CALGARY — Corb Lund is seeking a legal review of Elections Alberta’s decision to quash his anti-coal citizen initiative petition.
The country music singer who is the figurehead of the Water Not Coal campaign is challenging Chief Electoral Officer Gordon McClure’s decision that deemed the campaign unsuccessful.
The application filed in the Alberta Court of King’s Bench states that, “the decision was unreasonable, procedurally unfair, and inconsistent with the purpose of Alberta’s Citizen Initiative Act (CIA), which is intended to facilitate public participation in direct democracy.”
“More than 200,000 Albertans signed this petition in good faith, and they deserve a fair and reasonable process,” said Lund in an official news release on Thursday.
“We believe Elections Alberta applied standards that were stricter than the law requires, and that thousands of Albertans were effectively shut out by verification processes that don’t make sense. This judicial review is about ensuring that citizens’ voices weren’t get lost in technicalities.”
Lund’s campaign needed roughly 178,000 verified signatures — equal to 10% of the ballots cast in the last provincial election — to trigger a province-wide referendum.
During the electoral process, Elections Alberta initially validated 196,088 signatures.
However, a statistical verification process reduced the estimated number of verified signatures to 172,088, leaving the petition 5,644 signatures short of the required threshold.
Now, Lund claims Elections Alberta misinterpreted the CIA by applying stricter standards than required and modified its verification process, “requiring electors to provide personal information in order to verify their signatures, and also, to provide precise, exact details with limited prompts or opportunity to clarify when needed, causing valid signatures to be rejected without justification.”
Lund is also claiming verification calls were not properly conducted and is challenging the sampling process as well.
“The judicial review asks the Court to set aside the decision, declare the Water Not Coal initiative successful, or alternatively return the matter to Elections Alberta for reconsideration,” the official statement reads.
