Labor | Issue | Political

Ballot Initiatives

LSPMA has extrensive experience in supporting and opposing ballot measuress. We are the only firm to have defeated a term limits initiative, which we did in 1991 in Washington state. When conventional wisdom said we could not pull it off, our polls said we could beat the pro-term limits forces and our strategy worked.

We are currently working on an initiative in Michigan that will allow state workers to have collective bargaining without going on strike. We are working with a coalition of labor organizations and have conducted six focus groups and just recently completed a survey on the initiative.

Some of our other ballot work:

• We also recently completed work on a Right to Work initiative, Proposition 695, in Oklahoma. We worked with the AFL-CIO and conducted several surveys and a number of focus groups on the initiative.
  
  
• We were also the pollster for a library tax ballot initiative in Seattle. Our participation included crafting the messages that led to the initiative passing even in the height of the tax rebellion.
  
  
• We helped California’s Superintendent of Public Education Delaine Eastin develop a message that proved successful in defeating a school voucher initiative in 1993. We found that it would be critical to begin with the theme that the schools in California are broken, but this is the wrong solution to shift the focus away from the question of whether or not the state=s schools were in good shape.
  
  
• In 1994, we worked with Children Now to defeat Pete Wilson's welfare initiative in California. Our initial focus group and polling research showed that the measure would pass if opponents allowed the debate to focus on poor welfare beneficiaries. Using a strategy which our analysis suggested -- shifting the discussion to the needs of senior citizens and children -- the campaign against Wilson=s initiative was able to reach and persuade middle class voters.
  
  
• We have worked on several gay marriage initiatives including Proposition 22 in California and one in Hawaii. In 2000, we conducted polling for the Progressive Leadership Alliance of Nevada in an effort to help them keep an anti-gay marriage initiative off the statewide ballot. ?In 1998 we were pollsters for Maine Won’t Discriminate, an initiative to prevent employment and housing discrimination. In 1994, we conducted focus groups and polled for the Don’t Sign On campaign in Washington State, and the Show Me Equality campaign in Missouri, both of which were focused on employment discrimination. In Idaho, we beat the anti-gay initiative in a campaign that focused effectively on values and the broader community.
  
  
• In 1999 we worked with a coalition of business groups and political leaders organized against a car tax initiative in Washington state. We conducted focus groups and surveys developing targeted messages for several unique audiences. And in 2001 we tested language for a transportation ballot initiative in Washington. 
  
  
• In 1996, we helped pass a path-breaking drug and prison reform initiative in Arizona. In our research, we explored attitudes about treatment for non-violent drug users and probed the connections that voters make between drug use and violent crime to craft a message that would appeal to Arizona’s conservative electorate.

Our other initiative-based research includes measures on affirmative action in California, Texas and Washington state; education funding in Michigan; health care in California, Washington state and Oregon; Taxpayers for Choice in Colorado; welfare reform in Montana and Colorado; minimum wage in Washington state for Washington Livable Income; economic development in Montana; and transportation in Maine. In addition, we have polled for Citizen Action of Washington State on health care reform, Washington League of Women Voters and Washington Education Association on campaign finance reform initiatives.