Friday, May 20, 2011

Great news on SB5 repeal

This is awesome: Volunteers in Ohio have collected an astounding 214,399 signatures on petitions to put repealing the heinous SB5 on the November ballot. It took them just one month to collect all those names; maybe the fact that 10,000 people (including plenty of Teamsters) were working to gather them.

Volunteers have until June 30 to collect the 231,149 signatures to put the measure on the ballot. They'll collect a lot more, though, to be sure they're all valid.

If you haven't been keeping up, SB5 is a bill to strip government workers of their collective bargaining rights. It passed into law on  March 31 and was signed by corporate stooge Gov. John Kasich on April Fool's Day. A recent poll showed that Ohioans strongly support repeal.

It's important not to get too confident, though. You can bet that big money from the corporate front groups and the billionaires will be flooding into Ohio, paying for ads that spout half-truths and lies about the bill.