The campaign to repeal Portland's public campaign finance program failed to collect the required number of valid signatures to qualify for the ballot.
The number of valid signatures submitted was 25,855, which was 836 less than the 26,691 required to qualify for the ballot.
Those opposing the repeal said they wouldn't be surprised if another attempt was made to put the issue on the ballot.
"It is now time to move on to discussions of other city issues beyond this concern of special-interest campaign contributors," said Carol Cushman, president of the League of Women Voters of Portland.
"However, we won't be surprised if these deep-pocketed players come back again, and our education and advocacy campaign will continue to ensure defeat of a repeal whenever it might appear on the ballot."
Jo Ann Bowman, associate director at Oregon Action, said she was confident that another attempt could be defeated.
"We will prevail if they try again because Portlanders will see another repeal attempt for the power grab that it is and vote no to keep our elections fair and open," Bowman said.
The League of Women Voters of Portland, OSPIRG, Common Cause, the Money in Politics Research Action Project and other community organizations joined the Vote No Power Grab campaign to thwart the proposed ballot measure.
Therevised finalsignature countcomes after the city, Multnomah County and state elections officials discovered a technological error in the Oregon Centralized Voter Registration system and a procedural error in processing the petition sheets.
Multnomah County elections officials recertified and released the results to the city of Portland earlier this week. As soon as elections officials became aware of the potential errors, they requested advice from the Secretary of State's Elections Division, said Robert Cowan, public information specialist for the Portland Audit Services Division.
The county, city and state then undertook a full and thorough review of the petition to ensure that every valid signature was counted and that all applicable laws and procedures were carefully followed, Cowan added.
The technological error mistakenly excluded 49 registered voters from the valid signature count, while the procedural error mistakenly included over 180 petition sheets that contained errors committed by those circulating the petitions. The technological issue in the CentralizedVoter Registration System has been resolved, and city and county procedures have been reviewed to avoid future errors of this nature, Cowan said.
