Bonifaz worried about collecting enough signatures -- NEEDS HELP!

[Ian David]

Cross-posting in Activist forum:


Bonifaz worried about collecting enough signatures
by: David
April 14, 2006 at 12:24:23 EST
The latest email from the John Bonifaz campaign contains the following warning (emphasis in original):

We have good and bad news on the signature collection front. The good news is that we are almost halfway to our goal of 10,000 signatures.... The bad news is that the deadline is May 9th, and we are currently not on pace to reach our goal. We need to expand the team, and people have to step up NOW.

There has been a great deal of yakkity-yak here and elsewhere about whether the candidates will get the required 15% of delegates at the June convention. But that is not the only hurdle the candidates face in getting on the ballot. The signature requirements are significant, and candidates always have to over-collect in order to allow for the inevitable disqualifications resulting from the state's fairly draconian laws on this subject (as a candidate for Secretary of State, Bonifaz needs 5,000 signatures - he's apparently set 10,000 as the goal in order to make sure he has 5,000 that are valid).

Anyone have any intel on how the Governor and Lt. Governor candidates are doing? They need 10,000 to qualify, which means they'd be smart to collect a couple thousand more than that. That's a lot of signatures.

More:
http://www.bluemassgroup.com/showDiary.do?diaryId=1950

[paineinthearse]

1. Foul! The extract is taken out of context.

Here's the entire letter:

We have good and bad news on the signature collection front. The good news is that we are almost halfway to our goal of 10,000 signatures. We have assembled "Team 10,000," a group of hardcore volunteers who are out in all kinds of weather getting the job done. We have begun turning signatures in to the city and town halls, and more are coming in each day.

The bad news is that the deadline is May 9th, and we are currently not on pace to reach our goal. We need to expand the team, and people have to step up NOW. We are organizing signature blitzes for the end of the month, and if we can get another 30 people to sign up, we will easily reach our goal of 10,000 signatures by the first weekend in May.

If you can help, send an e-mail to [e-mail] or call [phone]. I am leading the signature drive and can either get you a packet of materials to gather signatures on your own or put you in contact with a team in your area.

We have several coordinated efforts around the state that people can plug into. But you have to commit today. There are many opportunities to collect signatures on our calendar at http://www.johnbonifaz.com/events.

IMPORTANT: If you have been collecting signatures, but have not received e-mails or phone calls asking you for an update on your progress, then we need to hear from you! Several volunteers took signature forms at events last month but haven't maintained contact with the campaign. Please let us know how you're doing! Thanks.

Pat Keaney
Coordinator for Signature Drive

My take is that to insure 5000 certified signatures are secured, the goal is to obtain 10000 signatures, against which almost half are in hand. So it's not as bad as Blue Mass Group is inferring. I have it from reliable sources that the signature campaign has things well in hand. Over the past several days a very high number of volunteers and pledged delegates are registering their support.

However, I'm sure we are all familiar with the saying "many hands make light work". The thrust of the message was more in line with "when more people do nomination signature gathering, each volunteer will need to gather less".

If you support election reform and can help to gather signatures at events identified at www.johnbonifaz.com/events or at your town meeting or local super market, contact volunteer coordinator Patrick Keaney at 857-829-1882, or email [e-mail]

John has received the endorsement of Rep. John Conyers, Rep. Jesse Jackson, & 21st Century Democrats, among others.

John is a leading authority on United States election reform. He is taking on the political establishment in Massachusetts. The state-level election injustices that have occurred are outrageous, and John has a vision to restore the integrity to the process.

What makes John an extraordinary, visionary leader?
John has an incredible vision for the secretary of state position in Massachusetts, and it centers around one main theme: Make voting as accessible as possible to all citizens. In 1994, in an effort to start this fight, John helped launch the National Voting Rights Institute, an organization that works to protect our constitutional right to a free and just democracy.

Through his work with the NVRI, John battled cases related to absentee ballots, provisional voting, candidate filing fees, public access to contribution records, and enforcement of campaign spending laws, among other things.

John is a strong supporter of same-day registration, federal holiday and early voting, and restoring a felon’s right to vote. As do many Americans, John believes that taking away any and all barriers to voting is the most decisive way to increase voter turnout and elect the kind of leaders who truly represent their constituents.

Background
John has been active in social movements for change from a very young age. As a college student at Brown University, John worked to register thousands of voters, participated in the nuclear disarmament movement, and fought for the university's divestment from companies doing business in then-apartheid South Africa. In 1990, John was one of 11 Harvard Law students who, along with a coalition of student groups, sued the school for discrimination in the hiring of its faculty. Following his graduation from Harvard Law School in 1992, John moved to Washington, DC to serve as the staff attorney for the Center for Responsive Politics. He moved back to Massachusetts in 1994 to start the National Voting Rights Institute and to join his father's law practice.

John continues to maintain a private practice with his father, Cristóbal Bonifaz, that specializes in international human rights and environmental law cases. John and his father serve as co-counsel for thousands of indigenous people living in the Ecuadorian and Peruvian Amazon in an ongoing case against the Texaco oil company for the company's environmental destruction of their homeland. John was instrumental in launching a landmark case against the Unocal oil and gas company on behalf of Burmese villagers for human rights abuses connected with the company's construction of a major gas pipeline in Burma.

For more information on John’s campaign for Secretary of State, please visit his website at www.johnbonifaz.com.

[Ian David]

4. Thanks for clarifying that! Makes a big difference! n/t

[Cos]

2. margin of error

See <a href="http://www.bluemassgroup.com/showDiary.do?diaryId=1950">my comment on the Blue Mass Group post</a>, regarding signature gathering buffers of confidence.

And do tell your friends in Massachusetts we need their help gathering some signatures this week.
-- Cos

[PuraVidaDreamin]

3. On Thursday at Delahunt's WHOI- civil rights town meeting

I plan to get sigs, before and after.
will do so Fri/Sat too.

Thought I'd could be out and about today, but having
more knee pain postop scope than thought I would-