Six Californias Petition Falls Short of Making Ballot
The initiative to split California into six states, commonly referred to as the “Six Californias Plan” has failed to garner enough signatures to appear on the ballot next year. The failure had California Secretary of State Debra Brown strike it from inclusion on the November 2016 ballot.
The Six Californias Plan was the brainchild of billionaire Timothy Draper, who told BuzzFeed News that the plan would have given the state a “refresh” after what he described as 40 years of decline. Proposed maps of what the new six Californias would look like were drawn up in hopes of creating support for the plan, one of which appears above.
The Six Californias initiative had 1.3 million signatures back in July and needed only 807,615 to be on the ballot. The California Secretary of State, however, says that random sample testing for validity found that only 752,685 of those signatures would count, which put it off the ballot. Signature validity, according to the Secretary of State, varied widely by county with issues like duplicate signatures, signers not being registered to vote, etc.
Draper and supporters of Six Californias, however, are undeterred and plan to fight for their place on the ballot next year. Although a lawsuit has not been proposed, it’s a possible outcome, as Davis says the result is one of the reasons that six Californias are needed.
“It is yet another example of the dysfunction of the current system and reinforces the need for six fresh, modern governments.”
Other problems may have kept the initiative off the ballot, however. Under California law, a state-wide petition must have a specific number of signatures in each county of the state. Four counties, including Los Angeles County, one of the largest, had not publicly reported their signatures on the Six Californias petition, according to the San Francisco Chronicle.
Once on the ballot and with enough votes to pass into legislation, however, the Six Californias plan may have ultimately failed regardless, says The Huffington Post. Once the people had voted, it would go to Congress in Sacramento where it would have likely languished for years as arguments over where the six Californias would split would undoubtedly commence.
As for Draper, he spent over $5 million of his personal fortune on the Six Californias plan. He’s calling for a full check of the signatures submitted, saying that they have “more than enough” and that such a full count would prove it. He also left open the possibility of a formal challenge to the Secretary of State’s assessment, according to a report from KQED News.
