Florida Marriage Amendment in Danger of Not Making 2008 Ballot

http://www.florida4marriage.org/

Officials Report 30,000 Petitions Short in Unprecedented Recount

Immediate Action Needed to Collect More Petitions 

(Tallahassee, FL)  Monday January, 14, 2008 — Leaders of Florida4Marriage.org declared a state of “constitutional emergency” today when they learned from Division of Elections officials that due to an “audit” ordered by the Division, the Florida Marriage Protection Amendment fell short by some 30,000 petitions. The state constitutional amendment seeks to define marriage as the union of one man and one woman and would prohibit polygamy, group marriage, and same sex marriages in Florida. 

According to state officials, only 589,020 petitions were officially certified after the unprecedented audit, leaving the petition effort just under 22,000 short of the needed 611,009 needed to be certified for the ballot in 2008.  Florida4Marriage.org State Chairman John Stemberger said, “Right now, we are not interested in whose fault this is.  We just want to finish the job — and finish it immediately.” 

Amendment leaders are calling upon national, state and local pro-family leaders to alert Floridians to the crisis and to immediately pull out all stops to collect new petitions over the next two weeks.  Stemberger said all petitions must be physically mailed or hand delivered into the state headquarters located at 4853 S. Orange Avenue, Orlando FL 32806, before close of business on Tuesday, January 29, 2008 (Presidential Primary Election Day).  Under a new law, petitions can no longer be delivered to local county supervisors of elections by individual citizens.  Petitions can only be received from the official sponsoring committee of the amendment.

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Action Steps:

1) Find new friends, neighbors and family who have not signed the petition. Petitions can be downloaded in PDF format HERE 
 
2) Appeal to your pastor to do one last petition collection over the next 2 Sundays. 

3) Collect Petitions at Early Voting Sites: Volunteer to collect petitions outside of early voting sites which opened today.  Click HERE to look up your county Supervisor Elections office and find early voting sites in your county.  Make sure you stand 100 feet away from the polling place to meet the legal requirement.

4) Contribute: We need to raise $50,000 before January 17th to mail the 40,000 petitions waiting at the mail house ready go out to new voters.  Donate to this historical cause now online HERE

News Clips:

Miami Herald: Same Sex Marriage Ban May Not Make Ballot 

Florida Today: Ballot Inititatives Short on Signatures

Associated Press: Gay Marriage Ban Short of Signatures
Click the link below to proceed to the Action Center:
http://votervoice.net/groups/FLFPC/?AdminPreview=True&SiteID=-1