Editor's Note: This story includes reaction quotes
Petitioners seeking to ban vacation home rentals in residential neighborhoods will seek a review by Douglas County commissioners in light of a certificate of insufficiency issued by the Clerk-Treasurer’s Office.
On Wednesday afternoon, Douglas County Clerk Amy Burgans filed a certificate of petition insufficiency. Burgans said she’d notified the committee on Tuesday evening.
“It is far from over at this time,” said spokeswoman Cynthia Mohiuddin. “Significant irregularities appear to be demonstrated in Amy Burgans' review process and protocols.”
According to the Clerk’s office the group brought petitions with 4,852 signatures they had 4,277, 112 signatures short of the required 4,389.
“My office has followed standard verification processes as required by Nevada law, and found discrepancies in the data,” said Douglas County Clerk-Treasurer Amy Burgans. “I place the utmost importance on a fair and equitable democratic process and will follow protocols to ensure that petition verification is accurate and lawful.”
Tahoe Chamber director Steve Teshara said petition contained falsehoods that could have resulted in it’s being challenged in court.
“This initiative petition was a misguided attempt from the beginning,” he said. “Among other missteps by those leading the effort, there were false statements made in the wording which would likely have been legally challenged. We are not necessarily surprised at the outcome announced today but pleased.”
According to the Clerk’s Office, there were 124 uncured address discrepancies, 127 instances where the required circulator affidavit was not included, 231 instances where signatures didn’t match, bring the total to 574 rejected signatures.
The process used to verify the petition saw clerks select a random sample of 500 signatures from the 109 documents and then drawing numbers until they had 500 signatures.
“Next, the Clerk examined the 500 signatures for verification,” according to the process laid out under state law. “The random sample showed the number of valid signatures was 90 percent or more, and less than 100 percent of the 500 samples. Therefore, as required by NRS 295.260(2)(a), the Clerk's Office continued the verification of the remaining documents.”
Burgans said that by examining the registration records on file the 4,277 signatures were valid and belonged to registered voters.
“During the course of the verification process, it was determined four of the documents lacked a circulator's affidavit,” Burgans said. “In this instance, one document was missing the jurat language, one document was missing the notary public stamp and two of the documents were missing the signature of the notary. Due to a lack of a circulator's affidavit, the four documents do not comply with the requirements of Nevada's Constitution Article 19 §3 and thus none of the associated signatures on the four documents can be verified as genuine.”
This is the second petition that organizer Jeanne Shizuru has had declared insufficient.
She gathered signatures seeking to overturn the approval of the Park Ranch project in 2020, but that petition was also deemed insufficient.
In that instance she asked county commissioners to override the petition but was denied.
Not long afterwards a judge determined the petition was also in violation of state law.
Petitioners could start over and try again, particularly since they already have a list of willing signers.
Editor's Note: This story has been rewritten.
Petitioners seeking to ban vacation home rentals in residential neighborhoods walked into the Douglas County Clerk-Treasurer’s Office with 4,852 signatures but by the time the verification process was over, they had 4,277, 112 signatures short of the required 4,389.
On Wednesday afternoon, Douglas County Clerk Amy Burgans filed a certificate of petition insufficiency. Burgans said she’d notified the committee on Tuesday evening.
“My office has followed standard verification processes as required by Nevada law, and found discrepancies in the data,” said Douglas County Clerk-Treasurer Amy Burgans. “I place the utmost importance on a fair and equitable democratic process and will follow protocols to ensure that petition verification is accurate and lawful.”
According to the Clerk’s Office, there were 124 uncured address discrepancies, 127 instances where the required circulator affidavit was not included, 231 instances where signatures didn’t match, bring the total to 574 rejected signatures.
The process used to verify the petition saw clerks select a random sample of 500 signatures from the 109 documents and then drawing numbers until they had 500 signatures.
“Next, the Clerk examined the 500 signatures for verification,” according to the process laid out under state law. “The random sample showed the number of valid signatures was 90 percent or more, and less than 100 percent of the 500 samples. Therefore, as required by NRS 295.260(2)(a), the Clerk's Office continued the verification of the remaining documents.”
Burgans said that by examining the registration records on file the 4,277 signatures were valid and belonged to registered voters.
“During the course of the verification process, it was determined four of the documents lacked a circulator's affidavit,” Burgans said. “In this instance, one document was missing the jurat language, one document was missing the notary public stamp and two of the documents were missing the signature of the notary. Due to a lack of a circulator's affidavit, the four documents do not comply with the requirements of Nevada's Constitution Article 19 §3 and thus none of the associated signatures on the four documents can be verified as genuine.”
This is the second petition that organizer Jeanne Shizuru has had declared insufficient.
She gathered signatures seeking to overturn the approval of the Park Ranch project in 2020, but that petition was also deemed insufficient.
In that instance she asked county commissioners to override the petition but was denied.
Not long afterwards a judge determined the petition was also in violation of state law.
Petitioners could start over and try again, particularly since they already have a list of willing signers.
Original Release
A petition to alter Douglas County’s vacation home rental ordinance to ban rentals in residential zoning and allow them in neighborhood commercial zoning has been determined insufficient by the Douglas County Clerk-Treasurer’s Office.
The Clerk’s Office — practicing standard petition-verification protocols pursuant to Nevada Revised Statute (NRS) 295.270 — found 124 address discrepancies, 127 instances of no circulator affidavit, and 231 signatures not matching, among other discrepancies, totaling 574 rejected signatures, according to a press release from the county.
Consistent with NRS 295.260, the Clerk's Office selected a random sample of 500 signatures for verification.
The random sample was selected by numbering each of the 109 documents and then drawing numbers 1-109 corresponding to the document number until the threshold of 500 signatures was reached.
Next, the Clerk examined the 500 signatures for verification. The random sample showed the number of valid signatures was 90 percent or more, and less than 100 percent of the 500 samples. Therefore, as required by NRS 295.260(2)(a), the Clerk's Office continued the verification of the remaining documents.
“My office has followed standard verification processes as required by Nevada law, and found discrepancies in the data,” said Douglas County Clerk-Treasurer Amy Burgans. “I place the utmost importance on a fair and equitable democratic process, and will follow protocols to ensure that petition verification is accurate and lawful.”
In the Certification of Petition Insufficiency, Burgans determined that, “Pursuant to NRS 295.260, I caused to be conducted an examination of the signatures affixed, and determined that 4,277 of those signatures were valid signatures of registered voters in Douglas County by examining the registration records on file in my office; and from the examination I have determined the following results:
TOTAL NUMBER OF SIGNATURES SUBMITTED 4,852
TOTAL NUMBER OF SIGNATURES REMOVED PER REQUEST OF SIGNATORY 1
TOTAL NUMBER OF SIGNATURES EXAMINED 4,851
TOTAL NUMBER OF SIGNATURES REJECTED 574
TOTAL NUMBER OF SIGNATURES ACCEPTED 4,277
TOTAL NUMBER OF SIGNATURES REQUIRED 4,389
“During the course of the verification process, it was determined four of the documents lacked a circulator's affidavit,” Burgans said. “In this instance, one document was missing the jurat language, one document was missing the notary public stamp and two of the documents were missing the signature of the notary. Due to a lack of a circulator's affidavit, the four documents do not comply with the requirements of Nevada's Constitution Article 19 §3 and thus none of the associated signatures on the four documents can be verified as genuine.”
More information on County petitions can be found here.
Petition organizer Jeanne Shizuru filed to gather signatures for the petition at the end of August.
Organizers said at the end of January that they were confident they have more than the required 4,389 signatures required to get the ordinance on the ballot.
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