The Secretary of State’s Office says they’re investigating potential fraud after they found questionable initiative petition sheets that appear to have come from one signature gatherer.

The sheets were for Initiative 1098, which seeks to create a state income tax on high wage earners, and cut property taxes and the state’s B&O tax on small businesses in order to bolster the state’s funding for education and healthcare.

“At this point, it looks like an isolated problem with one gatherer submitting 20 bad petition sheets, and this should not affect the underlying initiative check,” said Elections Director Nick Handy said.

Said the office via press release:

As part of the standard practice of doing an initial check of each and every petition sheet before the signature validation process begins, 20 petition sheets, all collected by the same gatherer, were identified. About 350 names, signatures and addresses are being investigated. The gatherer signed the back of each of the questioned petitions.

The office notified the Washington State Patrol, the Attorney General’s Office and local authorities, though they didn’t say who the local authorities are. I e-mailed Communications Director David Ammons seeking clarification. *UPDATE* - - Ammons says this occurred in King County.

The full press release is below the fold.

FYI: Our Elections Division is reviewing apparent fraud by a signature-gatherer for Initiative 1098, the proposal to adopt a high-wage earner income tax and lower other taxes.

As part of the standard practice of doing an initial check of each and every petition sheet before the signature validation process begins, 20 petition sheets, all collected by the same gatherer, were identified. About 350 names, signatures and addresses are being investigated. The gatherer signed the back of each of the questioned petitions.

Elections Director Nick Handy said “the investigation is ongoing,” but that the Secretary of State’s Office was moving quickly to notify the Washington State Patrol, the state attorney general and local authorities. The investigation, including a thorough review of all of the questioned names, will be completed in a few days and a report will be turned over to the appropriate authorities.

Under terms of federal and state restraining orders, the petition sheets in question cannot be released to the public at this point.

“We intend to get to the bottom of this,” said Secretary of State Sam Reed. “We take our role of protecting the state’s initiative process very, very seriously. There are laws against fraud and we will vigorously pursue this situation.”

The questioned petition sheets are a small fraction of the 24,817 sheets submitted by the I-1098 campaign on July 1. The Elections Division is currently half-way through a random check of 11,545 signatures. The campaign submitted 385,061 signatures, not counting the questioned ones. Checkers are working at “heightened awareness” of possible fraud. The initiative’s error rate is running at normal levels, Handy said. It takes 241,153 valid signatures of registered Washington voters to secure a place on the November ballot.

“At this point, it looks like an isolated problem with one gatherer submitting 20 bad petition sheets, and this should not affect the underlying initiative check,” Handy said.