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Tag: domestic partnerships

R-71: No gay-marriage bill expected in 2010

R-71: No gay-marriage bill expected in 2010

Gay-rights activists say they don’t expect to jump from their Referendum 71 victory to pursuing gay-marriage in the Legislature or in the courts right away. Sen. Ed Murray, sponsor of the state’s newly ratified domestic partnership law, tells The Herald of Everett that he isn’t expecting even a hearing in Olympia on the perennial request for the right to marry.  The spokesman for the Approve R-71 says “I think 2010 is too soon,” and activists called it a conversation for…

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R-71 Part Deux: Will high court take up disclosure ban?

R-71 Part Deux: Will high court take up disclosure ban?

The continuing court battle by foes of Referendum 71 to shield their petitions from public view stepped up a notch Friday with filing of papers formally outlining the reasons why they want the U.S. Supreme Court to hear their case and uphold a disclosure ban. A 30-second recap: In September, U.S. District Court Judge Benjamin Settle in Tacoma agreed to Protect Marriage Washington’s request to block the Secretary of State from the scheduled release of over 9,000 R-71  petition sheets…

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R-71: Effective 12-3-09

R-71: Effective 12-3-09

Media outlets have declared Referendum 71 approved by voters, describing it as the country’s first voter-ratified gay-rights measure.   As of Friday afternoon, the measure had an approval margin of nearly 71,000, or about 5 percentage points –754,180 to 683,320.  King County, which accounts for nearly a third of the electorate, was giving the measure an approval margin of over 150,000. King’s approval rate has been running 68 percent, and a number of the ballots remaining to be counted are from that county….

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Recount? Let me count the ways …

Recount? Let me count the ways …

With Seattle and Tacoma mayoral races uber-close — and other contests as well —  we’re getting the inevitable questions about the R word — recount. Here’s the crash course: –The basic rule is that a recount is mandatory if the margin is less than one-half of 1 percent and also less than 2,000 votes. (If you want to look up the citation, it’s RCW 29A.64.021.  If you want to wait for the movie, that’s OK, too.) –A manual recount, as…

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The voters speak … and keep speaking

The voters speak … and keep speaking

After an “Election Day” that spanned nearly three weeks, the process of tallying the final vote will take still more time. As of this morning, ballots of 28.5 percent of the state’s 3.58 million registered voters have been counted.  That’s over a million ballots.  Tons more are being processed as we speak, and many more are still “in the mail,” since state law only requires that ballots be postmarked by Nov. 3. How many people will have voted by the…

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‘Looming over gay-rights vote’: Disclosure debate

‘Looming over gay-rights vote’: Disclosure debate

Washington’s hot ballot measure dealing with domestic partnerships, Referendum 71, is getting national media attention, along with Maine, which is voting on actual gay marriage.  But in Washington, the debate is sometimes eclipsed by a legal and public relations war over whether the R-71 petitions should be released as a public record, or kept confidential. The New York Times’ William Yardley visited this disclosure battle in a Sunday newspaper piece ,calling the dispute a collision of “privacy, free speech and elections in…

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Federal judges OK release of R-71 petitions

Federal judges OK release of R-71 petitions

The 9th Circuit Court of Appeals has just lifted the ban on Washington releasing Referendum 71 petitions. A three-judge panel handed a clear victory to the Secretary of State Sam Reed and Attorney General Rob McKenna, who had vigorously argued that the state’s voter-approved Public Records Act requires the state to treat initiative and referendum petition sheets as a releasable public record. The court, in a brief three-page order released from Pasadena, Calif., said it is reversing Tacoma-based U.S. District…

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Thurston R-71 hearing set for Tuesday

Thurston R-71 hearing set for Tuesday

Challengers who hope to block a statewide vote on the state’s new “everything but marriage” law have been given a court date in Thurston County Superior Court for the day after Labor Day. The hearing of the lawsuit brought by Washington Families Standing Together will be before Judge Tom McPhee at 1:30 p.m. in the county courthouse in Olympia. A King County judge dismissed a challenge brought by Washington Families earlier this week, seeming to concur with their views but…

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R-71: Signature-count edges to finish line

R-71: Signature-count edges to finish line

State election crews were wrapping up final signature-checks for Referendum 71 Tuesday night, paving the way for Secretary of State Sam Reed to certify the measure to the statewide ballot on Wednesday morning. The referendum is sponsored by foes of the newly adopted “everything but marriage” expansion of state rights for domestic partners who are on the Secretary of State’s domestic partner registry created by the Legislature. Voters’ choice will be to approve or reject the new law, Senate Bill…

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R-71 update: 103,000 signatures approved

R-71 update: 103,000 signatures approved

The latest signature update for Referendum 71 shows that signature checkers have approved more than 103,000 signatures. Nearly 7,000 signatures have been counted since Tuesday’s update, bringing the cumulative total to 117,069 checked signatures. Of this total, 103,198 have been accepted and 13,871 have been rejected for one reason or another. The overall error rate is now 11.85 percent, just a little up from the 11.81 percent reported Tuesday. In order to make the November statewide ballot, the referendum’s overall…

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