On February 21, the Montana House State Administration Committee tabled HB 436, which would have set up a top-two primary system in that state. Thanks to James Conner for this news. The vote was 16-3. UPDATE: see this story. Thanks to Mike Fellows for that link.
Arizona State Senator Michele Reagan (R-Scottsdale) has introduced SB 1416, to provide that statewide initiatives must collect at least 40% of their valid signatures from voters who live outside Maricopa County (which has Phoenix) and Pima County (which has Tucson).
The bill also provides that newly-qualifying party petitions would need at least 10% of their signatures from outside those two counties. Under court precedents, this bill, if enacted, would be unconstitutional.
During 2013, San Mateo County, California, will redraw its county supervisor districts. All counties in California except San Francisco County have five county supervisors, who comprise the county’s legislative body. See this story. It is very rare for mid-decade redistricting to occur. San Mateo County redrew its supervisorial districts after the 2010 census already. But the county’s system of electing supervisors has since then changed (as a result of a decision of the voters in 2012) from at-large elections with a requirement that one supervisor be a resident of each district, to a system in which each district elects its own supervisor. The change makes the district boundaries more significant. The new districts will be in place for the 2014 election.
Kentucky is one of only five states that elects its governor and most of its other statewide state executive offices in odd years instead of even years. On February 20, the Kentucky Senate State & Local Government Committee passed SB 55, which is a proposed constitutional amendment that would switch Kentucky statewide state offices from the odd year before a presidential election, to the presidential election year.
If the bill passes, then the voters would vote in November 2014 on whether the State Constitution should be changed in this way. The statewide officers elected in 2011 would then remain in office one more year than they had expected. For the transition, they would get 5-year terms instead of 4-year terms.
Six Georgia State Senators have introduced SB 184, which says that all federal, state and county offices in Georgia should be partisan offices. The bill would allow counties that currently have non-partisan school board elections and judicial elections to retain non-partisan elections, but would require a popular vote in each such county to determine whether these elections should also become partisan.
The biggest impact on minor parties, apparently, is that special U.S. House and special legislative elections would be changed. Currently, in Georgia special elections for those offices, all candidates file; all are permitted to choose any party label; all candidates run on the same ballot. The special election then elects someone, with a run-off if no one get at least 50%. The bill is not explicit about special congressional and legislative elections.
Most counties in Georgia already have partisan elections for some county offices. The bill would have no impact on city elections. The bill has been introduced by these Senators: Joshua McKoon (R-Columbus), Jeff Mullis (R-Chickamauga), Butch Miller (R-Gainesville), Curt Thompson (D-Tucker), William Ligon (R-Brunswick), and Charlie Bethel (R-Dalton). Thanks to Jeff Sexton for this news.
The National Vote Plan organization has sued both Kindee Durkee and the bank she used, hoping for some restitution of the money embezzled from the organization. See this story. Kindee Durkee is already well-known for having pleaded guilty to embezzling from other Democratic Party politicians, while she was campaign treasurer for those office-holders and candidates. The lawsuit alleges that National Popular Vote Plan’s organization lost $1,520,034.64.