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Each signer of a petition shall sign his or her name in ink or indelible pencil, and shall place on the petition paper after his or her name and place of residence by street and number. The signatures to any such petition paper need not all be appended to one (1) paper but to each such paper shall be attached an affidavit by the circulator thereof stating the number of signers to such part of the petition, and that each signature appended to the paper is the genuine signature of the person whose name it purports to be and was made in the presence of the affiant.
All papers comprising a petition shall be assembled and filed with the Clerk of the Council as one (1) instrument. Within twenty (20) days from the filing of a petition the Clerk shall ascertain whether it is signed by the required number of qualified electors. Upon the completion of an examination the Clerk shall endorse upon the petition a certificate of the result thereof.
If the Clerk's certificate shows that the petition is insufficient in valid signatures, the Clerk shall at once notify each member of the petitioners, hereinbefore provided for, of the amount of such deficiency; and the petition may be amended by securing additional signatures, at any time within fifteen (15) days from the date of the Clerk's certificate of examination. Upon the filing of such an amendment the Clerk shall, within ten (10) days thereafter, examine the amended petition and attach thereto a certificate of the result. If still insufficient in signatures, or if no amendment shall have been filed, the Clerk shall file the petition in the office and shall notify each member of the committee of that fact. The final finding of the insufficiency of a petition shall not prejudice the filing of a new petition for the same purpose.
When the certificate of the Clerk shows the petition to be sufficient in valid signatures, the Clerk shall submit the proposed ordinance to the Council at its next regular meeting, and the Council shall at once read and refer the same to an appropriate committee, which may be the committee of the whole. Thereafter, the committee shall report the proposed ordinance to the Council with its recommendations thereon not later than the third regular meeting of the Council following that at which the proposed ordinance was submitted to the Council by the Clerk.
Upon receiving the proposed ordinance from the committee, the Council shall at once proceed to consider it and shall take final action thereon within thirty (30) days from the date of such committee report. If the Council rejects the proposed ordinance or passes it in a form different from that set forth in the petition, the committee of the petitions may, as hereinafter provided, require that it be submitted to a vote of the electors in its original form, or that it be submitted to a vote of the electors with any proposed change, addition or amendment, which was presented in writing either at a public hearing before the committee to which the proposed ordinance was referred, or during the consideration thereof by the Council.
When an ordinance proposed by petition is to be submitted to a vote of the electors, the committee of the petitioners shall certify that fact and the proposed ordinance to the Clerk of the Council within thirty (30) days after the final action on such proposed ordinance by the Council and also file with the Clerk a supplemental petition asking that the proposed ordinance be submitted to popular vote, which petition shall be signed by ten (10) percent of the qualified electors of the City in addition to those who signed the original petition. The sufficiency in valid signatures of any such supplemental petition shall be determined, and it may be amended in the manner provided for original petitions for proposing ordinances to the Council.
Upon receipt of the certificate, certified copy of the proposed ordinance and petition, the Clerk shall certify the fact to the Council at its next regular meeting. If a regular election is to be held not more than ninety (90) days or less than forty (40) days after the receipt of the Clerk's certificate by the Council, Council shall cause such proposed ordinance to be submitted to a vote of the electors at such election. If no such election is to be held within the time aforesaid the Council may provide for submitting the proposed ordinance to the electors at a special election. If no other provision is made as to the time of submitting a proposed ordinance to a vote of the electors, it shall be submitted at the next election.
The ballots used when voting upon any such proposed ordinance shall state the title of the ordinance to be voted on and below it the two propositions: "For the Ordinance" and "Against the Ordinance". Immediately at the left of each proposition shall be a square in which, by making a cross (X) the voter may vote for or against the proposed ordinance.
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