BY LUCY MAY
The Cincinnati Enquirer
With more than 33,000 signatures and counting, Broadway Commons supporters plan to submit petitions Sunday to try to get the Reds ballpark issue on Hamilton County's November ballot.
The group expects to have more signatures by the time volunteers finish counting. The group wants volunteers to turn in their petitions by noon Sunday, said Jim Burton, who is helping coordinate the effort. City Councilman Jim Tarbell, one of the group's leaders, stressed that people pushing petitions shouldn't slow down until then.
"We've got to get the insurance runs, and we're real concerned that people will misinterpret this," he said Friday. "If everyone really holds fast here and is diligent over the next couple of days, we will exceed 40,000."
Leaders of the petition effort have every confidence the measure will be before voters in November. Even if some of the signatures they have collected are invalidated, the group believes state law provides an extra 40 days for volunteers to collect more.
Hamilton County Board of Elections Director Bruce Taylor said Friday "there is something in the language about extra days if everything is in order."
"Does that apply? I don't know," he added.
Mr. Taylor said he will seek the board of elections' advice if the question comes up.
Meanwhile, Hamilton County commissioners are seeking a county prosecutor's opinion about what they should do with the petitions once they officially receive them at 5 p.m. Sunday.
"(State law) is a little cryptic, so I think some clarification would be important," said Commission President Tom Neyer Jr. The Broadway group needs 28,600 valid signatures of registered Hamilton County voters to put a measure on the ballot that, if passed, would create a county charter.
That charter would require Hamilton County to build any new Major League Baseball stadium at Broadway Commons, the site at Broadway and Reading Road. Proponents of the site say that's all it would do.
But opponents of the charter measure fear it also would endow county commissioners with broader powers, even if that's not what the Broadway group intends.
Hamilton County already has reached a tentative deal with the Reds to build a new riverfront ballpark at a site west of the Crown known as Baseball on Main or the "Wedge."
The county expects to spend $297 million to prepare the riverfront and build the ballpark, which is expected to be finished by 2003. Reds Managing Executive John Allen, who has always favored a riverfront site, did not return calls Friday. But a source close to the team said the team is simply watching to see how the petition drive takes shape as the team and county work toward a lease deal.
"It's more about local politics than baseball," the source said.
