Credit State of Idaho
Opponents of a bill to make it more difficult to put citizen initiatives on an Idaho state ballot are appealing directly to the governor.
On Friday, a state Senate committee approved a proposal by Kootenai County Republican Senator Steve Vick. His bill would require initiative sponsors to collect signatures from at least six percent of registered voters in all 35 legislative districts.
Current law requires six percent from just 18 districts. Vick argues current law allows initiative sponsors to concentrate their signature gathering efforts in urban areas and ignore rural voters.
The bill now moves to the state Senate for consideration.
Want a voter-led initiative in Idaho? This bill would make it more challenging eastidahonews.com - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from eastidahonews.com Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.
Want a voter-led initiative in Idaho? This bill would make it more challenging Hayat Norimine, The Idaho Statesman
Feb. 19 A bill that would make the process to place a citizen-led initiative on the ballot more challenging in Idaho will head to the Senate floor for a vote.
After more than three hours of public testimony, most of the speakers opposed, a panel of senators approved Senate Bill 1110 on Friday. It would require that a petition to place an initiative on the ballot include 6% of registered voters from each of Idaho s 35 legislative districts. Currently the state requires that signatures come from 6% of voters in 18 districts.
James Dawson / Boise State Public Radio
Idahoans are once again pushing back against a legislative attempt to make it harder for citizens to get an initiative on the ballot.
The Senate State Affairs Committee Friday signed off on a bill requiring these campaigns to get a certain number of signatures from each of Idaho s 35 legislative districts.
Right now, organizers just need those signatures from half of Idaho’s legislative districts to put an issue to voters.
Sen. Steve Vick (R-Dalton Gardens), who’s sponsoring the bill, said he’s not trying to disenfranchise those who live in cities.
“Urban voters have different interests,” Vick said Wednesday during the first of two days-worth of testimony. “It doesn’t make them less important or more important, but they are, in many cases, different.”
IDAHO FALLS â Aâlana Marmel had insurance.
It was a last resort policy â one that might not help a ton with routine doctor visits, but would keep the single mother of two afloat if an emergency struck. Catastrophic insurance, as brokers call it.
Then Marmel needed surgery. It could wait. So she did. A year later, she had her medically necessary but not time-sensitive surgery â an ovarian mass found to be benign once removed â after Medicaid expansion took effect in Idaho this January.
âI ended up having to basically wait,â Marmel recalled recently. At a screening before the surgery, she found out the mass had grown more complex.