Dixon attempts end run around voters, Gov. Little

Three days after Gov. Brad Little vetoed legislation to make it much harder to qualify a voter initiative for the Idaho ballot, Rep Sage Dixon reintroduced the same proposal, split into four separate bills. This is another attempt by Rep. Dixon to take away voters rights to the initiative process and another example of his arrogance in thinking that he knows better than those who he represents.

The house committee voted to send one of the four bills to the full House without a hearing or any public testimony. Whenever the public has been allowed to testify, it has been overwhelmingly against Dixon’s bills. The other three bills have been sent back to the committee for possible public hearings. Dixon’s bills were written with the aid of lobbyists who know that it’s easier to control and influence 70 legislators than all of the voters in Idaho.

Rep. Dixon the sponsor of all four new bills and the House sponsor of the two vetoed ones said, “What we’re doing here is taking what was SB 1159 and HB 296 and breaking it up into four separate pieces.”

The governor’s office received more than 6100 telephone calls and emails from voters who were against Dixon’s bill with only 53 people in favor of it. An attempt to pass this again by dividing it into four separate bills does not make any of it better.

Rep. Dixon is not representing his constituents.

CONNIE BURKHART

Hope