Ballot access · closes November 2026
Help put Bob on the ballot.
Registered Rockford voter? Your signature helps give the city an Independent choice on April 6.
Signing doesn't commit you to vote for Bob. It says he should be on the ballot.
Signing takes a minute at your own door and there is nothing you need to bring. Carrying sheets is the volunteer job, and the campaign trains you first.
- Who can sign? Any voter registered inside the City of Rockford. Once.
- Where? At your door, or on the counter at Bennie's, 126 N 1st St, weekday mornings.
- When? Now. The sheets stop circulating in the first days of November 2026.
- What do I need? Nothing. A pen is provided.
Signing closes in November 2026 — four months before the April election. Why the deadline is where it is →
How to get a sheet in front of you today
Somebody will bring one to your door. Call 815-669-9604.
That's the fastest way to sign, it's a real offer, and it gets used every day. There is also a sheet sitting in one fixed place all week:
Anything else — a church hall, a shift outside a shop, a Saturday somewhere — moves week to week. Those go on Where to sign this week, which is updated by hand every Monday. Or ask on the same call and you'll be told where and when.
Want us to come to you?
Three fields. Somebody brings a sheet to your door instead.
Who can sign
You must be a registered voter inside the City of Rockford. That's the whole test, and it's stricter than people expect.
- Loves Park, Machesney Park, Cherry Valley, and unincorporated Winnebago County addresses cannot sign. A signature from outside the city isn't just wasted — it's something an objector can point at.
- You can sign a nominating petition for a candidate for this office once.
- Signing doesn't commit you to vote for Bob. It says he should be on the ballot.
- Illinois has no party registration, so signing this doesn't affect any primary ballot you might pull if a February 23, 2027 primary is held.
Signatures have to be collected on paper, in person, with a qualified circulator present. A website cannot collect one. Everything on this page is built around getting you and a sheet of paper into the same room.
When signing closes
Signatures are not collected up to Election Day. They stop months before it.
An Independent's nominating papers are filed inside a narrow window fixed by state law, and for an April 6, 2027 election that window is November 16–23, 2026. Every signature has to be in hand, checked, and bound before it opens. Practically, that means the sheets stop circulating in the first days of November.
The Rockford Board of Election Commissioners is the authority on the exact dates — 815-987-5750 or voterockfordil.gov. If you have been meaning to sign, the honest answer to “when” is now, not later.
Where this stands
The campaign doesn't publish a running signature total.
Illinois sets both a floor and a ceiling on an independent petition, so more isn't automatically better — and a public number tells anyone planning an objection precisely what to aim at. What can be said plainly: the sheets are out, and they are being checked as they come in.
The thresholds themselves are public, and they are steep. Bob needs a minimum of 864 valid signatures from registered Rockford voters, with a ceiling of 1,383. A Republican needs 25 and a Democrat 68 for the same office. Why the numbers are so far apart.
For petition circulators
Carry a sheet yourself
The fastest way to help is to circulate. It takes an afternoon, most of it talking to neighbors — and every conversation is worth more than the signature at the end of it.
To circulate you must be 18 or older, a United States citizen, and circulating for one candidate only. The campaign trains you first. The technical requirements on these sheets are exactly what objections get built from, and a well-meaning mistake is still a defect.
Materials for circulators
Sheets and a one-page instruction card are handed to you at training — printed on the right paper, with the header already correct.
Nothing you need has to be downloaded, printed, or retyped. A sheet that's been reformatted is exactly the kind of defect an objection gets built from.
The three things that get a sheet thrown out
All three are things you control at the door. The rest of the paperwork — sheet numbering, how the packet is bound, what gets filed when — is handled by the campaign.
- Signers who aren't registered voters in the City of Rockford.
- A missing, unsigned, undated, or improperly notarized circulator affidavit.
- A header that differs from one page to the next.
Nominating papers can't be amended after they're filed, so everything gets checked before it's turned in. If something is wrong with a sheet you circulated, nobody's going to be annoyed with you. That's what the checking is for.
The eligibility and filing rules described on this page are reviewed by Illinois election counsel before sheets circulate and before anything here is printed. The Rockford Board of Election Commissioners is the authority on all of it: 815-987-5750.
Keep me posted
Signing a petition doesn't put you on a list. This is separate, and it's up to you.