Shortly before Monday’s deadline to submit petition signatures to the Colorado Secretary of State’s office, backers of two measures each turned in well over 100,000 signatures to get their issues before voters.

Supporters of an initiative to make it harder to amend the state’s constitution on Friday, Aug. 5, turned in more than 185,000 signatures to qualify for the November ballot.

The Raise the Bar – Protect our Constitution measure would amend Colorado’s constitution to require future constitutional ballot initiative proponents to gather signatures from across the state, including at least two percent of all registered voters in each of Colorado’s 35 state senate districts. The proposal also requires 55 percent approval by voters of a state constitutional amendment.

On Thursday, Aug. 4, the Yes! on Colorado End of Life Options campaign submitted more than 160,000 petition signatures to qualify a “medical aid in dying” constitutional amendment on the November ballot.

The medical aid in dying amendment would allow a terminally ill, mentally capable Colorado residents with a prognosis of six months or less to live to request, obtain and – if his or her suffering becomes unbearable – self-administer medication that brings about a peaceful death.If enough signatures are verified by the Colorado Secretary of State and voters approve the measure, Colorado would become the sixth state to authorize medical aid in dying.

The measure is modeled after Oregon legislation that, proponents say, has worked well for nearly 20 years without any proven instances of abuse, coercion or fraud. Like Oregon, the Colorado measure includes precautions to protect patients.

The secretary of state’s office has 30 days from the day petitions were submitted to determine if enough signatures are valid to approve or disapprove the measures for the Nov. 8 ballot.