Letter to the Editor

We would argue that Costa Mesa Councilman Chris Steel was much more

responsible than the usual petition gatherer. He carried his petition

personally, he went house to house where he knew the people, he used a

precinct list to only solicit registered voters, and he discussed with

those he did not have on his precinct list whether they were registered.

We have collected ballot petitions for city, county and state

initiatives. We have also registered voters. Generally, petitions cannot

be physically solicited solely by the proponent. Too many signatures are

needed.

Usually the time required for soliciting is so great and the

impediments so high that paid solicitors are used. Even with citizen

volunteers, rarely is a petition hand-carried in a neighborhood. There is

just too little chance of anyone being home.

For the gatherer to use a precinct list to make sure the person is

registered is beyond expectation. Normally volunteers are at a shopping

mall with two or three petitions on clipboards; the people are going

shopping and do not want to spend a lot of time. You ask them a question

about the subject, you ask them whether they are a voter and you ask them

to sign. The person signs the petition. In between times you are

soliciting another voter. Under such conditions, depending on the

measure’s popularity, you have a hard time witnessing each signature.

Often, volunteers hand in partial petitions and have either signed or not

signed at the bottom.

Typically, the remaining signatures are gathered and the petition is

signed and turned in for counting. In the cases we are talking about, the

signature gatherers have all been reputable and there has never been a

problem. Often signatures are gathered at political events by passing a

petition around the table. Usually, the last person signs the bottom. All

people are known and are of good character, but no one witnessed every

signature. In all of the above cases, minor variances of the code have

been breached but not with intent to defraud or to illegally submit a

ballot petition. All of these breeches are worse than anything Steel has

done.

In other petition cases, gatherers asked people who were not citizens

to register to vote. They were registered and later voted. This evidence

was turned over to the district attorney but never prosecuted. To this

day, we are unaware of any attempt to remove these illegal voters from

the roles, much less punish either the illegals or the vote gatherers for

fraud.

In the recall of the board of education in Orange, we understand

students circulated petitions, which were signed by teachers as

witnesses. Clearly, the gatherers were not all voters and some of the

teachers who said they witnessed the signatures did not so witness.

Again, the district attorney has the evidence but chooses not to

prosecute.

In Steel’s case, the district attorney actually turned over the

evidence to resident Michael Szkaradek, submitted by Steel to the

district attorney investigator, so Steel could be sued. Having lost the

civil case with a lesser evidence standard, the district attorney is now

threatening a criminal suit for fraud. If a judge decided the evidence

was not convincing, clearly the criminal case should be dropped. Isn’t

this double jeopardy?

Clearly the district attorney has massive evidence of criminal fraud

on the record and people should be forced to defend their illegal actions

in court and be put in jail for election fraud. That no such actions have

been forthcoming clearly signals that the district attorney is blind to

justice but not colorblind.

RICHARD NICHOLS

Corona del Mar