Our Elections Division this week put the final touches on this fall’s statewide Voters’ Pamphlet and sent it to the printer. (More than 3 million copies will be printed and mailed throughout Washington in October.) Of the 56 pages that make up this year’s edition, 37 are devoted to Referendum 71.

The photo below shows how the pages look when you stretch them out on a football field. (No, Olympia and Capital high schools aren’t going to use this to replace their yard chains for football games…)   

Why so many pages just for a ballot measure? Because our State Constitution requires us to provide voters with a copy of the full text of each ballot measure that makes the ballot. The actual bill (E2SSB 5688) that prompted the creation of R-71 is 111 pages, but, thanks to a smaller font size, the Elections folks managed to shrink it down to 37. (You’re welcome!)