Voting, payday lending ballot drives advance in Michigan

DELTA TOWNSHIP, Mich. (AP) — Ballot drives to expand voting options, restrict payday loans and overhaul Michigan’s citizens initiative process have cleared procedural steps.

Organizers will soon start collecting signatures needed to make the ballot.

Promote the Vote wants to create over a week of early voting and let all voters request an absentee ballot for future elections. Michiganders for Fair Lending wants to slash interest rates charged by payday lenders.

Michigan’s election board also procedurally cleared a different voting rights initiative and a measure to eliminate lawmakers’ ability to pass certain ballot drives without the governor’s signature. Another initiative would decriminalize psychedelic mushrooms.