AN ACT CONCERNING ELECTION DAY REGISTRATION AND PRESIDENTIAL BALLOT PROCEDURES.

AN ACT CONCERNING ELECTION DAY REGISTRATION AND PRESIDENTIAL BALLOT PROCEDURES.

This bill allows certain people to register to vote on Election Day, the day a regular state or municipal election is held. It establishes Election Day registration procedures, including the use of “verifiable ballots” by applicants whose qualifications for admission as electors cannot be determined.

It also eliminates the use of presidential ballots for state residents and shifts responsibilities for presidential (but not overseas) ballots from town clerks to registrars of voters.

The bill permits anyone to register and vote on Election Day if he or she (1) is not an elector (i. e. , registered voter), (2) does not have a voter registration application pending, and (3) meets the eligibility requirements for voting in this state. Election Day does not include the day that a primary or referendum is held; thus, state residents cannot register and vote on these days.

The bill requires Election Day registration applicants to provide the same information as people who apply for registration before this date. This means they must state under penalty of perjury (1) their name, bona fide street address, date of birth, and citizenship; (2) whether they are disenfranchised because of a criminal conviction; and (3) whether they were previously registered to vote in another town in the state. They must present their birth certificate, driver's license, or Social Security card to the admitting official for inspection.

The bill requires the applicant to appear in person at a location designated by the registrars of voters on Election Day and declare under oath that he or she has not previously voted in the election.

If the applicant's ID does not include proof of his or her residential address, he or she must submit a U. S. passport, military ID card, learner's permit, utility bill due within 30 days after the election, or current college registration or fee statement that includes his or her name and current address. The bill allows college students to present their student photo ID in lieu of the identification currently required by law.

The registrars of voters must check the statewide voter registry to determine if the applicant is registered to vote in another town in this state. If the applicant is registered in another town but states a desire to change his or her town of registration, the registrars must follow the process under current law for removing the elector's name from the registry list in the prior town. Under this process, the registrars must send a notice of cancellation to the registrars of voters in the other town who must erase the elector's name from that town's voter registry list. The bill does not appear to allow this elector to register and vote on Election Day.

The registrars of voters must give a voting ballot and privacy sleeve to applicants that they admit as electors. Though the newly admitted elector must secretly mark the ballot in the presence of the registrars and place it in a privacy sleeve, he or she must give it to the registrars of voters who must “deliver” it for the “election official” to insert it into the voting tabulator for counting (see COMMENT). The process for casting a ballot on Election Day is unclear because the bill does not specify where the voting tabulator is located (i. e. , at a polling place) or when the registrars must “deliver” the ballot to the tabulator.

Immediately after each Election Day, the registrars of voters must send a confirmation by first-class mail to the residential address of each applicant admitted as an elector on that day. The registrars must ask that the confirmation be returned if not deliverable at the address shown. If it is returned undelivered, the registrars must refer the matter to the State Elections Enforcement Commission for an immediate investigation.

Application for a Verifiable Ballot. Applicants who are not admitted as electors because the registrars of voters cannot, for whatever reason, determine their qualifications may (1) apply for a verifiable ballot and (2) receive one after they declare under oath that they have not previously voted in the election. The verifiable ballot application form, which the secretary of the state prescribes, must be executed before an election official and include a written affirmation that anyone willfully making a false statement on it is subject to the penalty for false statement in absentee balloting, a class D felony punishable by up to five years in prison, a $ 5,000 fine, or both.

1. is an elector in a specified town,

2. is eligible to vote in the election taking place in the specified town and at a specified polling place,

3. lives in the district served by the polling place,

4. has not voted and will not otherwise vote during the election, and

5. is applying for a verifiable ballot.

The applicant must also affirm that the registrars of voters were unable to determine his or her qualifications to be an elector.

Voting by Verified Ballot. Once the registrars of voters receive an application for a verifiable ballot, they must provide it and a numbered envelope and record issuing it on a verifiable ballot inventory form. In the presence of the registrars of voters, the applicant must mark and fold the ballot in a way that maintains its secrecy and seal it in the numbered envelope in the manner prescribed by the secretary of the state.

The registrars of voters must (1) give the applicant information that allows him or her to later verify if his or her verifiable ballot was counted and (2) put the verifiable ballot and envelope in a verifiable ballot depository envelope. The applicant must then immediately leave the room.

The registrars of voters must provide a restricted, free access system so that the applicant completing a verifiable ballot can verify that his or her ballot was counted and if not, the reason why.

1. immediately after the polls close, verify the information contained with each verifiable ballot and cause a notice of registration to be sent to the home address of person who cast the ballot;

2. mark the ballot “rejected” if the notice is returned as undeliverable, include the reason for the rejection, and sign it;

3. verify and count all verifiable ballots in their town not later than six days after the election;

4. prepare and sign, in duplicate, a report showing the number of verifiable ballots received from applicants, the number rejected, and the number counted, including the additional votes counted for each candidate for office on the verifiable ballots;

5. seal a “report”, presumably, the above-described ballot report, in the depository envelope with the verifiable ballots and store the envelope with other election results material; and

6. preserve the depository envelope for the same period of time required to preserve counted ballots for elections, 180 days after the election.

The head moderator must file a corrected return for each office with the town clerk and secretary of the state showing (1) the final votes after any recount, the votes on verifiable ballots, and vote totals and (2) the number of verifiable ballots received from applicants, the number rejected, and the number counted, as reported by the registrars of voters. The secretary of the state must prescribe the procedure for counting verifiable ballots, which must comply as nearly as possible with existing counting procedures. It is unclear which procedures the bill is referencing because the law establishes different counting procedures for provisional and absentee ballots.

The bill removes the provision for Connecticut residents to vote by presidential ballot, leaving the procedures in place only for former state residents. Current law allows unregistered Connecticut residents and former state residents who move to another state after its deadline to register to apply for a presidential ballot and vote for candidates for president and vice-president, but no other offices. Under the bill, unregistered state residents would instead follow the Election Day registration procedures.

With a few exceptions, the application and voting procedures (which include the requirement to show current identification) remain the same as under current law. The exceptions are that (1) applications for presidential ballots must be submitted to the registrars of voters, rather than the town clerk, in the town where the applicant is qualified to vote; (2) assistant registrars, instead of just registrars, may indicate in the margins if a presidential voter's name appears on the registry list; and (3) registrars or assistant registrars must make the margin notation in red ink.

By law, registrars must prepare a list of the names and addresses of presidential voters and overseas electors. The bill requires that the list go to either the voting district or central counting as appropriate (see COMMENT).

By requiring registrars of voters, rather than voters, to place the voters' ballots into the voting tabulator, the bill appears to violate federal voter privacy and ballot confidentiality laws, including the 2002 Help America Vote Act (P. L. 107-252, 42 USC § 15301 et seq. ).

The law requires town clerks to receive overseas ballots and give the names of people voting in this manner to the registrars of voters. The registrars prepare a list, for each voting district, of the overseas electors whose names do not appear on the registry list. The list accompanies the official check list in the districts. The bill eliminates the requirement for town clerks to give the names of overseas electors to registrars of voters but leaves the remainder of the process in place. Thus, it is unclear how the registrars will be able to identify overseas electors.

Yea

Nay

(03/20/2009)