Official Obstruction of Boulder’s Voter-Approved Online Petitioning
Includes $490,000 of waste and fraud
-see slides 12 and 16-20
This presentation will show that City of Boulder Staff:
The documentation improves with later, more egregious events....
Background:
In 2017 Boulder City Council and voters were told by the City Attorney’s office that ballot Issue 2Q was a city charter cleanup -and voters approved it.
It was a charter mess-up. It messed up our citizen initiative and referendum process.
Former longtime Council member Steve Pomerance wrote in the Daily Camera:
“2Q is by far the most dangerous measure that I’ve ever seen the city put on the ballot...2Q eliminates the current well-designed, functional process, and substitutes the granting of arbitrary powers to the city manager to set the rules and the timing for everything from how long the review of the draft ballot format and language will take, to how long the city clerk can take to count the signatures.”
Any appeal would also be to the City Manager! 2Q caused other problems, too.
The City Attorney had to admit it at 12/19/17 meeting:
To fix the City Charter and campaign finance laws, Council appointed a working group (By a fluke, including me)
Group unanimously proposed 3 new Charter Amendments
My proposal became Ballot Question 2G, which read, 🙶Shall Sections 38, 45, and 56 of the City Charter be amended pursuant to Ordinance 8274 to allow the Boulder City Council to adopt ordinances that permit use of electronic petitions and to permit on-line electronic signing or endorsement of initiative, referendum, and recall petitions?🙷
We gave the 1st option of “electronic petitions” because Denver had them in the form of eSign, which lets petitioners hand you a tablet instead of a paper petition. We didn’t know then that Arizona for 7 years has had real online petitions -for candidates, but functionally the same. Online petitions are far superior to eSign for many reasons.
Staff showed bias towards eSign, against online petitions:
Staff Report*:
ESIGN:
No additional temporary help would be needed
if circulators utilize eSign.
ONLINE:
There is the potential that no additional
temporary help would be needed if online
petitioning was Utilized.
*Comparison in chart in staff report to Council, “CFEWG Ballot Measures” attached to Asst. City Atty 7/2/18 email
Working Group Response:
THIS IS FALSE.
Denver Elections states that help is needed to compare digital signatures printed out by eSign to signatures on file. The system imitates and uses paper.
Arizona’s online petition system, our model, does not require signature checking as no signatures are used: ID is by driver’s license, etc. instead.
The Working Group asked but staff did not correct the report before sending it to Council!
Personal Meetings & Op-Ed get facts established
8/10/18 Evan Ravitz and Steve Pomerance meet with Mayor Jones.
8/14/18 Ravitz & Pomerance meet with Mayor Pro Tem Brockett
8/14/18 Council unanimously puts online and eSign petitioning on ballot
10/5/18 Daily Camera runs working group editorial for online petitions
11/6/2018: Voters approve all 3 working group issues overwhelmingly
Staff fails to tell Working Group of 1st reading to implement eSign, Council goes with online instead
2/7/19 Assistant City Attorney David Gehr notifies working group of 2/19/19 first reading of campaign Finance ordinance, but not about the same night fist reading of ordinance to begin eSign system instead of online petitions. Evan Ravitz misses 1st reading entirely. City Clerk email confirms no notice given.
3/1/19 Staff finally notifies working group of public hearing and final decision at 3/5/19 Council Meeting. We have 4 days to prepare instead of 26.
3/5/19 Council over-rules staff after unusual public hearings bring out young folks wanting online petitions. Council choses a real online system!
Staff tries for year delay
4/23/19 Staff, including City Mgr, City Atty, City Clerk, IT Director, etc. present “Update on Work Plan for Implementing Electronic Signatures for Petitions” to Council, claiming Working Group’s successful 2018 Ballot Issue 2F, requiring initiative signatures be compared to signatures on file, somehow now conflicts with 2G, allowing for online petitions, both of which the City Attorney’s office helped write and approved for the ballot. Staff ask Council to consider another Charter Amendment, delaying online petitioning by a year. Every member of the working group repudiate the memo, and Council dismisses it.
Staff Reject Free Offer from Maplight
5/14/19 Maplight President Dan Newman flies to Boulder to demonstrate this prototype of free system they offered us, using open source code so it would be free to other cities and states to use. Maplight’s secure software runs on the California Secretary of State’s website, the League of Women Voters’ site, etc.
7/5/19 Daily Camera story: City instead announces Request for Proposals for online petitioning software. Staff go into dark mode, not communicating for 2 mos.
9/14/19 Camera story: Staff ask $400,000 in proposed new budget for online petition software. This is how we learn that staff has rejected the free offer.
9/23/19 Five City Council candidates co-sign a letter to City staff asking them to stop delaying online petitioning.
City Atty promises Council no contract before Group meets
(Contrary to City Atty, Arizona is 1st in world with online petitions -for candidates, wlhich is functionally identical.
But Staff Signs Contract BEFORE Group Meeting
At the Working Group meeting, which was delayed until 12/18, City IT Director Julia Richman said a contract was signed with Runbeck. Here is the signature page, notarized 12/17. You can see City Manager Jane Brautigam’s signature, as well as of the City Clerk and Asst. City Atty. See the entire contract (186 MB PDF)
Council members Friend and Swetlik were also at the meeting.
IT Director: Sec’y of State & County Clerk Uncooperative
After 9 months, no Memorandum of Understanding yet for access to State or County voter database needed to ID petition endorsers
<City IT Director Julia Richman speaks to the Working Group on 12/18/20
<Julia re-iterates at the same meeting
Maplight Free Offer rejected on false pretences
Boulder IT Director Julia Richman to Elections Working Group and Council members Friend and Swetlik on 12/18/19:
“Maplight has never built a secure website available to the public…”
IT Director: Maplight’s “free system included zero security protocols...”
But...
FALSE
FALSE
Maplight HAS built secure public websites!
After entering password at Maplight’s site for the CA League of Women Voters, votersedge.org/ca, you see the “lock” icon left of the URL, showing it’s secure:
Maplight’s Free Offer DID include security protocols:
This is basically the same security-by-driver’s license, etc. as 38 state online voter registration systems use, and as Arizona’s online petitioning for candidates uses.
2 of Maplight’s secure public sites:
https://votersedge.org/ca for the League of Women Voters of California.
https://quickguidetoprops.sos.ca.gov for the California Secretary of State.
See what the League and CA SOS say about Maplight
Maplight gets contract for Denver Elections’ new campaign finance reporting
Since Maplight builds sites with open-source code, any software engineer can inspect their code to see it’s secure at https://github.com/maplight/
(The City contract with Runbeck is NOT for open-source code, so it will be an expensive thing for wealthy places, instead of free for all, as Maplight intended.)
35 days later, Julia RIchman left City employ and 2 weeks later gets a strategic job with the Governor:
Corona Virus stops paper petitions, proves importance of online ones.
Gov Polis allows e-signatures for candidates but not for initiatives and referenda.
In 3 years only 1 honest, in-depth news article
It’s from the spunky Boulder Weekly: https://www.boulderweekly.com/news/a-tough-year-for-direct-democracy/
System details designed against Working Group, Community input
1. Petitioners must submit online OR paper petitions, not both. This discriminates against those without internet access or savvy and is less robust.
2. System uses proprietary (secret) software instead of open source (public) software. This means:
3. No postcard/letter alternative to problematic phone/text ID. 4.The system won’t let you “unsign” a petition.
12/15/20: City Attorney Carr slanders spearhead Evan Ravitz
1. Carr infers to Council that City Mgr, City Clerk and City IT Director Julia Richman left City because of this project: https://youtu.be/h-BYl7qe6MU?t=10849
2. Carr correctly says I said Julia lied to the Working Group and 2 Council members at the 12/18/19 meeting -and falsely says that she didn't lie: https://youtu.be/h-BYl7qe6MU?t=12911. He accuses me of getting Julia and maybe the others to leave. But, Julia’s official departure was 1/22/20. I didn’t say she lied until I created this presentation on 1/28/20 (see next slide) with proof in slides 16-20 of her lying. And it wasn’t public for weeks, well after Julia left working for the City. So my exposing her lying didn’t cause her to leave.
3. It’s hard to understand why Julia lied unless told to. ONLY the City Mgr and City Attorney can order departments heads around. Carr announced his retirement 1/25/21, after I showed these facts to Council in an email dated 12/17/20
Presentation title shows date begun:
System starts 2/8/21, 1st in nation, if clunky
Boulder voters did get the Bedrooms are for People ballot initiative through the process. The system is at https://petitions.bouldercolorado.gov/.
But it took all the campaign’s help at https://www.bedroomsareforpeople.com/sign-help
2 of 3 campaigns used paper petitions instead: https://boulderbeat.news/2021/06/18/bedrooms-makes-boulder-ballot/
They did this because the City forced petitioners to choose either paper or online. All the problems with the new system can be solved by giving people both choices! Allowing people to get ID confirmation codes by email or snail mail as well as by text or phone would also be good.
In Summary, City Staff:
Bonus: City Attorney Tom Carr dislikes democracy