Florida’s home building industry won a huge victory last month when the Florida Division of Elections announced that Hometown Democracy fell 65,000 valid signatures short to place the “vote on everything” amendment on the 2008 ballot.
Not only did Hometown not receive the required number of signatures, they also did not meet the minimum required number of signatures in Congressional Districts.
According to a spokesman at the Florida Home Builders Association, the Hometown proposal was so badly over reaching, it failed to attract broad volunteer petitioning support. Instead, their effort relied heavily on a few wealthy extremists to bankroll signature collection.
The likelihood that Hometown Democracy was headed for the 2008 ballot urged Florida’s business community to establish Floridians for Smarter growth - the statewide campaign to defeat the amendment.
David Hart, FHBA Vice President of Governmental and Legislative Affairs, spearheaded the association’s fundraising efforts.