Affirmative action group misses Mo. petition deadline

JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. -- A group seeking to bar many state affirmative action programs has missed a Sunday deadline to submit its initiative petition.

Missouri had been one of five states California businessman Ward Connerly and his supporters had targeted for an effort to strike down affirmative action laws.

The Missouri effort was led by Tim Asher, a former admissions director at North Central Missouri College in Trenton. Asher said it became obvious Saturday that there were not enough signatures to qualify the proposed constitutional amendment for the ballot, and he pledged to try again in 2010.

Asher estimated supporters gathered 170,000 signatures -- which is enough to make the ballot. But he said it wasn't high enough because many signatures are later disqualified.

It takes between 86,000 and 95,000 signatures for a petition that creates a new law, and from 140,000 to 150,000 for those that change the state constitution.

Connerly predicted Sunday that supporters would have collected enough signatures if they had another two weeks.

"This is a marathon and not a sprint, and it's far from over," Connerly said. "There is a lot of support in the state of Missouri."

Supporters from four groups angling to get their initiative petitions on the November ballot did hit the Sunday deadline. They wheeled in dollies stacked with boxes that were filled with petitions and tens of thousands of signatures.

As many as six groups had been expected to submit petitions, but only four had done so by the deadline.

Arriving within 15 minutes of one another Sunday were groups pushing petitions to change the state constitution to restrict the use of eminent domain and to require the use of more renewable energy.

And earlier in the week, petitions to allow home health care providers to unionize and to repeal the state's cap on gambling losses while barring the construction of new casinos were submitted.

The affirmative action petition had been among the most controversial, trigging lawsuits from Asher and critics challenging the fairness of a ballot summary authored by the secretary of state's office. A state judge later rewrote the passage that would have appeared before voters at the polls.

Asher and Connerly attributed the difficulty in collecting signatures to the court battle. They both called for changes in how initiative petitions are handled in Missouri.

"We effectively lost our right to bring to the voters of Missouri whether they felt race-preference policies were positive to the state or something that needed to be eliminated," Asher said.

Connerly said cold, rainy weather and "blockers" who trailed signature-gatherers also made it difficult to get enough Missourians to sign.

A spokesman for Secretary of State Robin Carnahan said the office stands behind the ballot summary it wrote. Spokesman Ryan Hobart said Asher had as much opportunity as everyone else to submit his petition by Sunday's deadline.

WeCAN, a coalition of community, religious, labor, business and education leaders that was created to oppose the affirmative action petition, said not filing any petition was the best outcome.

Jeff Ordower said the inability to get enough signatures also was "a movement for equality" in Missouri.

"We thought it would be close," Ordower said. "We thought they would submit and not have enough of a margin. We didn't imagine they wouldn't submit at all."

The petition had prompted Connerly, a former University of California regent, to speak several times in Missouri. Connerly had said he wants to end "race-based affirmative action" and replace it with "socio-economic affirmative action."

California, Washington and Michigan have already approved ballot measures backed by Connerly. Besides Missouri, he is supporting similar efforts in Arizona, Colorado, Oklahoma and Nebraska.

Supporters from the four groups that submitted petitions said they got far more signatures than what they needed. Election officials have until Aug. 5 to certify whether the measures make the cut.

Ron Calzone, a spokesman for the group trying get two eminent domain petitions on the ballot, said volunteers had been working all week to organize petitions for proposed constitutional amendments that would bar the use of eminent domain by nongovernment entities and for private use.

Calzone said the importance of private property rights helped fuel weary supporters who had to use less sleep-deprived designated drivers. He said he expects to have to educate voters and combat critics willing to spend a lot of money to fight their petitions.

But first, Calzone said, will come "a break, a nap and then we'll continue our public education efforts."

Arriving as Calzone was leaving, P.J. Wilson estimated 170,000 people signed his group's petition that would require utilities to generate 15 percent of their electricity from sources such as wind and solar power. Wilson said that included at least 10,000 signatures last month on Earth Day.

Alphonso Mayfield, a spokesman for the group that submitted the home health care petition, estimated it submitted about 200,000 signatures Saturday. He attributed the support to Missourians' concern about health care.

"Health care is an issue that resonates with a lot of people," Mayfield said. "It allowed us to talk to a lot of people."

In 2006, six groups submitted signatures, but only three made the ballot. Five initiatives appeared on the 1940 ballot, but only one of those passed -- a constitutional amendment creating an appointment system for certain state judges.

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Secretary of State: http://www.sos.mo.gov