PRELIMINARY Petition Signature Totals

In preparation for the launch of our Bellingham Initiative No. 2012-01 petition, 500 copies were printed.  Between January 12th and July 11th, 254 petitions were used to gather signatures. All but 16 have been accounted for and, pending receipt of these, we can report a PRELIMINARY total of 3208 signatures. As reported earlier, this is not enough to get Bellingham Initiative No. 2012-01 on the November ballot as Proposition No. 1. However, this total has attracted the attention of members of City government. At the direction of Mayor Kelli Linville, City staff is addressing the fact that Bellingham has a fireworks problem that needs to be dealt with. In a community which was suffering "petition fatigue" - the one about coal and the one about increasing to number of Port Commissioners as well as ours about fireworks - and with only about 25 volunteers and minimal expenditures, we should be very proud of what we have accomplished. Later . . .