Where do I live anyway?

Opponents of a downtown Olympia revitalization project have failed to garner enough signatures on an initiative petition to force the City of Olympia to look seriously at making the Fourth and Fifth avenue isthmus a park.

Proponents of turning the isthmus into a park were confident they had enough signatures to make the city do a study of the park idea but they came up short.

Supporters of a park turned in 4,732 signatures, they needed 3,819 valid signatures.  They ended up with 3,653 valid signatures.

I was pretty sure they wouldn’t have enough signatures.  Supporters of the initiative gathered signatures at the Olympia Farmer’s Market.  In getting those signatures, they always asked the question “Are you a registered voter in Olympia?”  Most often the person would say “Yes.”

But in actuality they were not registered voters in Olympia.  They just thought they were.  Many areas outside the corporate city limits of Olympia, bear an Olympia postal address.  Many of those who have such an address think they actually live in Olympia – – when in many cases they don’t.

Supporters of the park initiative were done in by the US Postal Service.