Wednesday, January 25 SB-62, the bill to lower the number of signatures to get NKAPC on the ballot was passed though the Senate State & Local Government Committee.  This bill is authored by Senator Thayer and Senator Schickel after they were overwhelmed with complaints from their constituents.  You can watch the entire 60 minute hearing by clicking here or use the following guide to zoom to the highlights. 

50:35 Executive Director of the NKAPC Dennis Gordon confirms that more than enough signatures were collected to get the NKAPC on the ballot.  I wonder why he says there are enough signatures and the Clerk says there are not enough?

51:35 Senator Thayer corrects Mr. Gordon on a key point.

55:33 Larry Klein takes time off from his job as City Manager of Covington to oppose SB-62.

56:40  Senator Thayer corrects Larry Klein.

57:40  Mayor Pro Tem Sherry Carran testifies that she witnessed the counting of signatures in the County Clerks office.  Ms. Carran describes seeing pages of signatures with the same handwriting and pages of names that were copied out of the yellow pages.  She places emphasis on the word pages and repeats it several times.  It is most troubling that neither of these claims is made in the RICO suit by the County Attorney.  The RICO suit is for three names and no mention is made in the suit about the names being in the same handwriting.  Surely the County Attorney and the County Clerk would not have missed the opportunity to base their lawsuit on pages of names with the same handwriting AND pages of names copied from the yellow pages and instead base their lawsuit on three of the more than 24,000 signatures submitted.  So why would the Mayor Pro Tem, an elected official, testify to witnessing such an egregious violation of the petition process?

60:00 Senator Schickel is LOUD AND CLEAR.

61:45 Senator Seum expresses his support, motions the bill forward and the bill is seconded by Senator Schickel where it  passes out of committee.

To Senator Thayer and Senator Schickel, from all the hardworking, freedom loving individuals that spent many a hot day collecting signatures to have our voices heard, we say a very LOUD AND CLEAR Thank You.