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VAN DYKE: Yeah, let me just go through the ideas that I <br /> had as I was reading the Charter and, base the (inaudible) on <br /> my discussions with Bob. <br /> The question of initiative and recall and referendum is , <br /> of course, always a lively one. And in the Hawaii County <br /> Charter , one thing that I noticed is that the percentage of <br /> signatures necessary varies with regard to initiative, recall <br /> and referendum. It ' s 15% of the people that voted in the last <br /> mayoral election for initiative; 25% for recall ; and 20% for <br /> proposing an amendment to the Charter through the (inaudible) <br /> process . <br /> So you have three different numbers , without any <br /> particular reason as to why they ought to be different. And <br /> each of those numbers is relatively high in comparison to other <br /> areas that use the initiative. On Oahu, for example, it ' s 10% <br /> for each of those categories . And there was an attempt to <br /> raise it to 20% on Oahu, which was defeated. <br /> So you may want to consider either standardizing those <br /> three numbers and possibly lowering them, depending on how you <br /> feel about the appropriateness of this process , whether it <br /> ought to be encouraged or what . <br /> The other thing that is . . .was interesting to me as I was <br /> going through your Charter is that the provision on limiting <br /> topics for initiatives had been deleted, I guess in 1982, so <br /> that now that there are no limits on initiatives. And I 'm not <br /> familiar with exactly what the political dynamics of that were, <br /> but you may want to discuss whether or not there ought to be <br /> some limits . <br /> You have a kind of, what we call , an indirect initiative <br /> in the sense that the. . .once an initiative is proposed, the <br /> Council is supposed to look at the matter and decide whether or <br /> not to adopt the matter, and it only gets put on the ballot if <br /> the Council decides not to. I think that ' s a sensible <br /> provision. <br /> The other question that is left unclear is whether or not <br /> a signature, once put on an initiative ballot , is good <br /> indefinitely. The. . . there doesn' t seem to be an answer to that <br /> in the Charter. So that you could have people gathering <br /> signatures for three or four or five years and then turning <br /> them into the Clerk. Probably, that ' s not a good idea, that <br /> there probably ought to be some limit and if. . . in other words , <br /> the petition drive ought to lapse after two years , or something <br /> like that , if the prerequisite number of signatures are not <br /> obtained. And so you may want to say something about that. <br /> BETHEA: It looks like there is a limitation. . . <br /> VAN DYKE: Sorry, maybe I . . . <br /> 113 <br />