OKLAHOMANS for BALLOT ACCESS REFORM (OBAR)
For Immediate Release
April 2,
2009
Contact: Angelia O’Dell 918-510-8315 Angelia@OkVoterChoice.org
Ballot Access Reform Bill Passes Senate
Committee
Oklahoma City (April 2, 2009) -- The Oklahoma Senate Rules Committee on Wednesday passed a modified version of House Bill 1072, which would make it easier to form a recognized political party in the state.
The bill, carried in the Senate by Randy Brogdon, R-Owasso, would lower the required number of petition signatures to form a new political party in 2010 to about 28,000. The bill passed 12-2 and now goes to the Senate floor for a vote sometime in the next couple of weeks.
On March 11, the House passed a version which would have lowered the petition signature requirement to 5 percent of the voter turnout in the last gubernatorial election. Oklahoma law currently states “last gubernatorial or presidential election.”
The House version would have equated to a lesser signature requirement in even-numbered years, since voter turnout trends lower for mid-term elections -- from about 73,000 to 46,000 signatures to be on the ballot in 2010.
On Wednesday, Senate Rules Committee member Judy Eason McIntyre, D-Tulsa, introduced a modified version changing the 5 percent to 3 percent of the last gubernatorial turnout. That would put the requirement closer to 28,000 signatures, based on 2006 numbers. At 3 percent, that would move Oklahoma closer to the national average of about 1 percent. OBAR has been asking lawmakers to revert the law to its pre-1974 threshold of 5,000 signatures.
Richard Winger, editor of Ballot Access News, a national newsletter that follows challenges to third-party ballot access laws, recently wrote, “Oklahoma is the only state in the nation in which a party can't place its nominees for all statewide offices on the general election ballot with the party label unless it does a fiver percent petition. All the other states have procedures at or below two percent, except that Alabama is three percent of the last gubernatorial vote. Oklahoma is all alone in being above three percent.”
Oklahoma stood alone in offering voters only two choices in the last two presidential elections. All other states in the region - Arkansas, Louisiana, Missouri, Kansas, Colorado, New Mexico - listed multiple candidates for president in the last election.
Only Texas came close to Oklahoma’s lack of choices in November -- with just three candidates on the ballot -- but still offered several other candidates a write-in.
Independents need only pay a filing fee to appear on Oklahoma ballots in all races except for president. Still, some registered Independents say Oklahoma law discourages dissenting voices.
“Half of our state legislative races went unopposed in 2006,” said Clark Duffe, Oklahoma Coalition of Independents Chairman. “To hold elected officials accountable, we need a process that engages Oklahoma citizens and allows them more choices. Ballot access reform is one way to have more engaging and competitive races,”
In 2007, OBAR collected over 14,000 signatures for an initiative that would return the number of signatures for recognition of political party back to 5,000 -- the number required in Oklahoma from 1924 to 1974.
OBAR is a coalition of the Libertarian, Green, and Constitution Parties and the Oklahoma Coalition of Independents unified with the simple goal of making laws fair for new political parties.
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