Laguna Beach : Sufficient Signatures Gathered for Recall Vote

Enough signatures have been gathered to trigger a recall vote against three school board members, a pro-recall group said Tuesday.

Nancy Kreder, a spokeswoman for Citizens United for Responsible Education, said that group had collected 3,790 signatures to recall Charlene Ragatz, 3,700 to recall Janet Vickers and 3,660 to recall Carl Schwarz.

The recall workers have until Monday to file the voter signatures with the county registrar of voters. A minimum of 3,515 valid voter signatures are needed for a recall vote.

But Kreder said CURE has only slightly more than 3,041 signatures on the petitions to recall the fourth school board member, Susan Mas, “and we’ve just about stopped” that effort.

Kreder said CURE hopes to get more than 4,000 signatures to recall each of the three members of the Laguna Beach Unified School District. The excess over 3,515 would be needed as a cushion against errors, Kreder said.

Meanwhile, Patrick Crosby, chairman of Citizens Against the Recall Effort, said Tuesday that his organization has about a dozen signatures of voters wishing to remove their names from the petitions and hopes to have about 100 by Sunday.

If any of the four recall petitions are successful, a special recall vote will be called between August and October.