LAKE COUNTY, Calif. – With the deadline looming to turn in signatures to place a recall of the county's sheriff on the ballot, proponents said they're organizing the final push to complete the effort.
Signature gathering to place a recall of Sheriff Frank Rivero before county voters began in April, led by a group calling itself the Committee to Restore Integrity and Recall Rivero.
The petition circulating started just weeks after the Board of Supervisors gave Rivero a no confidence vote on his performance and formally requested his resignation, which he refused to give.
The recall proponents had 120 days, and they're now in their final two weeks.
Lake County Registrar of Voters Diane Fridley said the deadline to turn in the necessary signatures – in this case, 7,026 – is Aug. 15.
Christopher Rivera, a retired Lake County Sheriff's sergeant and chairman of the recall committee, said the group is in the “home stretch” of its effort.
He said Rivero has outraged residents throughout Lake County with his mismanagement, erratic behavior and lack of integrity.
“Rivero has cost our county over half a million dollars in lost revenues in the past year alone,” said Rivera. “He is a financial time bomb waiting to explode on the hardworking taxpayers of Lake County.”
As of Tuesday, the committee had collected nearly 7,500 signatures for the recall, according to Rivera.
He said they were aiming to get another 1,000 signatures in order to guarantee that the recall qualifies.
Rivera said that, in order to collect the last of the needed signatures by the deadline, the committee this week began mailing out thousands of petitions to Lake County voters.
He said dozens of volunteer signatures gatherers also will be out in force over the next two weekends.
If Rivero's recall goes to a vote, two challengers – retired Clearlake Police Chief Bob Chalk and Brian Martin, the county's assistant chief probation officer and a former sheriff's lieutenant – have indicated they will run to fulfill his term, which expires at the end of 2014.
Fridley told Lake County News that she couldn't speculate about when the recall might go before voters if it qualifies for an election.
However, it's unlikely to be completed in time to be consolidated with the general election this November, when Fridley said there are a number of school board and special district board seats on the ballot. That means a special election would need to be called.
The committee can be reached at
Email Elizabeth Larson at
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