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Attorney
General Mike DeWine
DeWine Rejects
Petition for End Ohio Cannabis Prohibition Act
(COLUMBUS, Ohio)—Ohio Attorney General Mike DeWine today rejected the
petition for the proposed End Ohio Cannabis Prohibition Act because the
petitioners did not submit the minimum valid signatures required.
On February 17th, the Ohio Attorney General’s Office received a written
petition to amend the Ohio Constitution by adding the Ohio Alternative
Treatment Amendment. The submission contained 84 part petitions with
signatures from 45 counties. The part petitions were submitted to the
respective boards of elections for signature verification. Of the 1,000
minimum signatures required to proceed with the constitutional
amendment, the boards of elections reported receiving a total of only
883 valid signatures.
“Because your submission did not contain the verified signatures of at
least one thousand qualified electors, we must reject it,” DeWine
stated in his letter rejecting the petition. “Due to your failure to
meet the signature threshold, I have not made any determination
concerning the fairness and truthfulness of your proposed summary.”
In order for a constitutional amendment to proceed, an initial petition
containing summary language of the amendment and 1,000 signatures from
Ohio registered voters must be submitted to the Ohio Attorney General.
Once the summary language and initial signatures are certified, the
Ohio Ballot Board would determine if the amendment contains a single
issue or multiple issues. The petitioners must then collect signatures
for each issue from registered voters in each of 44 of Ohio’s 88
counties, equal to 5 percent of the total vote cast in the county for
the office of governor at the last gubernatorial election. Total
signatures collected statewide must also equal 10 percent of the total
vote cast for the office of governor at the last gubernatorial election.
The full text of today’s letter and of the initiative petitions
submitted can be found at
www.OhioAttorneyGeneral.gov/BallotInitiatives.
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