Activists in Plzeň submitted nearly 5,000 signatures for a referendum

Plzeň - Plzeň civic activists today handed over nearly 5000 collected signatures and an updated proposal to the city council for the local referendum on a gigantic shopping center. In open letters, they simultaneously addressed the Plzeň city councilors and the governor with a call to request Mayor Martin Baxa (ODS) to convene an extraordinary council meeting so that the referendum can coincide with the regional elections, Martin Marek, spokesperson for the referendum preparation committee, informed ČTK today.
    The activists aim for the referendum to take place alongside the regional elections, as they believe there will be a much greater chance of higher voter turnout than at another time. The proposal for declaring the referendum has already been submitted to the city before, but on August 24, the city council returned the proposal to the preparation committee, stating that 2,141 signatures were missing. At least 13,339 signatures are needed to declare a local vote, which is signatures from ten percent of the voters in Plzeň.
    "Only thanks to the number and commitment of dozens of volunteers was it possible to collect so many signatures in a very short time, even before the end of the summer holidays, that the updated proposal will be submitted to the city council with more than a hundred percent reserve," Marek said. Today, he submitted the proposal supplemented with 4,894 new signatures. Over 70 volunteers participated in the signature collection in the streets within seven days from August 22.
    Marek insists that the city council unjustly excluded a substantial portion of the originally provided signatures during the first check. "Our interest, however, is to get the referendum done together with the regional elections, so for now we do not contest the officially excluded signatures but are adding new ones," he stated.
    The preparation committee aims to organize the referendum on the dates of the regional elections, October 12 and 13. "At this moment, nothing else matters than the decision of the Mayor of Plzeň, whether the referendum will be held in conjunction with the regional elections, ensuring sufficient voter turnout for a democratic decision, or would be declared at another time shortly after the elections, which effectively means condemning the referendum to inadequate participation," Marek stated.
    According to the mayor, the Ministry of the Interior stated in its opinion that if the referendum is held concurrently with the elections, it is not suitable to use the same polling place for both the local referendum and the elections. Different election commissions cannot be used for regional elections and the referendum, as they differ in personnel and delegation timeframes. The counting of votes in the referendum and in the elections to the councils must also be carried out separately according to the ministry. Costs for the elections and the referendum cannot be merged either, as elections are funded from the state budget while the referendum is funded from the municipal budget.