A referendum to ban tall buildings in downtown Traverse City was rejected by the City Clerk’s office this week due to improper formatting.

City Clerk Benjamin Marentette informed referendum organizer Brenda Quick he could not certify the submitted petitions – which contained over 900 signatures, nearly double the 527 required for a ballot – because they didn’t meet city charter standards. According to the charter, each city petition must have a sworn affidavit attached to it signed by the circulator identifying the number of signatures on the petition and swearing to the signatures’ authenticity. The petitions submitted by Quick and her circulators did not include such affidavits.

Quick, however, notes that the petitions themselves clearly number each signature, and also include a bolded area for the circulator to sign attesting to the signatures’ authenticity. When Marentette informed Quick the separate affidavit was still required, she prepared to take the petitions back so circulators could resubmit them with affidavits attached. But the city charter also states that deficient petitions can only be corrected by “the filing of supplemental petition papers” – meaning, according to Marentette, the petitions already submitted can’t be returned. Only new petitions can be turned in; in essence, requiring the group to start over.

Quick plans to challenge the city’s interpretation of that last point. “We would claim that if they’re incomplete, give them back and we will finish and resubmit them,” she says. Quick is waiting on a second opinion from City Attorney Lauren Trible-Laucht – Marentette is out of office the rest of the week – on whether the group can do just that. If not, Quick’s next step is file “supplemental petition papers” by taking copies she made of all the petitions and attaching sworn affidavits to them, giving those to Marentette and asking him to attach them to the originals.

If the city won't accept those documents, Quick says her group will have to decide between challenging the city’s decision in court or starting over and collecting new signatures. “We’re considering both options right now,” she says. “If we wanted to challenge it in court, we have a very good case. It’s a matter of time, involvement and cost. It’d set us back if we had to start the petitions anew – but on the other hand, nothing goes through the courts very quickly, either.”

While the referendum – and the issue of tall buildings in general – has been a hot-button issue locally, Quick doesn’t believe the city’s ruling is politically motivated. “I think Ben Marentette is about as upstanding a person as you will find,” she says. “I don’t think for one minute he would do anything based on politics. I think he follows the rules as he understands them.” The issue comes down to how the city charter is interpreted, Quick believes, and she plans to continue challenging the city’s interpretation. “If the city would just give us back the originals, that would make life a lot easier,” she says.