Why Atlanta training center opponents will wait for next step on referendum

“In an effort to ensure that adequate resources are dedicated to this project, the City of Atlanta — through the adoption of the Atlanta City Council — has developed a step-by-step process to conduct the audit of the documents, of which the signature verification process maybe a critical element,” Interim Municipal Clerk Vanessa Waldon said in a statement. “We are committed to a transparent process that meets the requirements of the law and builds public confidence and trust.”

Opponents of the training center did not immediately respond when asked if they are comfortable with the city’s process, and if they will still wait until the deadline to turn in the petitions.

The city outlined the verification process as follows:

The signature pages will be sealed in front of petitioners and taken to a secure vault until they are scanned. Petitioners and the media will then be provided with copies of the pages, and each page will be marked with a unique identifying designation. Then, each line will be reviewed to determined whether the name and other information present corresponds to a registered Atlanta voter, and whether those signatures match that of the unique voter.

“This will be a manual process, a line-by-line review, which will also include double-checking of each line and other quality control measures,” city officials said in a statement. “Petition lines that do not pass the verification process will have detailed documentation as to the reason for the non-verification status.”

Organizers expressed concerns over the city’s usage of signature match to verify the signatures collected. The ACLU said signature match laws “disproportionately impact voters.”

Fair Fight Action, an organization founded by Stacy Abrams to address alleged voter suppression in Georgia and the U.S., called on the city to reconsider using the signature matching process in a post on X, the social media site previously known as Twitter.

“Using the discredited process of signature matching is unacceptable, and risks unfairly rejecting thousands of valid petitions,” the post said. “Signature verification is notoriously subjective, disproportionately impacts voters of color, and is biased against disabled and elderly voters. There is extensive precedent in Georgia showing the harms of this process, it must be relegated to the past.”

In a memo released on Monday, opponents suggested the city should use sampling or other statistical methodology to predict whether enough valid signatures exist and engage in a clear and transparent individual analysis only when doubts exist about the signatures’ validity.

“We’ve laid out what the law calls for and what morality calls for it’s up to the City now to honor the will of the voters,” Kurt Kastorf, counsel for the referendum effort, said in a statement.

In a statement, New Georgia Project Action Fund CEO Kendra Cotton called the city’s intention to use signature matching “dangerous” and “a tool of voter suppression”.

“The City Council and Mayor should immediately rescind this process and replace it with one built on sound, fair, and transparent procedures that give the voters who put them in office a shot at determining the future of their communities,” Cotton said in a statement.

The clerk will have 50 days to confirm the list has enough signatures of registered voters for a referendum, and present the petition to the City Council.

If it’s determined valid by council members, they have one week to issue a call for a special referendum election, which could put the question of the controversial training facility in front of voters. However, lawyers working for the city have argued that the referendum law doesn’t apply to cities. They argue that regardless of the number of signatures collected, no referendum can undo a lease that has been signed by both parties and enacted.

The question of the validity of the referendum effort will likely be resolved in court.

It’s been a winding road to get here.

Most recently, a federal court judge sided with a group of DeKalb residents who argued they should be able to collect signatures since the project is near the neighborhood. The July ruling by U.S. District Judge Mark Cohen restarted the petitioner’s 60-day window in which the group needs to collect a little more than 58,000 signatures, which accounts for 15% of Atlanta registered voters (388,022) in the 2021 municipal election.

Originally, the group set out a goal to collect more than 70,000 signatures based on the number of registered voters for the 2022 election.

A city’s motion to delay implementation of Cohen’s decision was denied and an appeal to his original ruling has been filed.

The group began collecting signatures on June 21, when interim city clerk Vanessa Waldon approved the referendum petition two weeks after it was submitted. Since then, the group claims to have collected more than 104,000 signatures.

“We’ve collected over 104,000 raw signatures around the City of Atlanta, from Southwest to Buckhead, and the people have decided. Cop City must be put on the ballot,” Mary Hooks, tactical lead for the referendum coalition, said in a statement.

In a statement, the group said they will consider upcoming opportunities for “nonviolent, direct actions to direct the peoples’ frustration with council’s obstruction of the democratic process.”

“If the City needs to see a demonstration of the people’s commitment to this issue, we’re happy to provide one,” Kamau Franklin, Community Movement Builders organizer, said in a statement.