County percentage requirements mock this concept. While one might argue for restricting candidates from polling places on Election Day, citizen initiatives are not candidates. Signature collectors at the polls are not asking people to vote on anything, but are simply asking people if they want an issue to be potentially put before the voters. People do not have to sign. There is no coercion.
Signing is totally voluntary.
It is important to remember that if the required signatures are gathered, currently 42,101, the Legislature first has the right to pass the initiative or if they choose not to, send it out to referendum. We do not have a problem in this state with an overabundance of citizen initiatives. In fact, to my knowledge, there are none scheduled for next year. I do not believe there has been a frivolous initiative on the ballot in the last 20 years. Indeed, if we take a historical perspective there have only been 31 citizen-initiated bills in the last 30 years.