Green Party plans for fall elections

JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. -- The Missouri Green Party says it has gathered enough petition signatures to qualify its candidates for the November general election.

Party officials turned in more than 15,000 signatures Thursday to the secretary of state's office. If at least 10,000 are verified to be from registered voters, then seven Green Party candidates would appear on various ballots.

The candidates include Daniel Romano of St. Louis for U.S. Senate, Fred Kennell of Maplewood for state auditor and Keith Brekhus of Columbia for the 9th Congressional District. The party also has one candidate for a mid-Missouri legislative seat and three for St. Louis-area offices.

The Green Party had to gather petition signatures to qualify for the ballot because none of the party's statewide candidates garnered a minimum of 2 percent of the vote in the 2000 elections.

Part of the party's goal is for either its U.S. Senate or auditor candidate to achieve that 2 percent threshold, freeing the party from having to gather petition signatures again in 2004.

This year, the party had 68 volunteers who gathered at least some signatures in about three-fourths of Missouri's counties. Brekhus said he personally gathered about 1,000 signatures.

"We want to offer a different choice than what the Democrats and Republicans offered, a different direction," he said.

The Green Party said it supports environmental protections, abortion rights, same-sex civil unions, universal health care, abolition of the death penalty, six weeks paid vacation for everyone, the closure of all overseas military bases and vigorous prosecution of police brutality and racial profiling.