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Press Releases>
Paid Canvassers Highjacking elections in Golden
Professional signature gatherers say “We are mercenaries,” using deceptive tactics, misleading language to convince residents to sign recall petitions
Golden, CO --
Jan 23, 2009 --
"Don't fall for the recall,” said Josh Pollock, a member of Citizens for Golden. “Marian Olson
and her small group of malcontents are using deceptive tactics and gross exaggerations about
what city council has and has not done to try to trick Goldenites into forcing an expensive and
unnecessary recall effort.”
According to several citizens approached in their neighborhoods on Saturday,
January 17, an effort initiated by a small group of disgruntled residents to force the recall of six
of the seven seated city councilors in Golden is using a paid labor force of professional
canvassers to press Golden residents for petition signatures that would initiate special recall
elections, to be scheduled by the city mere months before regular elections in November.
Several residents questioned the petitioners, who were walking door to door in several north
Golden neighborhoods. The petitioners generally refused to provide any information other than
their first names, but citizen activists have since confirmed the canvassers are likely employees
of a Colorado Springs-based marketing firm that has been contracted to collect signatures for a
wide array of ballot initiatives and other electoral measures in the past. As reported previously in
the Colorado Springs Gazette, this firm has been implicated in past investigations into the use of
dead people’s names on an Indiana petition drive to get then-Republican candidate Gary Bauer
onto the state’s presidential primary.
“We admit it; we’re mercenaries,” one canvasser, who identified himself only as “Joe,” said to
Golden resident Pamela Gould. “This is our business, what we do for a living. And we’re good at
it. We get paid per signature. We don’t even really want to be here; we’re a long way from
home.”
When asked, the canvassers said they were being paid by Golden resident Marian Olson. Olson,
who publishes the Voice of Golden newsletter, is generally acknowledged as the primary agent
and source of funding behind the recall effort.
The same canvasser said, “They [Marian Olson and other recall effort supporters] couldn’t use
their volunteers because volunteers couldn’t get people to sign a recall petition. But we can.”
The paid canvassers were found to be using highly deceptive tactics to try to garner signatures
from local residents. They limited their description of the recall effort and the petitions on which
they were gathering signatures as an “accountability measure.” In one case, they described to a
Mountain Ridge resident that they were “gathering signatures for Golden,” making it sound as if
the measure might be a city-sanctioned effort and not an independent campaign to force recall
elections primary being driven and funded by one wealthy resident.
“They didn’t even use the word ‘recall,’” said Bill Fisher, who was approached in North Golden.
“When I asked if this was about the recall effort, the canvasser who called himself Bob said
‘Yeah, recall is such a bad word; we say accountability instead.’”
Paid canvassers were also sighted collecting petitions in front of the Safeway supermarket on
Jackson Street on Sunday, January 18. The canvassers initially claimed to have a letter of
permission from Safeway management granting them permission to collect signatures in front of
the store. Safeway manager Cathy Brewster has since confirmed that the store had specifically
denied them permission to approach shoppers on Safeway property. Police eventually asked the
canvassers to leave.
Golden resident Brenda Porter was one of several citizens approached by the paid canvassers in
front of the Jackson Street Safeway. “I watched the team of three paid petitioners get signatures
from several people who could not have known what they were signing, based on the verbal
information the canvassers presented,” said Porter. “Hiring petitioners seems dirty to me.”
A group of Golden residents has formed Citizens for Golden, an all-volunteer effort to oppose
the recall effort and educate residents before they sign the recall petitions unwittingly.
Information regarding this organization and the recall effort they are opposing can be found at
Citizens for Golden is a group of residents committed to
fostering an open and actively engaged community.
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