BADER & ASSOCIATES, INC.

The "Stop Special Interest Money Now" petition would curb special interest money in politics by eliminating involuntary "payroll deductions" by unions and corporations for political purposes.  The measure would make such deductions from the paychecks of union members and employees of corporations strictly voluntary.  The initiative became a target of a massive, union-backed, multi-million dollar "blocking campaign".  The blocking campaign was meant to keep people from signing the petition, in hopes of keeping it off of the ballot.

From one end of the state to the other, Bader & Associates received daily reports of circulators being harassed and intimidated by blockers attempting to get them to stop carrying the petition.  These blockers were also deliberately signing more than once (to load the petition with duplicate signatures), signing fake names multiple times (to lower the number of valid signatures) or distributing flyers to potential signers in order to discourage them from signing the petition.  On top of this there was a very costly radio campaign, which tried to scare people into not signing the petition (or any petition) for fear of becoming a victim of identity theft.

Throughout this enormous blocking campaign, one of the worst in initiative history, we never lost sight of our goal, which was to qualify the petition for the June 2012 California Primary ballot, no matter what.  The initiative did in fact qualify for the Primary ballot, but as widely reported in the media, the Legislature, with few hearings or debate, abolished the June Primary ballot for citizens' Initiatives, specifically to force the petition onto the November ballot, where it was believed to have a better chance of being defeated.

The idea for the Recall Petition began with Ted Costa of People's Advocate, who initially asked Tom Bader to come to California to qualify the Davis Recall Petition after the signature gathering firm that was expected to qualify the petition bowed out, and other California signature gathering firms refused to take on the project.  The means to launch the Recall Petition weren't available until Congressman Darrell Issa of San Diego stepped in with the funds to form a new organization, Rescue California, headed by Dave Gilliard, Chris Wysocki, and Phil Paule.  Rescue California funded the signature gathering campaign, which was managed by Bader & Associates.  In the end, the Recall passed by a comfortable margin, making history as well as resulting in the election of Arnold Schwarzenegger as Governor.

Jessica Lunsford was a 9-year old Florida girl who was abducted, raped, and murdered by a convicted sex offender who lived nearby.  The initiative was named in Jessica's honor and was sponsored by husband and wife legislators State Senator George Runner and Assemblywoman Sharon Runner.  This petition was circulated and qualified by Tom Bader and Bader & Associates in early 2006.  Jessica's Law was passed by the voters in a stunning 70.5% YES vote to 29.5% NO vote.

Marsy's Law was funded almost entirely by billionaire Dr. Henry Nicholas III, a southern California entrepreneur and founder of the Broadcom Corporation, a semiconductor firm.  Dr. Nicholas' sister Marsy was murdered by her former boyfriend in 1983, leaving her mother, brother, and family to deal with a legal system that afforded insufficient rights for crime victims.  Marsy's Law helped remedy this by requiring that crime victims be notified and consulted on developments in their cases, among other things.  Bader & Associates qualified the Marsy's Law petition for the 2008 California ballot.  The initiative was passed by the voters with 53.9% saying YES, to 46.1% saying NO.

Bader & Associates, Inc. (now incorporated) was able to collect enough signatures to qualify this Referendum Petition in a matter of weeks.  Just as the signatures were about to be filed with the counties, the State Legislature was prodded into repealing the recently passed Driver's License Bill, giving the new Governor, Arnold Schwarzenegger, his first legislative victory.  Consequently, this Referendum never had to be filed.

The DNA Initiative was a petition funded by a wealthy Orange County businessman, Bruce Harrington.  Mr. Harrington became involved in the issue because his brother and sister-in-law were murdered in their own home in 1980; and although the DNA was linked to a series of murders in California in the '70s and '80s, the killer was never caught.  Tom Bader and Bader & Associates collected the signatures for this petition in the Spring of 2004.  Prop 69 passed by a very comfortable margin.

Bader & Associates qualified this initiative, backed by the Nevada Tourism Industry, in less than 4 weeks, which we believe may have been the fastest ever for a Nevada petition.  The issue was sponsored by the Nevada Tourism Industry to counter-balance a more strongly worded competing initiative that they feared would drive business away from Nevada.

Major funding for the Parental Notification Initiative came from Jim Holman (owner of the San Diego Reader), Don Sebastiani (of Don Sebastiani and Sons Winery, and former CA Assemblyman), and Tom Monaghan (founder of Domino's Pizza).  The purpose of this petition was to allow the parents of minors to be informed before a pregnancy could be terminated.  Prop 73 was the first of three Parental Notification Initiatives qualified by Bader & Associates.  

This initiative was sponsored by the Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America (PhRMA).  Its purpose was to establish a discount prescription drug program that would enable certain low- and moderate-income Californians to purchase prescription drugs at reduced prices, negotiated by participating drug manufacturers.  Bader & Associates conducted signature-gathering for this petition in the Spring of 2005.  Of the two pharmaceutical related issues on the ballot, Prop 78 came closer to winning than a rival initiative (Prop 79), but in the end, they both lost.

The second Parental Notification Initiative was funded primarily by Jim Holman (owner of the San Diego Reader), Don Sebastiani (of Don Sebastiani and Sons Winery, and former CA Assemblyman), and Tom Monaghan (founder of Domino's Pizza).  The purpose of the second initiative was to allow the parents of minors to be informed before a pregnancy could be terminated, but added and removed language that the supporters felt improved the initiative from the earlier measure, Proposition 73.  Bader & Associates qualified this second Parental Notification petition for the 2006 California ballot.  The initiative lost at the polls by about the same margin as the earlier Parental Notification initiative.

Proposition 8 was an initiative to define the concept of a "marriage" in traditional terms, as being between a man and a woman.  It was an emotionally charged issue on both sides that could have caused great stress for the circulators and coordinators.  However, due to the professional way the petition was handled, with respect toward both sides of the issue, there were no significant cases of harassment reported during the signature- gathering process.  Bader & Associates conducted the signature-gathering for this petition in 2008.  The final vote was 52.3% to keep the traditional definition of marriage, to 47.7% that wanted to change it.

The third Parental Notification Initiaive was funded primarily by Jim Holman (owner of the San Diego Reader) and Don Sebastiani (of Don Sebastiani and Sons Winery, and former CA Assemblyman).  The purpose of the petition was to allow parents to be informed before a minor's pregnancy is terminated.  The third version inserted and deleted language from the prior two versions based on voter feedback, in an attempt to address voter concerns about the prior two initiatives.  Bader & Associates qualified this third version of Parental Notification for the 2008 California ballot.  Of the three Parental Notification initiatives voted on to date, this last one garnered more support than the other two.