Mayor Harold Washington`s supporters Thursday vowed a three-front attack on the petitions seeking a referendum for a nonpartisan mayoral election and on a controversial Chicago Board of Election Commissioners` decision to leave a space for the question on the November ballot.
The mayor`s allies also offered examples of what they said were irregularities in the petitions, including apparent forgeries and signatures of people who do not live in Chicago.
Meanwhile, Michael Lavelle, chairman of the election board, described as ”absolutely correct . . . legally correct” his decision to poll the three-member board on the legality of the referendum proposal and to announce a ruling without holding a meeting.
”I don`t care what Harold Washington and his supporters say in terms of trying to politicize it,” Lavelle said. ”We follow the law, and that`s it.”
Lavelle said the state`s Open Meetings Act contains an exception which allows the elections board to act without a public meeting in certain instances.
Ald. Timothy Evans (4th), who is directing the mayor`s anti-petition efforts, vowed to fight the surprise decision by the elections board.
”I can assure you we`ll file a challenge,” Evans said. ”We believe this whole process is soiled. He (Lavelle) has violated the law, but he will not get away with it.”
In a ruling certain to end up in court, the elections board, during a poll by Lavelle, voted 2-1 to allow the binding referendum that, if approved by voters, would change the way Chicago elects its mayor and other citywide officials.
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The controversial referendum–if approved by the voters–would make mayoral elections in Chicago nonpartisan and would most likely force Mayor Washington into a one-on-one race against a challenger from the regular Democratic organization.
In the 1983 Democratic primary, Washington was able to win a three-candidate race by getting only a little more than a third of the vote.
Mayor Washington and his supporters contend that state law allows only three referenda on the ballot at one time, and that those spots have already been filled by referenda questions passed by the City Council at the mayor`s request.
But the elections board this week ruled that the nonpartisan election question could also be placed on the ballot–if, and when the petitions are found to be valid.
Lavelle acknowledged that the elections commissioners held no meeting, no public hearing and no discussion before arriving at the decision.
Lavelle said he recommended that the referendum be tentatively allowed in a memorandum to fellow board members.
He said he based his decision on a legal opinion by the board`s attorney, Mickey Levinson, that a citizens` initiative belongs on the ballot even if there are already three referendums.
In his memorandum to commissioners James Nolan and Corneal Davis, Lavelle said: ”I believe Mr. Levinson is correct in his conclusions.
”Since this issue is almost certain to result in litigation, it will be necessary for the board to take expeditious action regarding our position in such a lawsuit and therefore I am, by this memorandum, requesting your full authorization to speak on behalf of our board in any lawsuit regarding this matter.
”Your signature below will constitute such authorization.”
Nolan, who was not available for comment, supported the chairman; Davis did not.
Davis said Levinson and Lavelle did not offer an explanation of the legal opinion. They only asked for his signature.
”They wanted me to sign this and let them speak for me,” Davis said.
”I wasn`t going to do that. I want to know what people are saying.”
”We didn`t have a meeting on this,” Davis said. ”There should have been a public hearing. It affects all of us. This will decide the next mayor of Chicago. What did we pass the Opening Meetings Act for? To not follow it?” Lavelle said there were several reasons why he polled election commissioners Nolan and Davis by memo rather than holding a meeting.
According to Lavelle:
— The board has authority to take votes in private concerning matters which are expected to end up in immediate litigation.
— The board expected a lawsuit to be filed on the nonpartisan mayoral question at any moment, and the board needed to have a clear position so it could respond to such a suit.
— Lavelle had to be out of town on ”private business” all day Tuesday and most of Wednesday. Thus the board could not hold a meeting and had to vote by memorandum, Lavelle said.
”It`s absolutely correct, legally correct” to vote by memo without a meeting, Lavelle said Thursday night.
”It`s something we do all the time.” Lavelle said the board voted by memo on certain issues last Spring.
Lavelle said Levinson had received numerous phone calls last week from lawyers demanding to know the board`s position on the nonpartisan mayoral referendum and it was obvious that a suit would soon be filed.
He said he told Levinson to research the law and give him an opinion, which Levinson did Monday. Lavelle said he approved Levinson`s opinion late Monday and sent it to the other two commissioners.
Nolan approved it Tuesday, Levinson said. Davis did not receive the opinion until Wednesday, according to Levinson, because Davis was at a Shriner`s function Tuesday.
Lavelle said he did regret not telling his press spokesman, Tom Leach, that the board members were voting by memorandum. (Wednesday evening, Leach told reporters the board had not yet reached a decision, when in fact, the board members had already acted.)
”There was no attempt to keep this a secret,” Lavelle said. ”I didn`t even think of Tom. It just never occurred to me. In hindsight . . . I should have told Tom.”
Washington, who avoided reporters earlier in the day, told an audience Thursday night at Providence M.B. Church on the South Side that the petition drive was ”one of the biggest frauds perpetrated on the people of Chicago;
they (the petitions) were designed to polarize the city.”
”Mr. Lavelle is ramrodding the people of Chicago,” the mayor said.
”The law says whoever gets there first with the most gets on the ballot. We got there first and put three referendums on the ballot.”
The mayor`s three-front attack is expected to include continuing efforts to invalidate the petitions by challenging thousands of signatures as fraudulent, seeking additional time to examine the petitions and challenging the board`s decision to approve the referendum in Cook County Circuit Court.
About 60 volunteers worked Wednesday night for the third successive day in an effort to disqualify hundreds of signatures.
Volunteers from such groups as the Chicago Urban League and the NAACP checked signatures on the petitions against voter registration cards, arranged by ward and precinct.
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”Many of the people are able to pick out discrepancies,” Clarence Thomas, a volunteer, said.
In addition, Thomas Johnson, counsel for Washington`s political organization, the Political Education Project (PEP), said the petitions likely would be challenged in federal court on grounds that the move violates the Voting Rights Act, which prohibits laws that abridge the rights of one particular group.
Another attorney, a legal adviser for the administration who asked not to be identified, also predicted an investigation into a possible violation of the Illinois Open Meetings Act.
”I`m a lawyer. I`ve analyzed the law, and I believe I`m correct,”
Lavelle said. ”There was no meeting held. Why should we?”
Lavelle said the decision-making procedure was allowed under the exemption in the state`s Open Meetings Act for pending litigation.
Under the act, according to Shawn Deeney, chief of the opinions division of the Illinois attorney general`s office, a meeting may be closed to discuss legal matters if litigation is ”probable or imminent.” But he added that,
”generally the act provides that final votes are taken openly.” Deeney said he was commenting generally on the act and not on the specific circumstances.
Levinson`s opinion was dated Sunday, the day before the petitions were filed. Lavelle`s memo was dated Monday.
Asked during a news conference in the elections board office about the mayor`s frequent charges that Lavelle follows the bidding of Ald. Edward Vrdolyak (10th), leader of the anti-administration bloc in the council, Lavelle responded:
”Everyone knows he`s speaking politically. I`m here not to serve Harold Washington. I`m here to serve the people.”
The question of whether three or four referendums will be on the November ballot is still under consideration, Lavelle said. Whether the city council has the right to put through three nonbinding referendums will be reviewed by Levinson after ”an exhaustive study,” he said.
Lavelle said an ”exhaustive study” in putting the nonpartisan election on the ballot was done by Levinson and himself, as an attorney.
Evans and Johnson reported there were only about 202,000 signatures on the petitions, not the 211,000 as had been reported earlier. A spokesman for the election board confirmed the lower estimate.
”We have discovered a pattern of irregularities,” said Evans, holding up sample petitions from the 23d Ward, whose committeeman, U.S. Rep. William Lipinski (D., Ill.), filed the signatures Monday.
In some cases, Evans said, there were duplicate signatures, apparent forgeries, signers who did not live at the designated addresses and signers who lived out of Chicago.
Johnson said 794 of the pages, with 25 signatures per page, ”have defects with the circulator`s oath.” An invalid circulator signature disqualifies the entire petition.
Washington and Jane Byrne, the former mayor who is seeking her old job, oppose the referendum, which would eliminate the current system of party primaries. Instead, all candidates would run in a nonpartisan election in February. If no candidates receives more than 50 percent of the vote, a runoff election between the two top votegetters would be held in April.