For the first time in several months, the leaders of the recall effort against New Orleans Mayor LaToya Cantrell have given a concrete number of how many signatures they have.
On Sunday, NoLaToya vice chair Eileen Carter provided that update as the campaign begins its final month. The deadline for the organization to obtain signatures is February 22.
“Voters are signing and sending in petitions from every neighborhood of New Orleans,” Carter said. “We roughly need 15,000 signatures to meet our goals with a tremendous response from the first mailer.”
Last week, Carter told WWL’s Newell Normand that the campaign had obtained signatures amounting in the “mid- to upper-30s.” Today’s announcement suggests that the NoLaToya effort has obtained approximately 39,000 of the nearly 54,000 it needs to put the Cantrell recall on the ballot this coming fall.
Carter says the campaign will continue to focus its efforts on mail-in petitions and on signing events alike.
“We decided to mail a second batch of roughly 100,000 and engage our canvassing effort, and we can see the light at the end of this tunnel,” Carter said. “The response to the recall has been overwhelming. Our issue, really, has been processing all of the signatures we receive daily with a small team. They’re coming in by mail, and residents are dropping them off at our new recall van, which is now located on Poydras and Loyola weekdays.”
Carter also eluded to Cantrell’s appearance on CBS’s Face the Nation, saying that Cantrell would speak on national TV but would not meet with residents of the city.
Contrasting Cantrell’s statement on Face the Nation that New Orleans residents want “continuity in leadership,” Carter said residents are ready for change.
“We have tremendous support from residents in New Orleans East, Gentilly, and Uptown,” Carter said. “People are tired, and they feel neglected by their mayor, and they want change now.”
