere you know which house or whatever just trying to be comfortable and you can walk up to keep one approach from with your petition there so there's another way where you can get people where they are too busy to sign where obviously they have nowhere to go nothing to do and as long as they don't particularly dislike what you're at I'm looking for they're not just qualified to sign that's a good thing now legal petitions require people who are registered to vote within a certain jurisdictions one way to guarantee that your signers fit this qualification and this is bit under only very certain you only do this under very specific circumstances is if there happens to be an election prior to the 1-year petitioning floor and it happens to be well time that it's around the time you're doing your petition it that then you can actually wait at a polling place and here's how you work that is if people are going into boat don't get in the way they're getting stuff handed to them by all these candidates or people promoting a cause that's in that election you're not concerned with that election you're thinking about the next one so after they're done voting they're coming out people with the I voted sticker know all the other folks are ignoring now you can walk up to them with your petition and and you don't even if you know what you could still ask of your registered voter but it's pretty much a foregone conclusion and you already know where they go you already got the right to dish oh and then you can introduce them to what the cause or the candidate or the party is that you're positioning for and proceed from there so once you have your place select circulate your petition you want to be able to find someone to sign the petition now you don't want just anybody signing your petitions you just walk up and say hey we like this here please sign it now you want to have a person who's qualified sign this petition and for legal petitions that we're talking about today the person needs to be a registered voter in the jurisdiction for which you are circulating the petitions so for instance let's say it's a statewide petition then your best opening line is hello are you registered voter in Michigan then they will either answer yes or no after answering yes there's people you want to sign this which is good because you also already have them saying yes to something and the next thing you want them to be saying yes to a sign now petitions and other jurisdictions of course II had introduced it that when for instance of the word each dish medicine hiring registered voter in each race only felony condition higher use over Lake County for so forth now even the statewide petitions are a little more focused and so once you have the person interested in your position you're gonna want to ask what's owned either in statewide because you have separate pages by counties or that statewide petitions so that would be the next part in the selection process before you get to that point you're probably going to be wanting stem then state the purpose though of why you're certainly and again as we look they have a political party that supports this issue now sometimes people will respond that they've already signed your petition if they've already signed your petition thank them and then do not want to have a person double sign a petition it won't count twice that will do just the opposite it will count against you because in the verification process for screening petitions they will straight off number of signatures statistically based upon the number of invalid signatures if they happen to see at random so you definitely you want to avoid double signing because that invalidates their signatures second of all let's say they're not sure still you're better off safe and sort they're not sure you probably should not have them sign because there's a possibility that you'd have this double signature now they might just flat-out say no they may not like what you're doing or they may not even be listening you get people that are totally shut off have blinders on and they might happen to like what you're saying if they gave it the time of day but they won't pay for that we have this rule on somebody's call it SW to the third power plus N and it stands for some will some won't so what next there are a lot of voters out there and you don't want to miss the ones that will sign your petition arguing with the chasing down the one that one also always have a pen ready use as soon as they are agreeable to thy P of signing condition want to uncap your pen and hand it to them you want them to be they wanted to be ready to go you want make this easy for holes a clipart for them to point out such hard petition you want them to sign walk me through it because you don't want to have to make mistakes and it gets frustrating if they have to clean it again but always have your pen ready and then of course you got your argumentative this person the person that may ultimately end up signing your petition but they just really are not sure they may just have doubts about it and they might be happy about it later but it is just that sure at that moment now if you have time and it's not a crowded day and there's no one else walking up soon so you got time to sit and explaining reach great tale what your petition is about in the cause and for the exhibition should actually have some text along the back but may occupy really have time to sit and read in the event though they get people coming by I'm a knight you know you might miss because he's busy explaining and involved from the person initially upon your summary explanation still is an interest but has it ruled it out completely and they just need more time or they say well I really just don't want to sign at this time I'd like to get back to you and that kind of thing for those people it's very important to have a little brochure available it's just um summing up information about your petition it would be great if it for instance has a webpage on it as well and then they could look things up in great detail until they're satisfied they understand the issue enough decide it's good to have those items available so if you have a situation where there's lots of people walking by you gave in hand it to them they can look at over while you're still there busy approaching the next person to see if they're interested in signing first opening up with are you registered voters it may also be important to have specific contact information with your name your name phone number email address information of that sort on there so they could get directly back to you and picks you up you know they want to sign your petition if you want to be able to meet them somewhere to have them sign it or let them know where you're gonna be circulate you might also end up finding that you get a volunteer for future boosting ever exercise you might just get signers or people already signed you'd like to circulate on their own and you'd like to be able to contact those people so that they can help your cause once you have a person ready to sign let make sure they sign the right page now in statewide petitions you need to be able to do it by county so ask some which County they're from and always have pages with the most populous counties already filled out and the cony you're in you're most likely to run into people from a either a well populated county or be the county that you're in however Tom you may have people from counties that you ain't even heard of before you may want to have some extra sheets with you that have a blank space where at the top of the page where it asks you to fill out the county in that case leave that when you get a person from that county fill it in just for them for the Nimrod let them be the first person to sign their name on that page back Tony now if you happen to have page all already made with the County listed on it you may also wish to include will be sometimes all you do there is you put a signature on there could be your own go it out you might say while I already filled out my signature on the first petition Isis it's fine put your name on there go it out and it's not a problem you won't get in any trouble with it as long as it's crossed out when you're all done and you're turning in your signatures the service that a seats seats the Tennessee signature does is it shows the next signer where items go that they actually see the oh this is where I sign my name in the swag print my name they actually see the name of a city printed up where it says street address they see that they only need to put their house number and Street that there's another box in the name of the city and so on they see that post office mean zip code they see that the date is today's date or date for today's date but is not their birthday that's one thing that the seating another thing it does on a more subconscious level is the person approaching them footboard is seeing another signature on there feels more comfortable exciting that person's being approached with a completely blank page where they're the suicide now of course it's very critical to actually watch the person signing the petition while they're signing because you want to guide them to do the right thing the first time make sure to mention just mentioning what what column there are when its place to fill in city or Township safe city your Township and they forget it check a box remind them hey can you check the box for city or Township and because actually there are cases where there is a city and a Township which each have the same name and are not the same place next you know of course you're going to have them fill out there's you know signature and printed name you want to be able to tell them which it is and so when it's placed inside signature puts their signature say please sign your name when it gets to print name mentioned print name when it gets the street address they only need to put down the street number apartment unit number and streets there's another place on the grid II filled out third city and of course if they're not from Michigan or and then you got the zip code and that's sometimes it says post office now the reason it says post office is there are some cases where people were had a mailbox in a different city than the township in which they live and so they put down the name of the city there however if they simply write their zip code that takes care of these pull em all together and then you have the date the date is probably one of the most problematic and critical boxes for them to go out because people instinctively when they fill things out and there's a place for a date they will often put their birthdate there make sure that as they get to that place you say today's date for instance if it happens to be June 6 2011 it doesn't hurt to say June 6 2011 and another thing about the date that becomes problematic if they sign a date that is parolee and the date before they signed is a later date for instance if they sign that it's June 5th 2011 and the signature right before them was June 6 2011 essentially that invalidates the whole line and they need to stare it over there's other places where you can make corrections so the date is not something that people are too can prefer to look kindly yes when people write down the date its month day and year and it is acceptable to either abbreviate or spell out the month or put down the number of the month since the box is fairly small it's preferable to put down the number of for the day that would go in the second box and that would be your two-digit day or if it's one you know 1st through the 9th of the month you can put that down and then for the year they can either put down the full four-digit year or the two-digit year since it's unlikely the second of time window of circulation is going to be long enough for there to be just any ambiguity on if you did you hear if a signer makes a mistake it's on often best to simply have them redo the entire line is that way you can make sure there are no new mistakes if they're in a hurry then you need to UM be aware of a couple variations on perfection that are allowed they put extra information in with their address that doesn't really hurt anything they do include their city in the state in the same line as the street address that's not really a problem that won't kill it if they actually mix their signature and their printed name up so they haven't reversed that won't kill so if they're in a hurry rather than having them do it over again at that point might as well just go ahead and accept it if a person signs mister and missus like you sometimes mister listen Bowman or mr. and mrs. Scott Bowman sorry you can't do that do it over back you should make it clear as soon as you're handing it to them that they should sign their own name when we get to it because every person gets a vote and every individual gets an opportunity to sign the petition so they can't sign for two if there's a husband and wife both there in fact that's two signatures of people to agree want both of those they try to sign it as some kind of hybrid signature then basically you've been validated vote another thing important for circulators if you are a petition circulator while it may be tempting to fill out everything and then go circulating the petition and so you're all ready to go and say oh great I'm gonna get you fill out the oh you have the last part all done already that's wrong legally you are not supposed to go out the circulator portion of your petition which is in the lower right hand corner of your petition you're not to fill that part out so make sure that that petition is filled out me then you fill out the circulator put the date or the circulator part must be on the same date or later than the last signature on the petition otherwise you will invalidate that nice page full of signatures you don't want to do that so always sign and date it after it has been completely filled out furthermore take your time filling it out while you may be in a hectic situation while you're circulating the petitions you have plenty of time to sit down at a table later on and carefully fill out the circulator part of the petition to make sure it's done properly so that you don't damage the quality of all the signatures that you might be producing now let's say you have lots of people showing up to want to sign your petition and they're getting impatient waiting that's when it's good to have two clipboards in you got two clipboards handy and of course a pen to go with each one and don't bring in red pen bring black with blue pencil we're especially black pens are bad then you can have one person while one source is filling out the petition if they seem fairly comfortable and they're do it and they believe they can fill it out unsupervised then you can go ahead and get the other petition and the other person's hands and you get two petitions being filled out at once and this is a way you get a lot more done in a shorter amount of time and you always got the shortcoming that while maybe people make mistakes while you're not looking so it's course that is a risk you got as sometimes for instance made up a family over and over a bunch of friends they've already heard Watts worth rooting through and the next person is unlikely to make the same mistakes when they could be taking turns filling this out and then the other people over here you can get started on a separate board so let's say you have a family over here and they're already filling it out you were to explained it to the first person then everybody after them already has a good idea of what you do and they could be filling out the petition well I have another group of people over on your other side and fill out the other clipboard that you brought along and that way you get more than one clip worth being filled out in time now sometimes you get run into people that are not only aren't agreeing with your petition and not interested in signing it those people like I said you don't really don't worry about them if you like you know some will stop long so what next you don't want to again lose out on that good signature chasing down the person that isn't going to sign no matter what anyway however there is this other case and that is the disruptive voter or activist who decides that in order to promote their cause which happens to be against the war cause Airport to oppose your candidate that what they are going to do is try to disrupt the petition gathering process now first of all any direct attempts to block anyone else from signing your petition is illegal and a crime and if you have someone else along you can document it especially if they get video the incident where then you have both a visual and auditory documentation and what the person is doing then you have an excellent thing to take the court especially if they call like awesome often you don't have that luxury after you're out there alone petitioning in such a person show there's different levels of disruptive or obstructive activists some people really aren't trying to be that way just comes out that way trying to get argumentative people they just love to argue and will continue arguing with you for its own sake because that's the best thing they have to do with their time and that's how they're getting the most intellectual stimulation and enjoyment we need to do in that case is say you know I'd like to talk with you another time but right now I'm busy and I'd be really happy because you know discuss your views on another day check out right now and try to dismiss them slightly and peacefully that way and who knows maybe you want to talk about it with them as well later other people won't let go and they'll continue maybe you got to repeat it a little more clearly I right now I am devoted to this effort and I really should like to change my mind but it's not going to happen today we can agree to disagree today and get back on another day and discuss this all so that doesn't work then you may need to move move away a little bit now what are they allowed to do a napkin well they're not allowed to actually get in a way of another person signing so one thing when you see another person ignore the person who's arguing if you don't want if you know if you want to continue petitioning you go approach the person that you wish to get from an politely start from the beginning introducers on if that person starts interrupting and hurt you and then they're now interfering and it wouldn't be a document it making campus if you're alone and you don't have any other options and take a note of situations person keeps getting in the way and they could say a lot the key is when they actually get between you and the voter or they touch you anything like that that's when you know they break the law but otherwise they really can sit and talk to you and you can't stop them from standing there talking to you they have a First Amendment right as well so if it gets down to that there is one more thing you can do and that is simply move unfortunately you may be in a great spot but sometimes you just have to relocate you don't have to do it very long if they just happen to unless they're staking the place out in which case you can come back with someone but otherwise if they just happen to run into you and saw an opportunity to cause trouble for what you're doing then once you are gone they're gonna get bored and they're gonna leave wait it out I'm back a little later you're back in business now while petitions ultimately end up in Lansing for the Board of Canvassers to a cruise you may often run into a situation where you've collected all your petitions and you want to get them handed in quick don't stuff them in an envelope and send them to Lansing don't show up by yourself to hand them to the Secretary of State so here I got some prepared remember there's organizations over the entire petitioner and they got to be able to hand in the complete body of petitions as one vault with the cover page identifying how many signatures they've collected with basically a breakdown by counties so you need to get with someone within your petition organization now sometimes there will be people organized at a county or congressional districts level because state requirements will often require dispersal of signature collection at different levels and they want to verify that there have been enough signatures collected but any case when the petitions finally are due they are due to be handed in as a gracefulness how it measures yes now let's say the day ends you have all your petitions collected filled out the circulator sections and then you look at it you realize with some of these saw them look a little funny there's things that look inconsistent perhaps there's names that you're not sure of addresses don't look probable there's things that don't match what do you do with that well first of all it's fiction you don't want to cross out a signature that's good that can still be used on the other hand you do not want to submit the kitchen with signatures you know to be bad because it again if it does those end up being counted against you statistically based upon when they go and they start looking through your signatures at random for every bad one they run into that is multiplied many polls to represent a large number of signatures that they don't get to look now when you find a signature you find disagreeable it should be crossed out a single line with a very thick broad end is good maybe double cross you have to make sure that it's fully blasted it's not intended to be counted and then regardless of what it says on there it won't be counted four against two it simply are the pictures but how does one make these determines okay signature is acceptable if it includes the name city or township where the signer is registered to vote we mark to indicate whether it plays with a city or Township the name of the signer could be cursive printed and the signatures street address a rural route number and the signers zip code improper dates and earlier I mentioned that the data scheme sequence and it needs to be the date for assignments each signer must have fixed his or her signature to the petitions which bears in the headings she's the name of the county in which the signer is registered to go by the way the circulator does not need to be registered in the same county as you signers on a statewide petition as long as you are registered to vote state however all the people signing that page for that county must be registered in the same codes now here's what you should look look for as far as invalidation a signature is invalid if the signer is not registered to vote Michigan hopefully already got rid of that at your first question - it's registered to vote in the state but not in the city or Township listed in fact if a person is unsure whether or not they should be signing one address or another address for instance if I said well you know I just moved to Detroit last week but I'm register zero zeros for whatever city they are registered to voted before they change their registration dates wherever they were last registered to vote that is where they should sign we are not legal to sign in the city therefore who registers your city circulated petitions for that community and they want a sign and they just move there let them know they need to register to vote first in that community then make it okay and also of course even if they're legal to sign the petition they need to be signing for the county that matches the name is the top of the sheet some of the things that will invalidate either your whole petition or signatures include in the heading a petition shoot is invalid if it contains one or more the following irregularities in the heading the county where the cert were circulated not listed or there is more than one county of circulation or it is not apparent from the cities and townships listed by the signers as a circulator was within a single County and we started the circulation was in a single plane our words you have signatures that appear to be from more than one County on the same key and required information concerning the candidate office size was omitted from in other words they didn't know what they were saying other things that can invalidate your submission this has to do with you as a circulate a petition sheet is invalid if it contains one or more of the following irregularities it's not signed by the circulator we're not saying or if more than one circulator signed the same petition at all so it's gotta be one sheet per circulator if it is not dated correctly or is in completely jaded that could invalidated days are very important to make sure the David's honor after the last date of the last signer if it's dated before all the signature dates that would invalidate all the dishes the city or Township of the registration of registration is not listed that would definitely disqualify a signature but there's no street address or rural route lumber listed on a signature that would disqualify the signature if the circulator leaves it out it disqualifies the entire page others details may be a little off but will not invalidate for instance if the county were circulated was not listed or more than one county of circulation listed and it is apparent from the cities of townships listed by the signers the circulation was within a single county nurse the only error was at the top but everything else was in the same County then it's redeemable though he's definitely not desirous if the if your signature is illegible as a circulator it's still acceptable though it's illegible it just by you signing if you fail to enter your zip code or it's an incorrect zip code you can still get by but again it's not really desirable if you list a village or unincorporated place instead of the townships registration when village is or unincorporated place is contained within a single townships then at least it's Valley Casino in town being second home affect the validity of the individual signature okay a signature is not acceptable so if it contains one or more irregularities or omissions listed below no city or Township by that name in the county in other words the person City or Township is not part of the county that acceptable village or unincorporated place listed instead of Township or registration village is not contained in the single Township in other words they don't know which Township even though it's once one community signature is crossed out prior to filing rostov signatures don't count Fersen may change your mind filling it out and cross it out they do it right then they can do that by the way if you walk away and they run into you the next day and want to take it off now you don't have to remove it so most of all when you're out petitioning have fun now you may not run into everybody being real eager to sign it but the next person might be and remember why you're circling a petition hopefully it's something you believe in and it's something you want to see accomplished and if you're professional petitioner while money is something you believe but in whatever case it is it's something you believe in is something you're enthusiastic about keep that at the core of your thoughts and that should guide you through and keep you on in a positive mood about what you're doing don't let people get you down sometimes people are sitting they had a bad day it's not you it's them and like I said earlier some wells some won't so what next just focused on the next person keep each introduction brand new and don't let any baggage from any adverse interaction before dragging forward on the other hand when you have that good positive person is happy about what you're doing you know you really have a uplifting experience you ran into a kindred spirit while you're out there standing on the corner by the post office remember that person also because that might be the next person you need and you want to approach that person with a positive attitude also don't prejudge people and maybe e-z-go size somewhat up to look at them and think oh no they're not gonna want to sign this this guy you know he looks like he's you know a bit too redneck or a bit too hippie-dippy or a bit too you know prim and proper or it looks like a stone or whatever well whatever prejudgments you have you don't know that person you don't know that they might happen to like your cause in spite of being different for you in every other way imaginable but they like what you're doing on that cause they're going to sign it and that's what you want so keep a positive attitude and greet every person on you know fresh and anew without judging but expecting the best and have a good time you