A court ruling Tuesday evening knocked down a late challenge to the petition process that put Amendment 66, the proposed school finance overhaul and $950 million tax hike, onto the November ballot. A lawsuit brought by two opponents of the measure, former state legislators Bob Hagedorn and Norma Anderson, sought to invalidate nearly 40,000 signatures because of alleged missteps by petition circulators and effectively remove the issue from consideration by Colorado voters. The lawsuit claimed some circulators didn’t follow proper procedures. Those violations, the suit concluded, should invalidate the signatures, taking the total below the threshold required to put the measure on the ballot. Denver District Court Judge R. Michael Mullins ruled that the petition process was sufficiently compliant with the law.
Hagedorn, an Aurora Democrat, and Anderson, a Jefferson County Republican, both are associated with Coloradans for Real Education Reform, the primary public opposition group to Amendment 66.
Hagedorn said he did not know yet if the ruling would be appealed but felt that the stakes were high enough that a strict interpretation of election law would have been a proper standard.
Full Article: Denver judge throws out late challenge to Amendment 66 – The Denver Post.