Yesterday was the deadline for the opponents of Plano’s equal rights ordinance to turn in petitions to force a repeal referendum, and the haters of Plano duly did so.
Opponents of Plano’s Equal Rights Ordinance say they’ve met the deadline and collected the necessary signatures to force the Plano City Council to repeal the ordinance or place it on the ballot.
The group has collected about 7,000 signatures, far more than the 3,822 signatures needed by today’s deadline.
“We applaud the citizens of Plano who turned out to have their voices heard on this important religious liberty issue,” said Gregg Wooding, a spokesman for the Liberty Institute, a Plano-based non-profit legal organization.
Plano City Secretary Lisa Henderson confirmed today that she received the petitions and now must verify all the signatures.
See here for the background. A couple of things to keep in mind here: One, the initial claim by Houston’s haters was that they had collected over 50,000 signatures, nearly three times the required amount of 17,269. That number later shrank to 31,000 that they claimed to have verified. We know what happened from there. Conventional wisdom says you want to have at least double the number of signatures needed to feel confident that you’ve made the cut. They’re not quite there, so their margin of error is a bit small. The question is how careful their signature gatherers were, and how closely the petitions get scrutinized. I strongly recommend that anyone in the area that wants to get involved get in touch with People in Support of the Equal Rights Policy of Plano TX and/or Plano Citizens for Equality. I hope there is an organized effort to review each and every page and signature like there was in Houston. Regardless, the good guys will need all the help they can get. You feel disappointed by November’s elections? You still want to make a difference? Plano is one place you can, right now and through their municipal elections in May, even if the petition drive winds up falling short, as Council members who supported and opposed this ordinance will be on the ballot regardless. So don’t sit around and wait. Go get involved and make a difference. The Trib, Unfair Park, and the Dallas Voice have more.