Breaking News: George W. Bush Sewage Plant Renaming Qualifies for November Ballot
Wayne Pickering (AKA, Brian McConnell), head of the Presidential Memorial Commission of San Francisco formed to honor George W. Bush -- which, at the risk of boasting, SFist was the first to tell you about back in March -- just contacted SFist to let us know that commission's ordinance initiative to changing the name of the Oceanside Wastewater Treatment Facility to the "George W Bush Sewage Plant" will, in fact, be on the November ballot. More details to come. Stay tuned.
Pickering was worried yesterday that they might not qualify since there was a spot check of 500 of their signatures. But that's normal since the process works like this: the power that be test 500 random signatures against the voter files. Based on said raw count, if no more than 143 of the 500 signatures (28%) are thrown out, you automatically qualify for the ballot. And: ta-da! Also, according to Wayne, "we turned in 11,999 signatures, of which 11,041 were counted in the official raw count. We need 7,168 signatures from SF voters to qualify, so we went in with over 50% more than we needed."
Congrats, craz poop plant renaming people! For the full press release, follow the jump.
INITIATIVE TO RENAME SEWAGE PLANT IN HONOR OF PRES. BUSH QUALIFIED FOR NOV 4TH BALLOTSan Francisco (July 17th) - Officials at the Department of Elections announced today that the citizens' initiative to rename the Oceanside Water Pollution Control Plant the George W. Bush Sewage Plant has qualified for the November 4th San Francisco ballot. Voters will decide on the measure in the general election alongside the presidential election, numerous statewide initiatives, and an expected 20 to 30 local measures.
"We want to thank the dozens of people who volunteered to campaign throughout the city, and the thousands of San Franciscans who lined up to sign this petition to pay tribute to our President," said initiative co-author Brian McConnell. "With over 100 volunteers, we were able to run a citywide campaign with no donations, no paid signature gatherers - it was a 100% grassroots voter movement."
The Presidential Memorial Commission is planning a creative, art-driven general election campaign, and is putting out a general call for support from artists who want to design flyers, billboards and other attention-getting devices. "We're hoping for an election campaign like no other," said Mr. McConnell.
While the measure is only being presented to San Francisco voters, voters worldwide can contribute to the general election campaign by donating artwork and funds at www.presidentialmemorial.org