Campaign organizers are having trouble promoting initiatives sponsored by Repair California that would call a constitutional convention. The first of the two initiatives (09-0066) would allow voters to call a constitutional convention, and the second (09-0067) would actually call the convention.
John Grubb, the initiative's campaign director, stated in a February 10 e-mail: "We are running a lean campaign with many volunteers and others working almost for free because they believe in the mission of the campaign and refuse to let California fail. That said, we still have to pay rent on our offices across the state, meet payroll and print petitions for registered voters to sign. Our overall budget is $3.6 million to qualify the Convention for the ballot, a small amount considering the normal $60 million cost of a full ballot measure campaign."
As of February 10, the campaign had raised $830,250 in total contributions, according to figures from the secretary of state. The largest donor to the campaign is the California Tribal Business Alliance. If the initiative were approved by voters, a number of delegate seats would be saved for representatives from American Indian tribes located in California.
Last week, campaign organizers distributed a press release claiming that many professional signature-gathering firms have blacklisted anyone affiliated with the constitutional convention initiative, and have even gone so far as to hire petitioners to throw away valid signatures.
On February 10, Mr. Grubb told John Meyers of KQED public radio that the campaign is currently on pause, and has enough funds to operate for another 30 days. (Sources: Blockbuster Democracy, A Blog from the New America Foundation, and KQED Capitol Notes, February 10.)
Cal-TaxReports, February 16, 2010
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