Turf Valley Grocery Store Veto Referendum, 2009
From Ballotpedia
The Turf Valley Grocery Store Veto Referendum is an attempt through the veto referendum process to allow voters in Howard County, Maryland to give a thumb's-up or thumb's-down to Howard County Council Bill 58, a bill that would allow for an expanded grocery store in the Turf Valley area.
Howard County Citizens for Open Government filed about 9,300 signatures to force the question to a vote.
Greenberg Gibbons Commercial, however, filed a lawsuit on February 5, 2009 to keep the question off the ballot, claiming that the people who collected the signatures lied to get signatures, and lied about being paid to collect signatures.[1]
If the ballot measure is judged to have enough valid signatures, it will go on the November 2010 ballot in Howard County.
Referendum halted
The attempt to collect signatures to qualify the measure for the ballot was halted in mid-March 2009 when a review of the petitions by the county's Board of Elections concluded that many of the signatures collected were invalid. [2]
The board re-reviewed the signatures after Greenberg Gibbons Commercial filed their lawsuit, saying that a December Maryland Court of Appeals decision regarding Montgomery County Gender Identity Referendum (2008) led to different rules for validating signatures.
Background
In November 2008, the Howard County Council approved a zoning change to allow Greenberg Gibbons Commercial to build a grocery store of up to 55,000 square feet at a planned shopping center in Turf Valley in Ellicott City.[2]
References
- ↑ Howard County Times, "Grocery store developer challenges petition", February 5, 2009
- ↑ 2.0 2.1 Turf Valley referendum halted after review of signatures, March 13, 2009
