The Post has the story here. The Gazette also reports on it.
Citizens for a Responsible Government, the group organizing the petition, needed 25,001 votes to put the county’s transgender law to referendum. Interestingly, neither the Board of Elections’ letter nor CRG’s press release indicates how many of the 32,087 signatures were found to be valid. As Equality Maryland intends to challenge the petition in court, the number of signatures by which CRG beat the margin will be relevant.
CRG has something else to worry about. Back in the summer of 2006, noted petition addict Robin Ficker was trying to get yet another tax ballot question approved. But the County Council rejected the petition wording by a 7-0 vote in part because of this:
One issue is whether the intent statement circulated with the petition reflected what the measure would do if voters approved it. It is misleading at best, council members said.
Many people, including Council President Mike Knapp, have alleged that CRG has been spreading misinformation about the transgender law. Could this issue come back to haunt them, perhaps before the council?
So this issue is not going away anytime soon. Oh joy! Maybe we will get lucky and receive some more video from new YouTube celebrity Dana Beyer.