Opinion ID: 2745875
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Thirty-Day Cure Period

Text: Stephens initially argues that the petition was not prima facie valid when it was submitted on July 7 because it relied on petition parts with forged notary signatures to meet the initial-count signature threshold.5 For this reason, he claims, GARN was not entitled to a thirty-day cure period. With respect to this claim, the master found, in relevant part: The second issue is Petitioner’s contention that several signatures should not have been included in the Respondent’s initial count because the notary’s signature on many of the petition parts had been forged. (e) Petitioner presented evidence through the testimony of handwriting analysis expert Joe Lucas that the signature on 1666 petition parts were not that of Alex Rancifer who purportedly signed as a notary. There are 8611 signatures on these 1666 petition parts. This total must be reduced by 110 signatures on 19 of the petition parts that I found should have been culled for failure to have a complete legible text of the entire measure as discussed above in paragraph (c) dealing with the first issue. These 8501 signatures are found to be invalid. (f) Although the 8501 signatures are invalid they were not facially invalid for purposes of the initial count, i.e., their invalidity did not appear on the face of the petition parts. Facially, these petitions and notary’s acknowledgments appeared to be compliant, having the purported signature of notary “Alex Rancifer,” which matched the name in the notary’s seal. In arriving at this finding, I found it necessary and helpful to review the caselaw 5 We note that Stephens’s challenge appears to be, and the master found it was, limited to the initial submission of signatures on July 7. As the master noted in his report: Petitioner does not question the sufficiency of the signatures that were filed with the Respondent if those filed during the 30-day cure period must be counted. The thrust of Petitioner’s challenge is that the Respondent erred in allowing Intervenor a 30-day cure period to obtain and file additional petition parts. Indeed, Stephens states that his challenge “goes to the authority of the Secretary of State to grant the additional thirty-day cure period.” 7 Cite as 2014 Ark. 442 on the issue of facial validity and what is curable. I concluded that the signatures should be counted by Respondent because the signatures themselves have not been called into question by the evidence and problems with the notarization have been subject to cure. (Footnote omitted.) Stephens maintains that GARN’s petition was not facially valid for purposes of obtaining a thirty-day cure period since it did not contain the requisite number of signatures. He contends that because the notary signatures on certain petition parts had been forged, the petition was not facially valid, which he claims was required in order to obtain a thirty-day cure period. Stephens avers that if the signatures on the forged petition parts had been properly excluded from the July 7 count, GARN would have lacked the requisite number of signatures to entitle it to a thirty-day cure period, and GARN’s proposed initiated act fails for want of initiation. This court has previously considered the propriety of the Secretary of State’s determination relating to the thirty-day cure period under Amendment 7. See, e.g., Arkansas Hotels & Entm’t, Inc. v. Martin, 2012 Ark. 335, 423 S.W.3d 49 (original action seeking a writ of mandamus to the Secretary of State to accept the petition); Ellis v. Hall, 219 Ark. 869, 245