The county says MROSD opponents didn’t get enough signatures. Next stop: court

The Midpeninsula Regional Open Space District will not be on the November ballot, if the County’s signature count is upheld. Opponents of the MROSD were only able to gather 3,443 valid protest signatures versus 4,071 required to bring about a vote in November.

According to the certification [PDF] posted on the San Mateo County Elections web site, 1,757 of the 5,340 signatures collected were invalid. Most were duplicates or not registered.  MROSD supporters were only able to gather 140 valid withdrawals.

In an email to the Southcoast mailing list, Catherine Peery reports:

...a lawsuit on this is being heard tomorrow at 9 am in Judge Forcum’s court, room 2H in the Board of Supervisors building (400 County Center).  The total of duplicate and nonregistered signatures is about half of the rejected total.  There are some questions about whether both duplicates (the valid and invalid) were not counted, etc.  So, I think…its off the ballot, but the methods for invalidating were not as clear cut as the certification would imply.  The judge who agreed to hear the case said a 34% rejection rate was a red flag.

I guess I shouldn’t be surprised that this wound up in court.