Maine

Search by jurisdiction: municipality
Soft matching: yes
Signing dates: no sandwiching, year is not required
Transcribing: not allowed

Circulator Declarations

For Maine, the shorthand is the

1. first letter of the first name
2. first letter of last name

Check the boxes if:

• the circulator signed
• the notary signed
• the notary either stamped their official seal or printed their name and expiry

And of course, enter the date of signing as written, even if written wrong.

Signatures

Maine petitions are to validated according to whichever municipality is most common on a page. Signatures from other municipalities are deficient -o0 (the letter), but...

Search for the voter first, in case it's a nickname for the municipality or they accidentally wrote the wrong one, which is okay. Only mark -o0 if you you couldn't find the voter. If the municipality written doesn't match the rest, you do not have to make three distinct searches, because the odds are so low of a match.

If there is a nearly equal split of signatures per municipality, go by the first municipality you can find a match for and don't tag anything until you find a match so you can change the jurisdiction.

Municipality is not required on every line, but if there is no municipality written on any line, flag the file.

On most jobs, it doesn't matter if the voter put info in the wrong spots and same is true here except for legal signature. That must be in the signature column, or you need to add the -s deficiency code. A printed signature is okay, but if there is a printed name in the signature column and a cursive signature in the printed name column, it's -s. If there is a printed signature in the signature column and no name in the printed name column, it is considered okay and is not -s.

Address not required. Since it cannot be a hard match without a matching address, at most a soft match is possible.

Printed name is not required if signature is clearly legible.