EXCLUSIVE: Recall Chafee Group Formed on Facebook
Saturday, March 05, 2011
A fledgling Facebook page has been formed by a small group of discontent Rhode Islanders - many with ties to talk radio station WPRO and they are calling for a recall of Governor Lincoln Chafee.
Chafee has been in office just over 60 days.The page has 34 members to date, and three of those are the official pages and personal pages of Citadel Broadcasting employees including two of the on air personalities - Matt Allen and Dan Yorke. Citadel owns and operates WPRO AM.
Both Yorke and Allen have criticized Chafee extensively for his policies and specifically for his ban of members of his administration from appearing on talk radio shows. The Chafee ban policy has come under criticism by the radio stations and radio industry leaders - read here.GET THE LATEST BREAKING NEWS HERE -- SIGN UP FOR GOLOCAL FREE DAILY EBLAST
More recently, the Chafee administration announced that they were re-evaluating the ban policy. At the time of the ban announcement, the Chafee administration said:
“The rationale is that these are profit, ratings-driven programming,” Chafee spokesperson Christian Vareika said. He said the Governor’s office will continue to deal with the news divisions at radio stations.
The effort by radio personalities to use their on air voice and social media to drive a recall - just 34 members, may be an effort by the radio personalities to be relevant in a non-election period. Radio, especially talk radio is under far greater scrutiny due to the adoption of by the industry of People Meters (PPM).
Efforts to reach the organizers of the page have been unsuccessful.
The recall of a general officer by the Rhode Island Constitution is not allowed as a remedy for the outcome of an election according to Article IV:
Recall is authorized in the case of a general officer who has been indicted or informed against for a felony, convicted of a misdemeanor, or against whom a finding of probable cause of violation of the code of ethics has been made by the ethics commission. Recall shall not, however be instituted at any time during the first six (6) months or the last year of an individual's term of office. Such a recall may be instituted by filing with the state board of elections an application for issuance of a recall petition against said general officer which is signed by duly qualified electors equal to three percent (3%) of the total number of votes cast at the last preceding general election for that office. If, upon verification, the application is determined to contain signatures of the required number of electors, the state board of elections shall issue a recall petition for circulation amongst the electors of the state.
Moreover, the Constitution requires a number of significant hurdles to be cleared:
Within ninety (90) days of issuance, recall petitions containing the signatures of duly qualified electors constituting fifteen percent (15%) of the total number of votes cast in the last preceding general election for said office must be filed with the state board of elections.
The signatures to the application and to the recall petition need not all be on one (1) sheet of paper, but each such application and petition must contain an identical statement naming the person to be recalled, the general office held by said person, and the grounds for such recall set forth in a statement of one hundred (100) words or less approved by the board of elections.
Each signatory must set forth his or her signature as it appears on the voting list, the date of signing, and his or her place of residence.
The person witnessing the signatures of each elector on said petition must sign a statement under oath on said sheet attesting that the signatures thereon are genuine and were signed in his or her presence. If the requisite number of signatures are not obtained within said ninety (90) days period, the recall effort shall terminate. Upon verification of the requisite number of signatures, a special election shall be scheduled at which the issue of removing said office holder and the grounds therefor shall be placed before the electors of the state.
If a majority of those voting support removal of said office holder, the office shall be immediately declared vacant and shall be filled in accordance with the constitution and laws of the state. The person so removed shall not be eligible to fill the unexpired portion of the term of office. The general assembly shall provide by statute for implementation of the recall process.
Disclosure: GoLocalProv.com LLC and Citadel Broadcasting had a media sharing agreement that ended in December of 2010.
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