When it comes to running ballot initiatives, it can be a bit tricky for several reasons. First, the process varies from state to state and city to city, and many areas do not have ballot initiative processes. I recommend visiting the Web site of your city or county clerk’s office, or the secretary of state, to find out the details. The second and perhaps more important issue with initiatives is that they are often prohibitively expensive or logistically difficult to carry out successfully. Simply qualifying a local measure for the ballot can cost thousands of dollars (or even tens of thousands in large cities), and statewide measures typically cost hundreds of thousands of dollars.