AB571,,22An Act to renumber 5.84 (1) and 7.315 (2); to renumber and amend 6.50 (3); to amend 5.056, 5.40 (7), 7.08 (1) (a), 7.08 (1) (c), 7.15 (1m), 85.61 (1) and 301.03 (20m); and to create 5.057, 5.058, 5.84 (1) (b), 5.84 (4), 6.36 (1) (ae) 3., 6.50 (3) (b) and (c), 6.50 (4m), 7.15 (16), 7.23 (1) (jm), 7.315 (2) (b) and 69.03 (16) of the statutes; relating to: maintenance of the voter registration list, training of municipal clerks, data sharing agreements, pre-election procedures, lines at the polls on election day, and granting rule-making authority.

Under current law, if a municipal clerk or board of election commissioners receives reliable information that a voter has moved outside of the municipality, the clerk or board of election commissioners must send a letter or postcard to the voter to verify the voter’s address and change the voter’s status on the registration list from eligible to ineligible if the voter’s address has changed. Under this bill, if the Elections Commission receives reliable information that a voter has moved outside of the municipality specified on the voter’s registration or to different address within that municipality, the commission must send a letter or postcard to the voter to verify the voter’s address and change the voter’s status on the registration list from eligible to ineligible if the voter’s address has changed. Under the bill, if the municipal clerk or board of election commissioners receives reliable information that a voter has moved, neither the clerk nor the board is required to send a letter or postcard to that elector if the commission has also received reliable information that the elector has moved. In that case, the commission must send a letter or postcard to the elector to verify the voter’s address.

Under the bill, information received from the Electronic Registration Information Center, Inc., is considered reliable information for purposes of determining whether a voter has moved. In addition, the bill requires the commission to request available information from ERIC at least once every 90 days and to annually request information from ERIC regarding eligible, but unregistered, residents of this state. Furthermore, the commission must, when it becomes available following an election for a national office, request information from ERIC regarding registered voters who may have voted multiple times in the same election.

Current law requires the administrator of the Elections Commission to enter into an agreement with the secretary of the Department of Transportation to match personally identifiable information on the official registration list maintained by the commission with personally identifiable information maintained by DOT in vehicle registration and license records. The bill requires the administrator and the secretary to update the agreement at least once every two years. In addition, the bill requires DOT to conduct matching of personally identifiable information maintained by DOT with that on the registration list on a daily basis. Under the bill, if the information on the official registration list for an individual does not match the information for the individual maintained by DOT, DOT must provide to the commission the name and date of birth of the individual and the number of the driver’s license or identification card issued by DOT to the individual. The bill also requires DOT to indicate to the commission whether the individual reported a change of address for purposes of updating records regarding a driver’s license, identification card, or vehicle registration.

Under current law, the municipal clerk must change the registration of deceased electors from eligible to ineligible status by means of checking vital statistics reports. Current law requires the Department of Health Services to establish the Office of Vital Records and to appoint a state registrar to supervise the office. Generally, the Office of Vital Records and the state registrar are responsible for accepting, indexing, and preserving vital records, such as original marriage documents and records of birth, death, and divorce. The bill requires the administrator of the Elections Commission and the state registrar to enter into an agreement to match personally identifiable information from the registration list with the death records maintained by the Office of Vital Records. The administrator and the state registrar must update the agreement at least once every two years. Under the bill, the Office of Vital Records must conduct matching of personally identifiable information on a daily basis and immediately notify the administrator of the Elections Commission of the name, date of birth, date of death, and place of death of any person on the official registration list for which the Office of Vital Records has a death record. The commission must then change the registration status of the person from eligible to ineligible.

Under current law, the Department of Corrections must transmit to the commission, on a continuous basis, a list containing the name of each living person who has been convicted of a felony and whose civil rights have not been restored, together with the person’s residential address and the date on which DOC expects the person’s civil rights to be restored. The bill requires DOC to transmit this information to the commission on a daily basis. In addition, the bill requires the secretary of DOC and the administrator of the Elections Commission to enter into an agreement to match personally identifiable information from the registration list with the personally identifiable information maintained by DOC and update that agreement at least once every two years.