In Washington state, each county decides for itself whether to use all-mail ballots, or whether to retain polling places. For some time, Pierce County (which includes Tacoma) has been the only county still using polling places. The Washington house had passed HB 1572 earlier this year to convert the entire state to mail ballots, but the Senate did not get to the bill, and now the legislative deadlines for passing bills have passed. See this story.
Ben Westlund, a former independent State Senator in Oregon, and an independent candidate for Governor in 2006, died on March 7. At the time of his death, he was the elected State Treasurer of Oregon. He had started his career as a Republican, had switched to being an independent, and then had become a Democrat. See here.
As a Senator, Westlund authored a bill to repeal the Oregon primary screenout. A “primary screenout” is a law saying primary voters may not sign an independent candidate’s petition. The Oregon legislature had passed that law in 2005, but in 2007 Senator Westlund tried to get it repealed. It was finally repealed in 2009.
Westlund qualified for the ballot as an independent candidate for Governor in 2006, but complying with the law was so expensive, he dropped out of the race before turning in his county-verified signatures to the Secretary of State, because petitioning had eaten up so much of his campaign funds.
A ballot access improvement bill, HB 142, is pending in the Alabama legislature. The bill has already received editorial support twice from Birmingham’s daily newspaper, the Birmingham News. On March 8, the Montgomery daily newspaper, the Montgomery Advertiser, also editorialized in favor of the bill. Here is that editorial.
The New York Libertarian Party holds its state convention in Albany on April 23-24. The convention will choose nominees for statewide office. Kristin Davis’s campaign says she will attend the convention. She wishes to run for Governor of New York this year but has not decided whether to seek the Libertarian nomination or to run independently under the label “Personal Freedom.”
In 2009, Jeffrey Vanke created the Center Party. The party’s web page, www.centerparty.us, is at this link. Vanke has begun to circulate a petition to run for U.S. House in Virginia’s 6th district, centered in Roanoke. He needs 1,000 valid signatures by early June.
