By David Eggert
Associated Press
LANSING (AP) — Defenders of Michigan’s prevailing wage law filed a challenge Monday alleging that a group behind a repeal drive submitted thousands of invalid voter signatures, falling short of the number needed to qualify for a legislative or statewide vote.
Protect Michigan Jobs also asked state election officials to investigate potential fraud by petition circulators, who were hired by a committee of nonunion contractors and conservative donors trying to rescind the 50-year-old law. It guarantees higher construction wages on state-financed public works projects.
“This is an absurdity — to see that every other page in the 50,000-plus sheets that were turned in, there’s a duplicate signature. It’s pretty obvious how this process has gone off the tracks,” said John Pirich, a lawyer for Protect Michigan Jobs, an organization of union contractors and trade unions.
If at least 253,000 of the 390,000 voter signatures submitted last month are certified, which could come as early as next week, the Republican-controlled Legislature will have a window to pass the bill with no possibility of a veto from GOP Gov. Rick Snyder. Snyder has said he supports the law as a way to address a shortage of skilled tradespeople.
If the bipartisan, four-member Board of State Canvassers rules enough valid signatures were collected but lawmakers decline to vote, the measure would go to a statewide vote in November 2016.
The panel likely will meet on Nov. 5, secretary of state spokesman Fred Woodhams said.
A preliminary review by the Bureau of Elections found that 355, or 71 percent, of 509 randomly pulled signatures are valid — which equates to nearly 271,000,
or 18,000 more than needed, according to prevailing wage proponents. But the challengers compared the sample to the entire collection of signatures and found 65 duplicates — not including those already tossed by state staff, largely because they were signed by unregistered voters.
If the duplicates are ruled out, just 290, or 57 percent, of the sample signatures are valid, Pirich said. If other challenged signatures are pitched, 267, or 52 percent, are usable.
That means there are as few as approximately 203,000 valid signatures, well short of the amount needed, Pirich said.
Supporters of the petition drive also filed a challenge before Monday’s deadline. They said six signatures in the sample should still be deemed valid because signers wrote their names or other information sloppily, and the board is supposed to err on the side of counting signatures where irregularities appear to be the result of minor technical errors.
The group backing the repeal drive, Protecting Michigan Taxpayers, accused “big labor” of attempting to “disenfranchise nearly 400,000 men and women exercising their right to petition their government.” Vice President Chris Fisher, who is president of the Associated Builders and Contractors of Michigan, said he looks forward to the board’s approval of the petitions.
Also Monday, the groups supporting and opposing the initiative filed their latest campaign-finance reports.
Protecting Michigan Taxpayers reported raising slightly more than $600,000 in the last three months and spending $918,000, primarily for signature gathering.
The largest donation, $425,000, came from the Michigan Freedom Fund, which has ties to Amway’s founding DeVos family. Overall, the group has received nearly $1.7 million and spent more than $1.5 million.
Protect Michigan Jobs said it raised $219,000 and spent nearly $171,000, mainly to scan and review the petitions. The biggest donors were the International Union of Operating Engineers and the Michigan Building and Construction Trades Council, which each gave $50,000.
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