"Amending the constitution" makes Colorado ballot
So far, four citizen initiatives have been deemed sufficient
DENVER, August 16, 2016 -- Colorado Secretary of State Wayne Williams announced today that a proposal that would make it harder to amend the state constitution will be on the ballot this November.
Backers of the "Requirements for initiated constitutional amendments" on Aug. 5 submitted their signatures. A 5-percent random sample of the signatures projected the number of valid signatures to be greater than 110 percent of the total number of signatures required for placement on the ballot.
Petition verification summary:
| Total number of qualified signatures submitted | 183,691 |
| 5% of qualified signatures submitted (random sample) | 9,185 |
| Total number of entries accepted (valid) from the random sample | 6,353 |
| Total number of entries rejected (invalid) from the random sample | 2,832 |
| Number of projected valid signatures from the random sample | 127,054 |
| Total number of signatures required for placement on ballot | 98,492 |
| Projected percentage of required valid signatures | 129% |
Initiative No. 96 requires that any petition for a citizen-initiated constitutional amendment be signed by at least 2 percent of the registered electors in each of the 35 state Senate districts. The percentage of votes to pass any proposed constitutional amendment would be increased from a majority to at least 55 percent of the votes cast, unless the proposed amendment only repeals any provision of the constitution.
"Amending the constitution" is the fourth citizens' initiative to successfully make the ballot. The other proposals approved for the Nov. 8 election are "ColoradoCare," Minimum Wage and Medical Aid in Dying.
Five other proposals that were turned into the Secretary of State are still being tabulated, but no sufficiency results are expected this week. They are:
- New cigarette and tobacco taxes: No. 143
- Primary elections: No. 98
- Presidential primary election: No. 140
- Local government authority to regulate oil-and-gas development: No. 75
- Mandatory setback for oil/gas development: No. 78
Also on the ballot are two measures referred by the Colorado General Assembly: Amendment T, regarding servitude, and Amendment U, regarding property taxes. In addition, the Denver Metro Scientific and Cultural Facilities Board put Ballot Issue 4B (PDF), a sales-and-use tax measure, on ballots in the following counties: Adams, Arapahoe, Broomfield, Boulder, Denver, Douglas (except Castle Rock and Larkspur) and Jefferson.
