Steve Kriston is accustomed to insults from shoppers. Some tell him to get a job when he solicits signatures to qualify measures for California’s ballot. This is my job, he responds. It’s a banner year for paid signature-gatherers like Kriston, who came to San Diego after three months working in Orlando, Florida, on state ballot measures there. He is weighing offers to move to Missouri and Minnesota after California’s season ends. The Hungarian immigrant now makes more than the $1,200 to $1,500 a week he earned as a truck driver. In California, always a hotbed for voter initiatives, sponsors are paying up to $5.50 a signature, well above the $1 to $3 in previous statewide elections. “No one has ever seen prices anywhere in this ballpark,” said Steven Maviglio, a longtime political consultant in California.
The threshold for questions to qualify is set by the turnout in the prior election. It was a record low in 2014, so the number of signatures of registered voters needed to place a question on the November ballot is 365,880, which is 28 percent lower, prompting more proposals.
Another factor is a 2011 state law requiring all initiatives except those written by the Legislature go to voters in November, giving advocacy groups only one shot each cycle, rather than the two they had when questions also could be on the primary ballot.
“It’s quite simple supply and demand,” said Democratic strategist Bill Carrick. “The rival initiatives start getting into a bidding war for the services of these signature-gatherers.”
Full Article: California elections are a bonanza for signature-gatherers | The Herald.