Court Rules for Florida Hometown Democracy

Supreme Court Decision

Yesterday, in a lengthy 4-2 opinion, the Florida Supreme Court struck down the revocation legislation passed by the Florida Legislature back in 2007 to keep Florida Hometown Democracy off the ballot. The Court ruled that “the politically charged counter-petition revocation campaigns created by these provisions would essentially eviscerate and render meaningless the citizen-initiative process.”

The Court further noted that Florida Hometown Democracy has been the only citizens’ initiative targeted by the sleazy process. Newly elected state Senator, John Thrasher (former uber-developer lobbyist and proposed Chairman of the Florida Republican Party), spearheaded the revocation effort. Under Thrasher’s name, tens of thousands of bogus, lying letters were mailed out to trick voters into revoking their signatures on Hometown Democracy petitions. His crew also hounded petition signers with phone calls. The Court reacted to Thrasher’s tactics by noting: “Indeed, the record before us contains evidence that frustrated Florida electors were actually duped and misled by a partisan letter into revoking their signatures only to later discover that they would face potential criminal prosecution if they attempted to re-sign the relevant initiative petition.

The entire campaign against Florida Hometown Democracy has been one desperate big lie after another that we have steadily defeated. Here’s a brief chronology:

The bogus, trick “Floridians for Smarter Growth” petition. The Florida Chamber of Commerce spent about $5 million on a petition designed to make sure you could never vote on whether you want your community to be further wrecked; Thrasher’s bogus trick revocation campaign that they spent $500,000 on to get a handful of revocations; The latest anti-4 lie is that Amendment 4 will kill jobs. Our developer- opposition fails to mention that they are the folks who killed Florida’s economy and its jobs with their reckless speculation and over-development. Now taxpayers are forced to live with the consequences of higher taxes and falling home values. Our opponents always fail to mention that we have enough growth on the books for decades to come that could be built right now. But building has stopped because we have a glut of over-development and foreclosures.

Amendment 4 won’t stop growth that follows the local plan. Moreover, we are confident that voters will approve projects that benefit their community. But Florida voters are sick of seeing destructive development rubber-stamped. Amendment 4 offers the only solution to change the status quo.

All this goes to show that you can’t believe anything our opposition says, as the Florida Supreme Court observed.Read the entire Florida Supreme Court ruling above.

Lesley Blackner