SALEM - Sponsors of ballot measures to allow state-licensed dispensaries for medical marijuana, restrict logging in state forests and cap medical malpractice damages turned in signatures Friday.

The signature check is preliminary, so that backers will know about how many will be eliminated as invalid before the July 2 deadline. That will allow them to collect more if needed.

Typically, 15 to 20 percent of signatures are deemed invalid for a variety of reasons.

All three initiatives seemed to have a good chance to qualify for the November ballot.

The logging and medical malpractice measures are expected to attract millions of dollars from interest groups if they get on the ballot.

The so-called "50-50" forest proposal would limit timber harvests to 50 percent of the Tillamook and Clatsop state forests in northwestern Oregon. The other 50 percent would be protected for drinking water, salmon and recreational uses.

Mari Ann Gest, spokeswoman for Oregonians for a Balanced Tillamook, said 78,000 signatures were submitted. The initiative needs 75,630 to make the ballot.

The initiative is an outgrowth of political battles over allowable timber cuts in the forests, which yields revenue for the state and county governments. The House passed a measure in the 2003 Legislature to double logging in the forests, but the bill died in the Senate.

Gest said the initiative is a 'win-win" for the state. "We are not anti-logging. We found the compromise we think that works," she said.

The timber industry opposes the initiative.

Pat McCormick of Portland, a spokesman for the opposition campaign, said the "fallacy of 50-50 is that current management plans already restrict timber harvest on substantial areas of the forests." He estimated that by applying the half-and-half rule to the remainder, two-thirds of the forest area would be off-limits to logging.

The malpractice measure would put a $500,000 lid on noneconomic, pain and suffering damage awards against doctors, and idea that has failed several times before in Oregon.

A sponsor, Dr. Peter Bernardo of Salem, said 106,000 signatures were turned in.

The measure needs 100,000 valid signatures to make the ballot because it would amend the state constitution.

Bernardo said the proposal shouldn't be compared to a damage limit that voters turned down in 2000, because the current measure is strictly confined to the medical malpractice issue. The previous initiative would have allowed caps in other civil lawsuits as well.

"We're not suggesting patients not be compensated," he said. But awards in the millions of dollars are making insurance so costly that doctors are quitting some specialties, he said.

A coalition of groups including trial lawyers, who represent malpractice victims, is expected to form to oppose the initiative.

On the marijuana measure, state election officials said backers of the initiative reported submitting 95,000 signatures. They need 75,630 to put the measure on the ballot.

Patients now can grow limited amounts of marijuana to treat some conditions, with a doctor's approval, but can't legally buy the drug.

The proposal would create a system of state-licensed dispensaries to sell marijuana to approved patients and increase the amount patients are allowed to possess.