November of even-numbered years is the prime month in the two-year election cycle to ask state legislators to introduce bills.  This is the time when state legislators are deciding what bills they will introduce in the new legislative session.  State legislators are more active in odd years, than in even years, except in Louisiana, Mississippi, New Jersey, and Virginia.  In the other 46 states, most law changes are made in odd year legislative sessions.

Some states have alarmingly early deadlines for bills to be introduced.  The most extreme early deadline seems to be Indiana, where bill ideas must be submitted no later than December of even-numbered years.  Indiana happens to be one of the states most in need of ballot access reform.

If you live in a state with bad ballot access, I am eager to work with you.   E-mail me at richardwinger@yahoo.com.  Half the states have voluntarily eased their ballot access laws during the last 30 years.  But nothing good happens without asking.

The Colorado Secretary of State will not appeal last week’s decision on the validity of write-in votes, when the voter forgets or doesn’t know to fill in the bubble next to the name that voter has just written in.  See this story.  The “undervotes” in the State House race in district 61 will now get a recount using human beings.  They may or may not find enough ballots in which the voter wrote in “Kathleen Curry” but didn’t fill in the bubble, to give the lead to Curry, the write-in independent candidate who is running for re-election.

The Green Party national office has released a list of party members who were elected or re-elected last week.  As noted at this site earlier, Ben Chipman was elected to the Maine legislature, and the party won three important elections in California:  in Richmond;  Mendocino County;  and Hollister.

Additionally, three Greens (Lisa Stephens, Jesse Townley, and Pam Webster) were re-elected to the Berkeley rent stabilization board; Robert Deutsch was re-elected to the Alameda Healthcare District; J. B. Shoats was elected to the Washington, D.C., Advisory Neighborhood Commission; Anita Stewart was elected to the Hillsborough, Florida, Soil and Water Conservation District; Raymond Meyer was re-elected to the Lucas County, Iowa, Health Center Board; John Anton was re-elected to the Portland, Maine, city council; Michael Beilstein and Richard Hervey were re-elected to the Corvallis, Oregon, city council.

The Libertarian Party national office has also released a list of party members who were elected or re-elected last week.  Cheryl Heacox won a partisan election to the Clay Township Board in Wayne County, Indiana.  In non-partisan elections:  Kathy Woolsey was elected to the Charleston County, South Carolina, Soil and Water Commission; Jim Culberson was elected to the Sebastian Inlet Tax District in Florida; Ron Skrutski, Tom Clark, and Kim Hawk were elected to the Lee County, Florida, Soil and Water Conservation District; and Scott Stewart was elected to the Pima County, Arizona Community College Board.

As was already reported, the Constitution Party won four partisan elections for local office in Nevada.  Also a member of the Constitution Party was elected to the Morgan County, Utah Commission, a non-partisan post.