St. Paul preschool petition drive falls short, but council will be asked to OK it for fall ballot

Kristi Belcamino, Pioneer Press
·2 min read

A ballot initiative to provide affordable early education for St. Paul families fell short on its petition effort, so organizers will ask the City Council to directly place it before voters in November.

The program, dubbed SPARK (St. Paul All Ready for Kindergarten) is a coalition composed of education, business and civic leaders. If passed by voters, the measure would rely on a series of property tax increases to provide free preschool and child care for the 63 percent of St. Paul 3- and 4-year-olds living at or below 185% of the poverty line.

On Thursday, SPARK announced that the Ramsey County elections board certified 8,541 signatures on a petition asking that the measure be placed on the fall ballot.

Organizers said that “while the number is just short of the 11,821 signatures required for automatic ballot access, SPARK still collected more signatures for ballot access than any other initiative in the history of St. Paul elections.”

Next, the coalition will ask the council to approve the question. Under city law, ballot initiatives seeking a special tax assessment require signatures from 20 percent of those who voted in the last city election — in this case 11,821 signatures, which the coalition called “an extraordinarily high threshold to meet.”

“We’re incredibly proud of the work we’ve done so far,” said SPARK field director Mara Novillo. “We submitted 19,436 total signatures, but unfortunately the county couldn’t verify them all. But after more than 20,000 conversations with the people of St. Paul over the last few months, we believe their voice is clear. We should let the voters decide in November if they want their city to make this incredible investment in early education.”

For more information, go to sparkssaintpaul.org.

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