The organizers behind an anti-mining campaign are asking anyone who signed their petition and was contacted by Elections Alberta to get in touch. Water Not Coal shared the callout on social media earlier this week, asking those who were contacted to fill out a form to share details of having their signatures verified by Alberta’s elections watchdog. The form asks for basic information — including one’s first and last name, phone number and email address — as well as information about how Elections Alberta contacted them and an optional field to share other details about the verification process. It’s the latest in the group’s push back against the election’s watchdog after it said the petition failed to meet the necessary threshold to put the question to voters. Launched by Alberta country singer Corb Lund, the petition aimed to ban new coal mining on the eastern slopes of Alberta’s Rocky Mountains. Elections Alberta’s law required Lund’s team to collect a minimum of 177,732 verified and validated signatures in order for Lund’s question to proceed to a referendum ballot. Canvassers collected signatures between February and June 10. The group says it collected more than 200,000 signatures during that period. Elections Alberta says it counted 196,000 valid signatures, and a statistical sampling led them to estimate only 172,000 of those could be verified, leading the petition to fail. Water Not Coal says Elections Alberta only contacted 384 people during the verification process. A spokesperson for Elections Alberta says it tried to contact 853 people during the signature verification process to meet that 384 figure, which is a statistically valid sample size for the petition. The spokesperson said Elections Alberta had not been able to conduct a verification process where the agency was able to reach the required sample size and conduct the verification with them. “The primary reasons signatures were rejected during the verification phase included electors being unable or unwilling to verify the information on the petition sheet, and not providing valid contact information to reach them for verification,” the spokesperson said.
