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Petition to apply OGA to Legislature revived
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Posted on May 06 2008
A lawmaker submitted yesterday a popular initiative petition to apply the Open Government Act to the Legislature.
Rep. Tina Sablan, who started the petition as a private citizen last year, filed the initiative request with the Attorney General’s Office. Some 2,500 signatures have been gathered for the petition.
Sablan hopes the initiative can be placed on the ballot for the expected election later this year. A federal bill, which President Bush is expected to sign in a few days, calls for a November 2008 election for the Northern Marianas’ first delegate to the U.S. House of Representatives.
It is not clear whether initiatives will be allowed on the ballot for the federally mandated election, but Attorney General Matthew T. Gregory told Sablan yesterday that “it’s a possibility.”
The 2,500 signatures accompanying the petition are the same as those collected last year. They were not enough to meet the required 20 percent of certified voters in 2007. Then, 20 percent was equivalent to about 3,000.
But because of the low turnout last election, the numerical equivalent of the 20-percent requirement was reduced to 2,400. Voters who fail to participate in an election are automatically removed from the voters list.
Although the petition now has more than the required signatures, the signature drive will continue. “Just to be on the safe side,” Sablan said. She noted that some of the previously collected signatures may be invalid by now.
Certified voters who have not signed the petition will have the opportunity to do so at Sablan’s “State of the Legislature” public forum in the Multi-Purpose Center, at 6pm today.
In addition to the initiative, Sablan plans to introduce a bill with the same intent.
Though the Open Government Act applies to all other government agencies, the Legislature passed a law in 1994 to exempt itself from the act’s provisions.
