Hi ,

I'm sending you this message directly so you can come tomorrow to the hearing to help stop a terrible Charter amendment proposed by Greg Kimsey.

Below you'll find the layout of the situation and notes you can use for giving public comment. If this Charter amendment goes forward, it will then be on the ballot in November and if passed would strip more rights away from "we the people."

Please don't broadly share these comments notes below on social media and I won't be sharing them on the larger email list... I'm only sending this to REC volunteers because Kimsey and others in the County monitor my email updates that are sent out on the larger email list (3,000+).

Someone told me the other day that what's going on, the evil doing, scares them but I told them evil doesn't scare me. Evil doing has been and will always be around until Jesus comes back. What truly scares me is good people doing nothing. Apathy of the righteous is truly the problem we must face and we must get engaged, respectfully and civilly, we must stand against evil and corruption.

The Charter Amendment Hearing To Further Restrict Initiatives In Clark County Is This TUESDAY June 25th 10 AM

Greg Kimsey didn't like the Restore Election Confidence (REC) Initiative. We discovered a vulnerability in the bureaucratic system that keeps citizens out of the administrative elite's control, and they didn't like it. They don't want the people telling them how to do their jobs. People like Greg Kimsey believe the public shouldn't have a say in election procedures.

After I filed the REC initiative, they tried to kill it illegally. When I filed a Writ of Mandamus, they realized they had to follow the law and the Home Rule Charter. Now, they're trying to change the law to stop people from any future attempts at self-governing through initiatives.

As it stands, Clark County has the most restrictive process for proposed initiatives in Washington State. The Prosecuting Attorney's office even avoided directly answering this point today, likely because they didn't want to admit it. No other county grants such broad powers to the Prosecuting Attorney's office, and this will undoubtedly be used to shut down initiative proposals they don't like, just as they attempted with the Restore Election Confidence initiative back in December.

JUNE 25, 2024 TUESDAY The 10 AM - Initiatives Charter Amendment - Hearing Information - If You Plan To Attend And Want Help Preparing Comments CLICK HERE To Email Me & I'll Send You Info

Council Meetings are held in a hybrid format, join virtually or in person.

Participate in the following ways:

• In person, 6th floor of the Public Service Center, 1300 Franklin Street, Vancouver, WA 98666
• Watch live on CVTV (Comcast channel 23)
• Livestream from your personal computer: www.cvtv.org

Join by computer: WebEx

Join by phone:

• Dial: 1-408-418-9388
• Access Code: 2496 504 7959
• Password: BOCC (2622 from phones)
• press *3 on phone to raise hand

Submit comments:

• Written via email: www.clark.wa.gov/councilors/public-comment 
• Written via US Postal Service to the Clark County Council, c/o Rebecca Messinger, PO Box 5000, Vancouver, WA 98666-500
• During the meeting from your computer or phone: follow these instructions

Here are issues that you can select from to share, depending on your interest.

If you do plan to give comment please send me a quick email letting me know and on what topics you plan to share.

General Comments

• Mr. Kimsey started this Charter Amendment conversation by saying that a recent initiative effort motivated him to come forward with this proposal, to prevent voter disillusionment.  Not my words but his words, but at the same time Kimsey has overseen a decade-long skid in voter participation where the last General Election saw a historic low, and yet he refuses to take meaningful action to acknowledge and correct it, say like a substantive post-election audit, that’s just one thing but he refuses. So when he talks of preventing voter disillusionment, his lack of action tells you and the public of something different.  The financial impact is important but would already be provided through a required County hearing that would follow from a successful signature gathering.  By the way, Kimsey falsely told you repeatedly last time there’s only been one initiative when there have been several according to Cathie Garber. 

• Why do you think there’s been no successful initiative attempts in almost ten years? And Does that sound like a “problem” that merits spending tens of thousands of dollars and a third charter amendment proposal to fix a problem that doesn't exist?  If anything requirements for initiatives should be lowered, with fewer signatures and more days to collect signatures.  As it stands, the requirements, which Kimsey authored, can only be successful with paid signature gatherers. The right to petition is supposed to be a nearly sacred right and important counterbalance, but because of how Mr. Kimsey wrote the Charter, it’s a right of the people that’s been effectively choked out of existence but Mr. Kimsey is proposing to enact a fatal blow.

• So, why is he doing this?  Because he doesn’t want citizens to have the right to make laws about election procedures or other areas that might be perceived as telling him how to do his job.  He fought tooth and nail with the PA’s office trying to convince them that the last initiative did break the 6 already stated limitations but they didn’t agree so now he wants to make sure something like that, the people creating law about election procedures or any other area of his job, ever happens again.  In fact, Kimsey threatened the PA’s office that he’d take action against the initiative if they didn’t take action to stop it, even though he didn’t have the authority to do so. So, now, he comes before you to not to help with voter disillusionment but to take away the rights of the people.

Voting for this violates your oath

• You all took an oath to protect the Constitution, including Article 1, section 4 that the right of petition shall not be abridged.  This charter amendment, if it goes forward, will functionally shut future initiatives take away the rights of the people, and expand the powers of the PA’s office all with the subtle language of “this is not a complete list."

• Look what the PA’s office did just a few months ago with the last initiative… this is what they will do again and only government-approved initiatives will be allowed to move forward.  After the Restore Election Confidence Initiative was filed, two days later, the PA's office improperly and against the Home Rule Charter smeared the initiative, without specifics or citing court decisions, but just lodged improper accusations and arbitrarily decided to not allow it to be placed on the ballot. No facts, no cases, no RCW's, and no consideration for the Charter. Thankfully a Writ of Mandamus was filed and their decision was reversed but if you pass this amendment that right too will be taken away. They broke the law and got caught, so now they want to change the law so they can do it successfully next time. That’s limiting speech, that’s saying now the gov will pick and choose what we get to say in petition… it goes too far and if you go along with this you’ll be violating your oath to protect the Constitution.

• Article 1, Section 4, clearly states as a right in Washington that the right to petition shall never be abridged.  The phrase "never be abridged" means that this right cannot be reduced, limited, or restricted under any circumstances. It guarantees that citizens have an unassailable right to petition the government for redress of grievances or to bring forth their concerns and suggestions without facing any form of obstruction or diminishment. This provision ensures that the government cannot take any action that would infringe upon or diminish this fundamental democratic right to exercise free speech of petitioning change.

• Clark County is already the most restrictive or limiting of any County in Washington and if this charter amendment goes forward it will push us beyond the most restrictive in WA and most likely violate the Constitution. And if and when challenged this will result in hundreds of thousands of dollars in legal fees to remedy.

• Most of you took an oath to protect the Constitution and the rights stated within, that is the most important issue before you and paramount with every decision you make. So far, very little debate has occurred about how this will further restrict or limit the people's rights of free speech through petitions.

Financial Impact Statement

• Giving the financial impact to the Auditor is asking for trouble.  Did you see what he did to the last initiative?  He wrote articles, gave misleading statements, gave improper legal analysis to the newspaper, and now you’re going to let the Audtor, who looks at the money spent, doesn’t budget or look at money to come to handle this?  What if another initiative comes forward directed at his department, how fair will that be?  And to put it on the petition?  That is blatant tampering that can be used to suppress signature gathering. The same auditor who proposed an election department remodel that is moving drastically out of budget, the auditor who came to the council and said it was going to cost hundreds of thousands of dollars for each amendment then once he saw that it wasn’t going to go forward because of money concerns miraculously came back changing his analysis from hundreds of thousands to just 10-20k each, you’re going to trust to give a fair assessment.

• The auditor’s office has no experience or duties regarding financial projections.  What will happen when there’s a conflict of interest? Ignore it, pretend that everyone always does the right thing? This change will give too much power to the Auditor’s office to unduly influence the outcome of signature gathering.

Undue Burden On Citizens

• If this charter amendment goes forward it will put an undue burden on initiative sponsors to stop abuses by the PA’s office or the Auditor's office regarding the financial statement, like what was just demonstrated a few months ago when the PA’s office improperly tried to stop an initiative with no specifics or court decisions cited… with just writing a letter, like the one provided, and the right to petition was halted. And what's the recourse for citizens?

• In previous meetings, Councilor Medvigy mentioned the importance of provisions for recourse that would help remove the burden on initiative sponsors but this draft has no provisions and will result in citizens having to spend possibly tens of thousands of dollars just to be able to exercise their right to free speech through petitioning.

www.reformclarkcounty.com