People Are Asking ... How do we force the Key Colony Beach City Commissioners to hold a referendum vote?

REFERENDUMS IN KCB

The referendum and the citizen initiative petition process is the most direct way voter can participate in Florida. The people resort to the petition when their voice isn't being heard.

City voters here can approve or reject by referendum any measure the city commission passes. Voters can also propose new ordinances directly via the initiative petition. In either case, the city clerk provides the petitions to be used.

In broad strokes, we have to oppose a specific vote of the commission within 10 days of that objectionable action. We will have to hustle. We must form a formal Referendum Committee, get the petition from the City Clerk, and put "boots on the ground" to get more than 200 registered voters to sign the petitions. We have 45 days to do that but that gives the Commission 55 days to do whatever they had planned. Turning in the completed petitions will stay the Commission's action but it may not stop them from doing bad things while the petitions are circulated. And then that committee will need to run a successful Get-Out-the-Vote effort.

Note to KCB voters: We do not know if we will be able to vote by mail or not. Be sure your vote by mail status is up to date as Tallahassee has changed the rules. You must renew your vote by mail status with the Monroe County Supervisor of Elections every year. Give the address where you will be this summer. You can change it when you return to KCB.

Canvassers have been talking to voters. "No one we have approached has been in favor of building the big proposed city hall. Everyone is sick and tired of waiting six years for a building that fails to materialize. And everyone wants a functioning city hall NOW! There are lots of other issues brought up, but those are the three most common.

The referendum petition can only force the Commission to hold an election. It is our votes that force the Commission to follow the will of the People.

REFERENDUM PETITIONS
THE ORDINANCE REQUIREMENTS

   Part II Key Colony Beach Code of Ordinances
   Chapter 2 - Administration
   Article II. - Elections, Initiative and Referendum
   Sec. 2-16. - Initiative and referendum.

(a) Right of initiative. The people shall have the power at their option to propose any and all ordinances, such power being known as the initiative. A petition meeting the requirements hereinafter provided and requesting the commission to pass an ordinance therein set forth or designated shall be termed an initiative petition and shall be acted upon as is provided in this section.

(b) Right of referendum. The people shall have the power at their option to approve or reject at the polls any measure passed by the city commission or submitted by the city commission to a vote of the electors, such power being known as the referendum, which power shall be invoked and exercised as is provided in this section. Measures submitted to the city commission by initiative petition and passed by the city commission without change or passed in an amended form shall be subject to referendum in the same manner as other measures.

(c) Petitions generally. The city clerk shall deliver to any elector, upon written request in the proper form, a sufficient supply of petition blanks to be used for the purposes of initiative or referendum petitions. The blanks shall be upon forms prepared and kept on hand by the city clerk. Each blank shall be dated and addressed to the city commission and shall indicate the name of the person to whom said blank was issued, the number of blanks so issued, and the procedure for which said blanks were issued. The city clerk shall file a copy of the request for said blanks in an appropriate book maintained for that purpose.

(d) Required signatures and review and certification of petitions.

(1) Before any initiative or referendum petition shall be validated by the city clerk, the person who filed the original request for same must have returned and filed with the city clerk, within forty-five (45) days after the initial issuance of the petition blanks by the city clerk, a completed petition with the signatures and residence addresses of at least twenty-five (25) per cent of the registered electors within the city as of the date the petitions were initially issued. The city clerk may accept signatures on more than one (1) sheet provided that there shall be an affidavit by the circulator of the several sheets to the effect that each signature appended to each sheet of paper is the genuine signature of the person whose name it purports to be, all of which papers shall be filed as one (1) instrument, the instrument to be signed and verified by the person designated as the one filing the same.

(2) From the date of filing the petition the city clerk shall have five (5) working days to validate the authenticity of the signatures, the fact that the signers were duly registered electors in the city, and the date that the written application was filed. If the city clerk fails to take action within the five-day period, the petition shall be deemed to be valid.

(3) Should the city clerk certify that the petition is insufficient the person filing the petition shall promptly be notified of the certification of insufficiency and the petitioner shall have no more than ten (10) working days after the certification of insufficiency to file a supplementary petition upon additional petition papers, dated, issued, and signed as provided in this section for the original petition.

(4) The city clerk shall have five (5) working days after the filing of any amendment to the original petition to re-examine the original petition and amendment and to determine whether the same shall have been signed by the requisite twenty-five (25) per cent of the registered electors as of the date of the original filing of the original petition. If the city clerk fails to take action within the five-day period, the amended petition shall be deemed to be valid.

(5) If the city clerk shall have certified the original petition and amended petition to be insufficient, the city clerk shall enter a final certification of insufficiency and shall file the same together with the petition and amended petition, if any, and shall certify to the petitioner and to the city commission at its next regular meeting the insufficiency of the petition.

(6) If the original petition shall have been certified by the city clerk to be sufficient or if the original petition together with the amended petition shall be certified by the city clerk to be sufficient, the city clerk shall certify such sufficiency to the city commission at its next regular meeting.

(e) Form of petitions.

(1) The initiative petition shall be directed to the city commission requesting that the city commission pass an ordinance, a copy of which shall be set forth in or attached to the petition.

(2) The referendum petition shall be directed to the city commission and shall be dated no later than ten (10) working days after the final passage of any measure enacted by the city commission, and shall designate by title, number, and date of enactment the particular measure or section thereof sought to be repealed or to be submitted to a vote of the electors. The filing of the referendum petition shall not serve to suspend the measure to which it is directed unless the petition is signed by at least twenty-five (25) per cent of the registered electors of the city. If the referendum petition is signed by twenty-five (25) per cent of the registered electors within the city, the filing of the referendum petition shall serve to suspend the effective date of the measure except in the case of an emergency measure which shall be defined as any measure enacted on account of an urgent public need for the preservation of peace, health, safety or property which was enacted by the affirmative vote of at least four (4) members of the city commission.

(f) City commission to order election. If the city clerk shall find the petition to be in proper form the city clerk shall issue a certificate of sufficiency and present the same to the city commission at its next regular meeting. The city commission shall within ten (10) working days of receipt of the city clerk's certificate of sufficiency, enter an order requiring that an election be held no less than thirty (30) days, nor more than forty-five (45) days after the date of the order. Provided, however, if there is any other municipal election scheduled within sixty (60) days after submission of the certificate of sufficiency, the city commission shall provide in its order that the election be held on the same date as the other municipal election already scheduled. The city commission shall provide certified copies of its order for an election to all interested parties.

(g) Form of ballot. The ballots used when voting upon a measure proposed by initiative or a matter subject to referendum shall set forth the substance thereof in a clear concise statement without argument and below or following the substance of the proposed measure set forth the two (2) propositions as follows:

For the measure
Against the measure

(h) Adoption by ordinance of measures proposed by initiative. Should any measure after being proposed by initiative be passed by the city commission but not in its original form, the original measure shall be submitted to a vote and the similar measure as passed by the city commission shall not take effect until after such vote. If the measure so submitted by initiative is approved by a majority of the electors voting thereon, the same shall become an ordinance of the City and the measure enacted by the city commission shall be deemed repealed. If a measure submitted by referendum is approved by a majority of the electors voting thereon, the same shall become an ordinance of the city.

(i) Court-ordered elections. Should the city commission fail or refuse to order an election as is herein above provided within the time prescribed, the Circuit Court of the 16th Judicial Circuit of Florida in and for Monroe County shall have jurisdiction to order such an election to be held.