Alameda County recently faced the grim prospect of a recall drive qualifying against a prominent county official (District Attorney Pamela Price) that invoked outdated local recall laws that were unsuited to modern elections. So the county supervisors rolled the dice on a ballot measure to update those rules. In their argument in favor the supervisors claimed that Measure B would "make the recall election rules clearer and … help avoid long and expensive legal battles." Measure B passed, but it created rather than solved problems. That's because the county clerk's certifying process for the recall seemingly combined the old charter and the new state rules in a confused and arbitrary process that is ripe for challenge.