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Committee adopts amendment to limit voter pamphlet legal text for very large measures, targeting $1.7 million in printing costs
Summary
The committee approved an amendment to exclude most legal text for ballot measures that exceed 100 pages, directing the voter pamphlet to include the first 20 pages and reference the full text online or by request; the change was framed as a one-time fix for an unusually large referendum and passed out of committee after elections officials and the Elections Commission weighed in.
The Special Rules Committee considered two competing ordinances to limit the volume of legal text printed in the voter information pamphlet for very large ballot measures. President David Chiu told the committee that the proposals were intended to avoid printing "phone book"-sized handbook mailings and estimated the city could save roughly $1.7 million for the coming election if the measure were amended.
Chiu described a compromise amendment he circulated that would not apply to charter amendments but would apply to ordinances and declarations of policy. For measures whose legal text exceeds 100 pages, the amended language directs the Department of Elections to include the first 20 pages in the printed voter pamphlet and to provide clear notice that the full text is available online, at public libraries and by mail on request. Jeff Creighton, representing Supervisor Wiener’s office, argued against partial inclusion of a measure (saying that omitting parts while printing others could be misleading) and preferred full exclusion whenever the cutoff is exceeded.
Jill Roe, president of the San Francisco Elections Commission, told the committee the commission unanimously supports a temporary, one-time fix that sunsets after the November election because of transparency, impartiality and the risk of manipulating petition language. John Arndt, Director of Elections, said the department could comply with printing only 20 pages and would mail full text upon request at no cost to voters, but warned that the department could not meaningfully compress or reformat agency documents that were part of the referendum material.
After debate about partial inclusion versus full exclusion and concerns about the digital divide for seniors and limited internet access, the committee adopted an amendment to President Chu’s proposal specifying that when a measure’s legal text exceeds 100 pages, the first 20 pages will be printed; the amendment passed and the amended Item 4 was forwarded out of committee. A separate, alternative proposal from Supervisor Wiener (Item 5) was continued to the call of the chair.
Next steps: the committee moved the amended Item 4 out of committee for Board consideration; staff said the Department of Elections will provide notice in the pamphlet about how to obtain full text by mail, online or at libraries.
