A business group aiming to overturn Glendale's 0.7 percent sales-tax hike filed a lawsuit against the city Friday, claiming it rejected petition documents "based on several misinterpretations of the law."
Last week, Save Glendale Now submitted 4,138 signatures to the city in an attempt to reverse the sales-tax increase approved by the City Council. About 2,100 are required to get on the ballot.
The city rejected the signatures and accompanying documents Wednesday.
City Clerk Pam Hanna and City Attorney Craig Tindall said the group made several errors in its submission. They say the summary submitted with Save Glendale Now's petition was misleading and that the group failed to include a serial number in its name and did not comply with a requirement to turn in signatures four months before the city's Aug. 28 election.
In a statement released Friday, Save Glendale Now Chairman Rod Williams said he is "outraged that two unelected officials, the city clerk and the city attorney, would attempt to trample on the rights of every Glendale citizen to exercise his or her initiative rights as enshrined in the Arizona Constitution."
Dave Kimmerle, president of Sanderson Ford and Save Glendale Now leader, said it's "amusing" that Tindall believes voters were misled.
"Every petition circulated contained the full text of the initiative for every voter to read," he said in the statement. "It doesn't take a law degree to read the initiative and understand what it does."
Tindall said earlier this week that the 100-word summary submitted with the petition suggested the initiative, if approved by voters, would reverse the city's sales-tax increase set to take effect next month. But initiatives do not act retroactively, he said.
Save Glendale Now Treasurer Connie Wilhelm said the group "fully complied" with all constitutional and statutory requirements for putting an initiative on the ballot.
The council approved the sales-tax hike in June to raise more than $20 million to help close a $35 million budget shortfall.
The increased revenue would help the city pay this year's $17 million arena-management fee to potential Phoenix Coyotes buyer Greg Jamison.
The anti-tax group filed its complaint in Maricopa County Superior Court. It is unclear at this point when the case will go before a judge.