# **The Future of Election Administration** Cases and Conversations

*Edited by*  **Mitchell Brown Kathleen Hale Bridgett A. King**

## Elections, Voting, Technology

Series Editor Kathleen Hale Department of Political Science Auburn University Auburn, AL, USA

This series examines the relationships between people, electoral processes and technologies, and democracy. Elections are a fundamental aspect of a free and democratic society and, at their core, they involve a citizenry making selections for who will represent them. This series examines the ways in which citizens select their candidates—the voting technologies used, the rules of the game that govern the process—and considers how changes in processes and technologies affect the voter and the democratic process.

More information about this series at http://www.palgrave.com/gp/series/14965 Mitchell Brown • Kathleen Hale Bridgett A. King Editors

# The Future of Election Administration

Cases and Conversations

*Editors* Mitchell Brown Department of Political Science Auburn University Auburn, AL, USA

Kathleen Hale Department of Political Science Auburn University Auburn, AL, USA

Bridgett A. King Department of Political Science Auburn University Auburn, AL, USA

#### Elections, Voting, Technology ISBN 978-3-030-18540-4 ISBN 978-3-030-18541-1 (eBook) https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-18541-1

© The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s) 2019. This book is an open access publication.

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## Acknowledgments

We extend our deep appreciation to the election administrators, academics, and advocacy professionals who took time out of their busy schedules to attend the Inclusion and Integrity Symposium at Auburn University in 2017 and to subsequently contribute to *The Future of Election Administration* and *The Future of Election Administration: Cases and Conversations.* We know that we asked you to contribute to this volume during an election year. Your willingness to openly accept our invitation, first to the Symposium and then to write for these volumes, is but another indication of your commitment to the profession and to the scholarship for and about the field.

Because of your collective efforts, we are able to contribute two volumes to the literature that include voices and perspectives from the range of stakeholder groups who contribute to and play integral roles in the evolving field of election administration. It is our hope that the expertise reflected in this collection of chapters and case studies will serve as a resource that facilitates better understanding of the complexity of voting and election processes in the United States and the profession of election administration.

We would also like to thank Auburn University for its support of our efforts. The Department of Political Science and the College of Liberal Arts supported this work, as did the Master of Public Administration (MPA) and PhD in Public Administration and Policy Programs, and the Graduate Program in Election Administration. Special thanks are due to the Charles Wesley Edwards Jr. Endowment for supporting the symposiums. And in particular, we thank our graduate students—MPA Election Center Fellow Tyler St. Clair, MPA Graduate Research Assistant Emily Hale, and PhD students Lindsey Forson and Shaniqua Williams. We are always learning about this field, and it has been a pleasure to have you learn along with us.

Research about public programs is not possible without open access to data—and not just numbers but also observations, interviews, and more. The transparency provided by election officials and other election community stakeholders has been essential to this project specifically and the field of election sciences more generally, and we are grateful for that. The openness of federal, state, and local officials, and vendors and advocates along with their interest in advancing the profession is encouraging and something for us all to celebrate and continue.

And not least, we are grateful for the support of the Election Center, also known as the National Association of Election Officials, both for its support for the symposium and its partnership with Auburn University. We believe our partnership and joint efforts over the past several decades to professionalize the field through Certified Elections Registration Administrator (CERA), the national certification for election professionals, has helped develop the field, and we look forward to future collaboration.

## Contents

x CONTENTS

## Notes on Contributors

**Bruce Adelson** is a former US Department of Justice Civil Rights Division Voting Section senior trial attorney. Today, he is a nationally recognized speaker and expert on voting, elections, and voting accessibility. He has given voting and elections presentations to organizations including the Election Center, National Association of State Election Directors, and Harvard University. He teaches cultural and civil rights awareness and implicit bias at Georgetown University School of Medicine.

**Lori Augino** is Director of Elections for the Office of the Secretary of State. Augino was appointed by Secretary of State Kim Wyman in January 2013. In this position, Augino oversees federal, state, and local elections conducted by the 39 local County Auditors in Washington State. Augino serves as a member of the Election Assistance Commission's Technical Guidelines Development Committee (TGDC), serves as Incoming President for the National Association of State Election Directors (NASED), serves as a member of the Council of State Government's Election Technology Working Group, and serves as a member of the Department of Homeland Security's Elections Critical Infrastructure Government Coordinating Council. Prior to serving as Director of Elections, Augino worked for the Pierce County Auditor's Office for nearly 18 years, serving the citizens of Pierce County as the Chief Deputy Auditor from 2010 to 2013, overseeing the county's elections, licensing, recording, and animal control divisions. Augino served as Pierce County Elections Manager from 2000 to 2010. Augino managed the closest election (and two recounts) in Washington's history during the 2004 General Election in Pierce County. In 2009, Lori was named County Election Employee of the Year by former Secretary of State Sam Reed. She's a graduate of the University of Washington, holding a BA in Politics, Philosophy, and Economics.

**David Becker** is Executive Director and Founder of the nonprofit Center for Election Innovation & Research (CEIR). As one of the foremost election experts in the country, Becker has led CEIR's successful efforts to help election officials of both parties, all around the country, ensure that all eligible voters can vote conveniently in a system with maximum integrity.

Prior to founding CEIR, Becker was Director of the Elections Program at The Pew Charitable Trusts. As the lead for Pew's analysis and advocacy on elections issues, Becker spearheaded development of ERIC, which to date has helped a bipartisan group of over half the states update nearly 10 million out-of-date voter records, and led to these states registering over 5 million new eligible voters. Before joining Pew, Becker served for seven years as a senior trial attorney in the Voting Section of the Department of Justice's Civil Rights Division, and served as a lead counsel on major voting rights litigations, including the case of *Georgia v. Ashcroft*, ultimately decided by the US Supreme Court. Becker received both his undergraduate and law degrees from the University of California, Berkeley.

**David A. Bennett** is Financial Officer and Treasurer for VR Systems Inc. and serves on the Steering Committee for "Investing in Elections," a research initiative conducted by Auburn University faculty for the Election Center. He is a graduate of the Auburn University/Election Center Certified Elections Registration Administrator (CERA) program.

**Kim Brace** is President and Founder of Election Data Services, a political consulting firm located in Manassas, Virginia, specializing in election administration and redistricting. Brace has worked with federal governmental agencies and state and local jurisdictions throughout the nation on election-related issues for over the past 40 years. He was the lead contractor and author of the Election Assistance Commission's studies in their 2004 and 2006 Election Day Survey and continued as a subcontractor in their 2008 and 2010 reports. A poll worker and chief judge since 2008, he also served as acting general registrar for Prince William County, Virginia.

**Mitchell Brown** PhD, is a professor in the Department of Political Science at Auburn University and is an associate editor of the *Journal of Political Science Education* (2016–2020). Her broader research agenda focuses on the empowerment efforts of marginalized communities, which she pursues through applied research. She is the author of numerous books, research articles, and reports in related areas. In addition to her work at the university, she serves as a researcher, evaluator, trainer, and consultant on applied projects around the country focusing on election administration, community building, and community-based problem-solving.

**Doug Chapin** is Director of the Elections Research Team at Fors Marsh Group (FMG). Chapin joined FMG from the Humphrey School of Public Affairs at the University of Minnesota, where he served as the founder and first director of the Program for Excellence in Election Administration. He also served as Director of Election Initiatives for the Pew Center on the States and was the founder of electionline.org, still the nation's premier source of nonpartisan news and information about election administration across the United States. Chapin has a Juris Doctorate (JD) from Georgetown University, a Master of Public Administration from Harvard University's John F. Kennedy School of Government, and a bachelor's degree in Politics from Princeton University.

**Donetta Davidson** has over 40 years of experience in election administration on local, state, and federal levels. She has served as a county clerk, Colorado State Elections Director, Colorado Secretary of State, and was appointed by the US President to serve two terms on the US Election Assistance Commission. Davidson spent eight years on the US Elections Technical Guidance Development Committee. Her experiences fuse a broad knowledge of election law, election best practices, election technologies, and actual, in-the-field experience administering secure and transparent elections successfully.

**Shauna Dozier** serves as the director for the Clayton County, Georgia Board of Elections and Registration for 191,000 voters in Jonesboro, Georgia. She has served as the voter education coordinator for the Georgia Secretary of State, as the assistant supervisor of elections for 55,000 voters in Rockdale County, and as the registration chief for 740,000 voters in Fulton County. Dozier earned her bachelor's degree in political science from North Carolina Central University. She is a graduate of the Auburn University/Election Center Certified Elections Registration Administrator (CERA) program.

**Lauri Ealom** is the democratic director for the Board of Elections in Kansas City, Missouri. Hired in 2012 as a seasonal staff member, she was quickly immersed in all departments during that year's election cycle, giving her an in-depth knowledge of all facets of election administration. Ealom is a strong believer of making elections and election administration practices inclusive and transparent to strengthen voter trust and participation in our democracy. She received her undergraduate degree from Clark Atlanta University and is also a graduate of the Auburn University/Election Center Certified Elections Registration Administrator (CERA) program.

**Lori Edwards** is the Supervisor of Elections for Polk County, Florida. Edwards was first elected to this post in 2000 and is responsible for administering fair elections, maintaining voter rolls, and providing voter registration services for this Central Florida jurisdiction. She is past President of the Florida State Association of Supervisors of Elections. Prior to her service in election administration, she served in the Florida Legislature for four terms, where her major projects included performance-based budgeting and restructuring of Florida's juvenile justice system. Edwards earned a bachelor's degree in business administration from Warner University and is a graduate of the Auburn University/Election Center Certified Elections Registration Administrator (CERA) program. She was awarded a professional certificate in electoral processes by the International Centre for Parliamentary Studies.

**Blake Evans** earned his master's degree in public administration, graduate certificate in election administration, and bachelor's degree in communication with a minor in community and civic engagement from Auburn University. He worked with the Escambia County Supervisor of Elections Office in Florida from August 2015 to March 2019. While there, he managed polling locations, trained election workers, supervised daily warehouse operations, led Geographic Information System (GIS) projects, and performed a variety of data analysis. Since March 2019, he has worked as Elections Chief with the Fulton County Department of Registration and Elections in Georgia.

**Lindsey Forson** is the Cybersecurity Program Manager for the National Association of Secretaries of State (NASS). In this role, she manages the association's information relationships related to cybersecurity issues in both election administration and other functions of offices of secretaries of state, collects relevant information and distributes it to Secretaries of State and their IT staff, and staffs the NASS Cybersecurity Committee. Forson is also a PhD candidate in Auburn University's Public Administration and Public Policy Program with a research focus on security and emergency preparedness in US election administration. She has previous professional experience in government affairs for a professional association as well as in education.

**Susan Gill** was elected in 1997 and continues to hold the office of Citrus County Supervisor of Elections. She is a Florida State Certified Supervisor of Elections and a Master Florida Certified Professional. A past president of the Florida State Association of Supervisors of Elections, Gill is a member of the Election Center Board serving as the vice-chair. She is a graduate of the Auburn University/Election Center Certified Elections Registration Administrator (CERA) program.

**Sean Greene** lives in Rome, Italy, and consults on issues related to US election administration. He formerly oversaw the research of the US Election Assistance Commission (EAC), including the Election Administration and Voting Survey, the agency's biannual survey which collects the most comprehensive nationwide data about election administration in the United States. Prior to joining the EAC in 2016, Greene was a project director at the Pew Charitable Trusts, managing the research of their Election Initiatives Program.

**Kathleen Hale** JD, PhD, is Professor of Political Science at Auburn University where she directs its Graduate Program in Election Administration. She is the Series Editor for Palgrave Macmillan's Elections, Voting, and Technology series. Her research examines how to improve government capacity, particularly in the area of election administration operations. Hale serves on the Board of Directors of the Election Center and directs faculty involvement in the Certified Elections Registration Administrator (CERA) program. She is an active instructor in the CERA program and frequent speaker on election matters around the country. She serves as an active reviewer for journals and book manuscripts and is a member of the advisory board for the MIT Election Data Sciences Lab.

**Ernest Hawkins** is an election consultant. He has worked on voter registration and elections consulting and research projects in numerous election jurisdictions, including work with the New York City Board of Elections. He has taught in the Registered Election Official Certification Program offered by the Election Center. From 1980 to 2003, he was appointed Registrar of Voters for Sacramento, California. From 1976 to 1980, he served as Senior Administrative Analyst in the Registrar of Voters office. Hawkins has held numerous positions with the Election Center and has been on its Board of Directors since its inception. He has chaired the Board for the last 20-plus years, a position he retired from in April 2019. He was also their Conference Programming Director and continues to direct their Consulting Services Division. He was the National Association of County Recorders and Clerks President in 2000–2001. He has served on the Board of Directors for both the National Association of Counties (NACo) and the National Association of County Recorders, Election Officials and Clerks (NACRC). He co-chaired the NACo/NACRC Election Reform Commission, which published its recommendations in 2001. He served on the Federal Election Commission's Advisory Panel and was a member of the Advisory Board for the US Election Assistance Commission. He served on the Advisory Board for electionline.org. Hawkins holds both a Bachelor of Science and an MBA from California State University in Sacramento; he is a Certified Public Official with a concentration in Elections Administration and is a Certified Elections Registration Administrator (CERA).

**Alice Jarboe** recently retired from the County of Sacramento after more than 27 years of service. As Interim Registrar of Voters, she led the successful implementation of the Voter's Choice Act in Sacramento County, the largest of the five counties changing to the new "Vote Center" voting model. This model improved access to voting for all the County's residents in the June 2018 election by mailing ballots to all voters, expanding online ballot access for voters with disabilities, and establishing "vote anywhere" vote centers in place of assigned polling places. As Assistant Registrar of Voters, she helped guide Sacramento County's implementation of optical scan voting in 2004. Over the past years, she worked to streamline election activities while maintaining the integrity of the election process. She worked with the Board of Supervisors on the County's 2010 redistricting project and with the County's Disability Advisory Committee to provide online accessible voting material. Jarboe stays active in state and national election organizations and has received both State CalPEAC (California Professional Election Administrator Certificate) and National CERA (Certified Elections Registration Administrator) certifications. She also holds a Bachelor of Science degree from California State University, Sacramento.

**Kamanzi Kalisa** is an election policy and project management professional who served as the Director of Election Policy and Programming for the Council of State Governments from 2014 to 2018. In that role, he oversaw a national working group of esteemed and prominent elected officials, policymakers, and academics exploring cybersecurity challenges and threats impacting US elections in the states, in partnership with the Democracy Fund. In addition, he also directed the Council of State Government's Overseas Voting Initiative, a partnership with the US Department of Defense's Federal Voting Assistance Program that promoted best practices and innovative policy solutions in an effort to improve the voting process for over 5 million US military and civilian overseas voters. Previously, Kalisa directed the Help America Vote Act Program for the Georgia Secretary of State based out of Atlanta, with an \$85 million budget for elections administration in 881 local jurisdictions in the State of Georgia. Kalisa holds a bachelor's degree in political science from Tufts University and a master's degree in public administration from the Andrew Young School of Policy Studies at Georgia State University.

**Bridgett A. King** PhD, is an assistant professor and director of the Master of Public Administration Program at Auburn University. She teaches graduate and undergraduate courses in state institutions and policy, public policy, and diversity in public administration. Her research focuses on political participation, voter disenfranchisement, and citizen perceptions of the electoral system. Formerly a voting rights researcher in the Democracy Program at the Brennan Center for Justice at New York University, she contributes regularly to the Election Center Certified Elections Registration Administrator (CERA) program.

**Kelly Ann Krawczyk** is Associate Professor of Political Science at Auburn University, where she directs the PhD Program in Public Administration and Policy. She teaches nonprofit and public administration courses in Auburn's MPA and PhD Programs. Her research focuses on the relationship between civil society and democracy. Her research is published in journals such as *Nonprofit and Voluntary Sector Quarterly*, *Voluntas*, and *International Review of Administrative Sciences*. She has authored book chapters and professional publications for the Governance Commission of Liberia and the World Bank.

**Jill LaVine** retired as Registrar of Voters for Sacramento County on March 31, 2018. She worked in elections for over 30 years, and as Registrar for 14 years. During her time as Registrar, LaVine was the co-chair of the Legislation Committee for the statewide organization, California Association of Clerks and Election Officials (CACEO), and testified at the State Capital on election-related legislation. On the national level, LaVine is a member of the Election Center an organization for election officials and has made presentations at their conferences.

LaVine continues her work with the Election Center teaching classes and as the chair of the Professional Practice Papers. LaVine has testified before Congress on the paper audit trail and at a public meeting of the Election Assistance Commission regarding the accessibility standards for voting systems. LaVine received her CERA (Certified Elections Registration Administrator) from the Election Center in 1996 and her CalPEAC (California Professional Election Administration Credential Program) in 2006.

**Matthew Masterson** serves as a senior cybersecurity advisor at the Department of Homeland Security, where he focuses on election security issues. Previously, Masterson served as a commissioner at the US Election Assistance Commission from December 2014 until March 2018 including serving as the Commission's Chairman in 2017–2018. Prior to that, he held staff positions with the Ohio Secretary of State's office, where he oversaw voting system certification efforts and helped develop an online voter registration system. He holds a law degree from the University of Dayton, School of Law, and Bachelor of Science and Bachelor of Arts degrees from Miami University in Oxford, Ohio.

**Tim Mattice** is Executive Director for the National Association of Election Officials (Election Center). Prior to his current role, he was Director of Education and Training for the Election Center from 2006 to 2014. Mattice was Special Projects Coordinator at the New York State Board of Elections from 1995 to 2006. He has extensive training and program management experience working with state agencies and local county election offices, particularly in New York State. He worked as Senior Trainer for SUNY Albany Sponsored Funds Program from 1984 to 1995. He has also done training for a major New York State corporation. Mattice has a BA degree from the State University College at Potsdam and graduate work in Public Administration from SUNY Albany. He was awarded his Certified Elections Registration Administrator (CERA) designation from the Election Center in 2008.

**Amber McReynolds** serves as Executive Director of the National Vote at Home Institute and Coalition. Formerly, she was Director of Elections, City and County of Denver, Colorado. She administered elections in Denver for over 13 years and has worked in public policy and administration for over 18 years. She was named as a 2018 Top Public Officials of the Year by Governing Magazine for her transformational work in election administration. Under her leadership, Denver has been recognized by the Election Assistance Commission, Election Center, National Association of Counties, and International Centre for Parliamentary Studies for numerous innovations. She serves on the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) Election and Data Science Lab Advisory Committee, the Michigan Election Modernization Advisory Committee, City Year Denver Board of Directors, Lift Colorado Board of Directors, Democracy Fund Validation Project Advisory Circle, and formerly on the Council of State Government's Overseas Voting Initiative's Technology Committee. McReynolds is CERA-certified and holds a Master of Science in Comparative Politics from the London School of Economics and a bachelor's from the University of Illinois, Champaign-Urbana.

**Robert Montjoy** retired as a research professor and DeBlois Chair, University of New Orleans (2018); professor and Assistant Vice President for University Outreach, Auburn University (2004); and captain, US Navy Reserve (1995). His academic career combined teaching, research, outreach, and administration. At Auburn, he was the founding director of the MPA program (1985–1997), director of the Economic Development Institute (1994–2001), and Assistant VP (1999–2004). Montjoy has had diverse outreach experiences, such as helping Virginia legislators develop a formula for the distribution of state aid to local governments (1977–1979); coordinating the implementation of Harris v. Seigelman (1988–1990); helping to found and serving as the first president of the Alabama Technology Network, the state center for the US Manufacturing Extension Partnership (1995–2004); and serving on the government effectiveness committee of the Bring New Orleans Back Commission after Hurricane Katrina (2005–2006).He is author or co-author of numerous publications, both academic and applied. Montjoy remains active in efforts to improve the administration of elections, serving on national boards of directors for the Election Center and the Ranked Choice Voting Resource Center. He teaches in the Election Center/Auburn University professional education program for election officials, which he helped found in 1992.

**Mindy Perkins** serves as the president and CEO of VR Systems, Inc., a trusted provider of technology for the elections community for more than 25 years. As VR's first employee, Perkins developed the customer support, business development, and sales teams as the company expanded across seven states. VR is 100% employee-owned, and offers Voter Focus, a voter registration and elections management system, EViD electronic pollbook, as well as elections web software solutions. She is a graduate of the Auburn University/Election Center Certified Elections Registration Administrator (CERA) program.

**Noah Praetz** was responsible for running elections in Cook County, Illinois. He was responsible for the overall management of one of the largest election jurisdictions in the country. Each year his team served 1.5 million voters, facilitated democracy for thousands of candidates, and trained and supported thousands more volunteers. He is a graduate of the Auburn University/Election Center Certified Elections Registration Administrator (CERA) program. Praetz is an election consultant, working primarily on the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency's election security efforts. He is Adjunct Professor of Law at DePaul University College of Law and Advisory Board Member at the University of Chicago Cyber Policy Initiative.

**Tyler St. Clair** holds a Master of Public Administration degree from Auburn University where he served as Election Center Fellow for two years and also completed a graduate certificate in election administration. His research focuses on topics such as electoral integrity, political parties, critical infrastructure, and the social impact of infectious diseases such as vector-borne illnesses. Prior to completing his graduate degree, St. Clair earned a Bachelor of Arts in History with a minor in Political Science at the University of Evansville. At the University of Evansville, he focused on language use by political parties in Africa, specifically how this language influenced Pan-Africanism and the development of political movements across the continent. Prior to pursuing a graduate degree, St. Clair worked as an advocacy campaign specialist, focusing on public health and environmental organizations.

**Jim Terry, Kaylan Dunlap, Steve Flickinger, and Dan Woosley** are with Evan Terry Associates, LLC, a firm in Birmingham, Alabama, that is dedicated to providing clients with highly professional architectural services and is also committed to the "Universal Design" concept for architectural accessibility. Their architectural projects are designed to ensure access to buildings and facilities for all people, including those with disabilities. The expert ADA (Americans with Disabilities Act) team offers detailed ADA facility surveys, plan reviews, training, expert witness, and product consulting on a regular basis to healthcare facilities, large corporations, and federal, state, and local government clients. Their work with the ADA has earned the firm a nationwide reputation as one of the leaders in the field of accessible design. Evan Terry Associates has recently developed and launched the Comprehensive Resource for the Americans with Disabilities Act (CORADA), for the purpose of helping people to identify, understand, and meet their obligations under the ADA and other access requirements. CORADA offers an online database that connects ADA requirements and official technical assistance materials developed by the Department of Justice, the Department of Transportation, and the Access Board, to other relevant information such as products, how-to videos, expert opinions, design ideas, possible solutions, training opportunities, and upcoming events.

**Tim Tsujii** is Director of Elections for the Forsyth County Board of Elections in North Carolina. He serves on the advisory committee for the Center for Technology and Civic Life and was involved with the ElectionTools.org project. His office was recently recognized by the North Carolina Center for Geographic Information Analysis for the implementation of a polling place wait time tracking application in the 2016 general election. He attended the George Washington University earning a Bachelor of Arts in Political Science and later went on to earn a Master of Public Affairs from the University of North Carolina at Greensboro. He is also a graduate of the Auburn University/Election Center Certified Elections Registration Administrator (CERA) program.

**Virginia Vander Roest** is the training and communications manager for the Michigan Bureau of Elections. She has worked in election administration for nearly 20 years, with the first 12 years being at the local level for the City of Kalamazoo. Vander Roest obtained her CERA certification in 2005 and has served on the Election Center's Task Force on Training and Education, the Task Force on the Future of Elections, and on the Steering Committee for "Investing in Elections," a research initiative conducted by Auburn University faculty for the Election Center.

**Tom Wilkey** is a founding member of the Election Center and joined the Erie County Board of Elections in Buffalo, New York. He joined the New York State Board of Elections in 1979 serving as the director of Communications and Voter Education. He is responsible for the oversight of New York's 62 county election offices. Wilkey has served as an executive director of the New York Board of Elections, and as both a member and participant in numerous national committees involved in developing the National Voter Registration Act and the Help America Vote Act. Wilkey served as the president of the National Association of State Election Directors, and is a proud life member of the New York State Election Commissioners Association.

**Shaniqua Williams** is a student in the Public Administration and Public Policy doctoral program at Auburn University. Her research interests include social justice and equity, election administration, and African-American political behavior. Prior to beginning her doctoral program, Williams received her Master of Public Administration (MPA) with a certificate in Election Administration from Auburn University. While pursuing her MPA, her studies focused on the effect of felony disenfranchisement on black voter turnout. During her time at Auburn, she has served two terms on the executive board for the Black Graduate and Professional Student Association. Williams has been heavily involved in the mentorship of African-American undergraduate students who are interested in pursuing graduate education.

## List of Figures

## Introduction

*Bridgett A. King, Kathleen Hale, and Mitchell Brown*

**Abstract** As the American election administration landscape changes as a result of major court cases, national and state legislation, changes in professionalism, and the evolution of equipment and security, so must the work of on-the-ground practitioners change. This Open Access title presents a series of open access case studies designed to highlight practical responses to these changes from the national, state, and local levels. This book is designed to be a companion piece to *The Future of Election Administration*, which surveys these critical dimensions of elections from the perspectives of the most forward-thinking practitioner, policy, advocacy, and research experts and leaders in these areas today. Drawing upon principles of professionalism and the practical work that is required to administer elections, this book lifts up the voices and experiences of practitioners from around the country to describe, analyze, and anticipate the key areas of election administration systems on which students, researchers, advocates, policy makers, and practitioners should focus.

**Keywords** Election • Administration • Policy

B. A. King • K. Hale • M. Brown (\*)

Department of Political Science, Auburn University, Auburn, AL, USA e-mail<EMAIL_ADDRESS><EMAIL_ADDRESS><EMAIL_ADDRESS>
<sup>©</sup> The Author(s) 2019 1

M. Brown et al. (eds.), *The Future of Election Administration*, Elections, Voting, Technology, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-18541-1\_1

*The Future of Election Administration: Cases and Conversations* raises up the voices of election administrators from the local, state, and national levels across the country, as well as vendors and other experts involved in elections. Their perspectives are essential to our understanding of the democratic process, and it is vitally important that their stories are shared widely. Election administration functions have been under siege since the 2000 presidential election, and media accounts of the most recent elections of 2016 and 2018 have, by and large, contributed to a negative narrative about what happens on the ground. Wait times or long lines, voter rolls that are not accurate up to the minute, intricate processes such as election security protocols, how we handle voters who do not appear to be eligible to vote, how we determine voting districts, the time it takes to count (and recount) votes, the deficiencies of aging equipment—all of these have been oversimplified and positioned as emblems of a broken system. These stories present a more balanced view and will be used, we hope, to advance an informed conversation across the field, in the media, and among the general public.

In this book, practitioner experts discuss and reflect on some of the most important aspects of election administration today, including the influence of history on current practices, construction of the current architecture of election administration, challenges related to technology and security, professionalism of the field, and innovative tools that help the field address current and future challenges. This book is a companion book to *The Future of Election Administration*, which lays out the experiences of practitioner, policy, advocacy, and research experts and leaders across election administration today. The authors address current and upcoming aspects of election administration systems, describing, analyzing, and anticipating the key areas of election administration systems on which students, researchers, advocates, policy makers, and practitioners should focus. Both of these projects were developed out of the Auburn University Election Administration Symposium Series.

## The Auburn University Election Administration Symposium Series

These books are the culmination of nearly five years of dialogue that began with a series of conversations between public administration and political science faculty at Auburn University and election officials around the country (including the leadership of the Election Center, the National Professional Association for Election Officials) about how to gather these perspectives and present them collectively to critical audiences. The most obvious of these audiences of course include election administrative professionals in the field, the vendors who serve it, and the researchers who study it. But we also hope to reach the policy arena, where local county and township commissions, state legislatures, and policy advisors at all levels of government propose ideas and make decisions that affect election operations, as well as the media who cover this critical aspect of American democratic functioning.

The Auburn Symposium on Election Administration is a vehicle to convene an initial set of conversations between leading academics, practitioners, and advocacy groups in the field. The first gathering was held at Auburn University on September 14-15, 2015. Titled *The Evolution of Election Administration Since the Voting Rights Act: 1965-2015*. The symposium brought together a diverse set of more than 60 voices through plenary sessions, panels, and informal gatherings to examine how the field has developed over the past half century, the challenges that remain, and future trends. The Auburn University symposium series expanded in 2017, and faculty hosted *Inclusion and Integrity in Election Administration* on October 15-17, which featured the US Election Assistance Commissioners and data-driven conversations around the Election Assistance Commission's Election Administration and Voting Survey (EAVS). The goals of *Inclusion and Integrity* were to foster conversations about critical issues that impact American democratic institutions, support the development of common language across diverse professional communities engaged in the practice of election administration, and promote dialogue between those who conduct elections and those who study the way elections operate. Drawing more than 200 participants over 2 days, *Inclusion and Integrity* advanced the conversation with cutting edge (and controversial) topics including the lack of diversity in the election workforce, the difficulties in untangling financial aspects of election operations, and presentations by representatives of leading equipment and service providers in the field about security concerns and the future of voting equipment. Through 64 separate panels and plenary session speakers, participants discussed data and measurement issues around national surveys, voter access and participation, diversity, voting system vendor concerns, election professionalism, technology and security, costs and resources, measuring success, and emerging research in the field.

## The Future of Election Administration Project as Companion Volumes

Our publisher encouraged us to develop two companion books to capture the range of issues and voices in election administration today. The chapters in both *The Future of Election Administration* and *The Future of Election Administration: Cases and Conversations* reflect the presentations and discussions at the October 2017 Auburn symposium. As a whole, the project identifies several key themes of common concern to election officials, policy makers, and researchers. How do we equip election administrators with the knowledge and skills to operate effectively in a rapidly changing legal and technological environment? How do we equip election offices with voting systems and operating procedures that inspire voter confidence about the integrity of election administration broadly? How do we sustain access to registration and voting for all eligible voters? Underlying all of these concerns is an intergovernmental mismatch between resources and authority that must be addressed if modernization is to take effect equitably across the states. These volumes can be read jointly or separately as stand-alone books, but our intent (and our hope) is that they are used together.

### *The Future of Election Administration*

*The Future of Election Administration* addresses current challenges and the future of access and participation; challenges in professionalizing the work of election officials; and emerging and future issues in the field. Each of these is briefly described below.

Part I of the companion volume begins with an exploration of the historic components of American election administration and how these remain relevant today. Its chapters identify and analyze impediments to voting and how those have changed over time for different groups. Authors in this part also discuss the issues that present particular challenges, and offer prescriptions for policy change as well as for administrative practice.

Part II examines the professionalism of the field of election administration as an area of public service. The chapters include perspectives from the administrative professionals who run elections, professionals who work in the field as academics, and those who work as members of professional associations and other nonprofit organizations. The authors provide a historical and contextual discussion of the development of the public service professionalism generally, and the professionalism of election administration specifically. They lay out the evolution of the Election Administration and Voting Survey (EAVS), the Election Performance Index (EPI), and the Election Administration Professionalism Index (EAPI). Some authors take up the importance of common language and common data format across the field of election systems, and specifically, the challenges in building common terminology and data formats. Other authors take up the quality and composition of the profession, including the history and development of diversity and resource availability.

Part III addresses issues that have emerged recently as either challenges or opportunities (or both), the ways in which election administrators have responded, and how they are preparing to address foreseeable challenges in the future. Authors discuss equipment, acquisition, and security. They lay out the components of election integrity and how we attempt to ensure it. Authors take up the use of audits to increase quality and transparency. Additionally, there is a discussion of elections from a comparative context as a way to compare what is happening in the US election system as we attempt to modernize.

### The Plan of This Book

This volume tracks the three parts in *The Future of Election Administration*, and is comprised of first-person, practical case studies written about experiences in the field. These illustrative case studies bring forward issues addressed in the other volume through firsthand accounts of often complicated and compelling issues. Taken as a whole, the pieces speak to where we are today as a field and where we ought to and are likely to go in the future.

#### *Future of Election Administration: Cases and Conversations*

The cases in this volume are presented in three groups, loosely organized around the ways that historical practices and reforms are reflected in today's issues; the professionalization of the field and approaches to capacity building; and tools that have been developed for the field. Of course, the experiences of election professionals are multidimensional and not neatly classified into categories, and so the readings provide illustrations that link broadly across the spectrum of the field. That said, we find these categories reflective of the key current themes in the field.

Reflections on History and Links to Reform. American election administration is rooted in more than 50 years of federal prescriptions that address practices which imposed inequities on particular groups and, more recently, a tide of technological change. Cases in this part examine these themes from a variety of perspectives and a blend of experiences.

Robert Montjoy, former Election Director of the state of Alabama and emeritus professor from both Auburn University and the University of New Orleans, discusses how the state of Alabama proceeded to implement a federal court order throughout the state on a controversial issue. He sheds light on how a small, committed group of people on a tight budget were able to make substantial improvements in election administration and pave the way for future improvements.

Thomas Wilkey, former Executive Director of both the US Election Assistance Commission and the New York state election board, works with Donetta Davidson, former Secretary of State of Colorado and Election Assistance Commission (EAC) Commissioner, to discuss the impetus behind the federal Voluntary Voting System Guidelines (VVSG), its development and evolution, and why it continues to be important today, especially as the relationship between election offices and vendors become even more critical.

Kamanzi Kalisa, formerly the Director of Election Policy and Programming for the Council of State Government's Overseas Voting Initiative, takes up the work of that organization to improve voting for overseas citizens, military personnel, and dependents, and describes the process and its challenges.

Jill LaVine, Election Director of Sacramento County California (retired), and Alice Jarboe, Assistant Registrar (retired), describe the provision of language assistance for voters who speak languages other than English. They present their approach to service provision in a large suburban county including the challenges they have faced, and how they have partnered with the community to enhance these efforts, particularly as more demands are put on their offices with the inclusion of previously uncovered languages.

Bruce Adelson, former lawyer for the US Department of Justice, spent a significant portion of his career investigating election administration complaints across the country. Here, he discusses his work on evaluating accessibility issues for poll sites and voters. He recounts problems he has seen, principles for addressing those problems, and considerations for the field. Attention to accessibility is only expected to increase as an essential aspect of election administration as the voting population ages.

Cybersecurity has also emerged as an essential aspect of election administration. Matt Masterson, formerly a US EAC Commissioner and currently serving as a senior advisor for the Department of Homeland Security's (DHS) cybersecurity unit, discusses cybersecurity from a national perspective. He presents what DHS has done since the designation of elections as critical infrastructure in 2016, and what they hope to achieve in the future.

From the Voting Rights Act of 1965 to the present, election practices have reformed significantly to expand the franchise to all eligible voters. Public attention to election operations has not expanded to include the diverse perspectives of staff and the vendors who serve election jurisdictions. And yet, the lack of staff diversity and the relatively negative media treatment of equipment vendors may contribute to loss of public confidence in the overall election process. Lauri Ealom, Election Director in Kansas City, Missouri, writes about her career and diversity in election administration and its importance for enhancing voter experiences. She discusses the central place of a diverse election office to enhance official understanding of voter needs to create programs and enhance implementation to meet those needs. Shauna Dozier, Election Director of Clayton County, Georgia, continues this discussion in a case study that tracks her experiences in rising through the profession as a young election official to her work today, reflecting on the changing demographics of voters and election officials. Mindy Perkins, President and CEO of VR Systems, Inc., presents the current public relations challenges facing election equipment vendors. She details a firsthand account of the vendor experiences in serving customers and maintaining public confidence under conditions of system stress and heightened public scrutiny.

The current election administration environment is chock-full of changes in voting methods and discussions about which methods are more effective in achieving policy goals. Lori Edwards, Supervisor of Elections in Polk County, Florida, broadens this conversation by discussing the financial challenges presented by policy change and highlights concerns that are not obvious in the current conversations about election administration reform.

Of course, change in election practice is not limited to American elections; structures and operations in other countries inform our understanding of the benefits and limitations of what we do in US election jurisdictions. Kelly Krawczyk, Associate Professor at Auburn University details her observations of elections in Ghana and discusses the trade-offs between efficiency, transparency, and integrity and what we can learn for the US system from an international perspective.

Professionalizing the Field and Building Capacity. Election administration is a relatively recent arrival to the professional scene within the broader field of public service. Local offices face challenges in building capacity within the intergovernmental relationships unique to the field, and education and training programs have emerged to provide both content knowledge and practical training. Cases in this part discuss these efforts from the perspective of state and local election offices, graduates of university-based programs and professional training associations.

Ernie Hawkins, former Election Director of Sacramento County, California, and Chair of the Election Center Board of Directors from 1999 to 2019, discusses the importance of training, communication, and peer sharing for the field of election administration. He describes the advent of the Election Center and his experiences in communicating with public officials about the complexities of the field.

Lori Augino, Election Director for the state of Washington, discusses how she has transformed the state election office to improve election administration across the state. Using principles of authentic collaboration, power sharing, and streamlined communication, she illustrates how the office has increased the impact of state-county interactions and enhanced consistency and quality of elections in counties across the state through certification, training, and other processes and tools.

The discussion of the state role in building capacity through training is continued by Virginia Vander Roest, Training and Communications Manager, Michigan Bureau of Elections. She discusses the Michigan training program and the benefits that it brings to local election jurisdictions, as well as the challenges in serving more than 1000 counties and townships.

University-based curriculum for the election administration field has emerged, first through graduate certificate programs at Auburn University, and subsequently through certificates at the University of Minnesota. The Auburn program focuses on graduate education and this volume includes the experiences of several of its Master of Public Administration (MPA) and PhD students and recent graduates. Lindsey Forson, Cybersecurity Program Coordinator for the National Association of Secretaries of State (NASS), tracks her journey through reflections about how she became interested in the topic through her doctoral program training, and how that interest is converging into a career dedicated to advocacy and support. Blake Evans, formerly an Election Coordinator in Escambia County Florida (and now Elections Chief in Fulton County, Georgia), discusses the transition from being a Master of Public Administration student with a focus on election administration into the actual position and what information he needed coming into the job. Auburn University graduate students Tyler St. Clair (MPA Program Election Center Fellow) and Shaniqua Williams (PhD Program) discuss their experiences in Nigeria for the 2019 presidential election, and in participating in that experience.

Professional certification in election administration has been well established through a partnership between the Election Center (also known as the National Association of Election Officials) and Auburn University's graduate program in election administration. Tim Mattice, Executive Director of the Election Center and former training director for the New York State Board of Elections, chronicles the evolution of national certification for election administrators through the Certified Elections Registration Administrator (CERA) program and its subsequent iterations for election equipment and services vendors (Certified Elections Registration Vendor (CERV)) and election monitors (Certified Elections Monitor (CEM)). The themes of these experiences are augmented by a discussion about education and training from Doug Chapin, a longtime advocate for election administrators and now working at the Fors Marsh consulting group.

Tools for the Field. As the field of election administration has become more professionalized, examples are emerging that illustrate how to accomplish process improvements, leverage technology, and use data to its best advantage. Cases in this part reflect experiences of election officials and other professionals with customer service, organizing to meet cybersecurity requirements, tools that can enhance capacity for infrequent but critical procurement and redistricting decisions, accessibility improvements, the utility of the EAC's Election Administration and Voting Survey, and the value of data integration tools in meeting current challenges.

Amber McReynolds, former election official from the City/County of Denver, Colorado, and current Executive Director for Vote-at-Home, an advocacy group promoting mail balloting, provides advice for election administrators about how to improve processes by adopting an office-wide customer orientation to the work that election officials do, which she thinks will enhance the voter experience and by extension the quality of voting in the US.

Tim Tsujii, Election Director in Forsyth County, North Carolina, discusses the creation of a line management tool based on commercial offthe-shelf technology. Through illustrations of the pilot program and further evolution, he shows how it can be used to improve communication with voters to increase voter satisfaction and participation.

Noah Praetz, a former election official with Cook County, Illinois, and currently a contractor for DHS, discusses the challenges that cybersecurity protocols pose to election officials at the local level. He offers tools for establishing protocols that address the key dimensions of local operations, and that draw upon new national institutional architecture around technology security in election administration.

Procurement of major election system hardware and software does not occur frequently enough for most election officials, many of whom conduct elections using equipment and technology purchased years ago. David Bennett, Treasurer and Financial Officer of VR Systems, Inc. and former state procurement expert, discusses the procurement process from multiple perspectives, with an emphasis on the challenges of purchasing technology and how established processes can frustrate local and state election offices in getting the results that they are seeking. He presents ways in which election officials can build capacity to improve their technology acquisition processes.

Also relatively infrequent but critical is the process of drawing district and precinct lines. Kim Brace, President of Election Data Services, illustrates how to use Geographic Information System (GIS) tools to improve the work that election officials do. He lays out the history and attendant problems of precinct line maps and placement of voter residences. Brace implores election officials at all levels to educate policy makers about the negative impact of some of their redistricting practices on efficient and accurate administration of elections.

The staff at Evan Terry Associates, Inc., a firm that specializes in accessibility, continue the discussion of accessibility and poll sites. They use their experiences working with election offices in New York to provide advice for election jurisdictions across the country about how to resolve common physical barriers for voters with disabilities, communication and etiquette considerations with these voters, and universal approaches that can help election officials work with all voters.

Last, but not least, electronic datasets occupy a particular space in election administration. The national EAVS database and corresponding reports produced by the EAC provide one lens for understanding the strengths and limitations of data flowing through local election jurisdictions to state offices and then to the EAC and the field. Sean Greene, consultant and former employee of the EAC and Pew Center on the States, discusses the value of the EAVS today from a national perspective. Susan Gill, Supervisor of Elections in Citrus County, Florida, adds to this conversation with a view from the local level, discussing the challenges election officials have responding to the EAVS.

David Becker, Executive Director and founder of the Center for Election Innovation and Research and formerly with The Pew Charitable Trusts, closes out the volume with a case that traces his development of the Electronic Registration Information Center (ERIC) and its contribution to improving the quality of data that states use in maintaining voter registration lists. ERIC streamlines processes that states can access to synthesize voter registration data along with data from multiple sources, ensuring the accuracy of electronic voter registration databases.

In sum, these case studies represent the collective wisdom of people who have developed a significant body of professional expertise about the issues facing election administration today. They have worked in a variety of roles in American elections and their perspectives are informed by a host of experiences. Our contributors include local election officials, state election officials, national government officials, academics, students in graduate programs, equipment vendors, consultants, advocates, and representatives of third party groups that represent associations of election officials and other related constituencies. Nearly all of the contributors have served in multiple roles across government and the election system more broadly. Many were selected as election officials through direct public elections; others have been appointed by elected officials. Together, the collective wisdom included here provides us all with a more complete understanding of how to improve elections in the US and how to move the field forward in a way that enhances public trust, ensures integrity, and is efficient, accurate, and transparent. Elections are the way that we measure democracy, and election administration is the machine that runs elections; these voices are at the heart of that machine.

#### 12 B. A. KING ET AL.

**Open Access** This chapter is licensed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/ by/4.0/), which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence and indicate if changes were made.

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## Reflections on History and Links to Reform

## Inter-Organizational Implementation: Carrying Out a Federal Court Order in Alabama

## *Robert Montjoy*

**Abstract** Administering elections requires coordination among independent parties. The implementation of a 1988 court ruling in Alabama was an extreme case of this proposition. State and local officials, volunteer trainers, Auburn University, and the Alabama Cooperative Extension Service worked together in a compressed time frame to carry out new procedures for recruiting and training poll workers. The case illustrates the need for and the results of interorganizational cooperation in unusual circumstances.

**Keywords** Intergovernmental • Poll workers • Training • African Americans

Elections require the interaction of multiple agencies and individuals, sometimes in unexpected ways. This is one of those cases. In 1988, a federal judge issued a ruling in the case of *Harris v. Seigelman* that required

R. Montjoy (\*)

University of New Orleans, New Orleans, LA, USA e-mail<EMAIL_ADDRESS>
<sup>©</sup> The Author(s) 2019 15

M. Brown et al. (eds.), *The Future of Election Administration*, Elections, Voting, Technology, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-18541-1\_2

changing appointment procedures and training for Alabama poll workers. Implementation involved the offices of the governor, the attorney general and the secretary of state, the plaintiffs, the probate judges of 65 counties, Auburn University, Alabama Cooperative Extension Service and 63 volunteer trainers. By an unusual confluence of circumstances, I became the coordinator for implementation.

## The Setting

In the 1980s, Alabama's election system was decentralized and fragmented. At the county level, four different public officials and the local party chairs had various responsibilities for voter registration and elections. The important ones for this case were the probate judges, who were responsible for training poll workers and who served, along with circuit clerks and sheriffs, on the boards that appointed poll workers from lists to be provided by political parties. All of these officials were locally elected. No office at the state level had a role in their selection or authority to make rules governing procedures. The state attorney general could issue nonbinding interpretations of law.

In the early 1980s, Secretary of State Don Seigelman set about trying to strengthen his role in the election process. Lacking formal authority to issue orders, he obtained a grant to develop and demonstrate instructional materials for use by local officials in training poll workers. He contracted with Auburn University's Center for Government Services (CGS) to implement the grant. As an associate professor of political science and assistant director of CGS, I managed the contract. This gave me an opportunity to learn about Alabama election law and to interact with state and local election officials. In 1987, when Glen Browder became secretary of state, he asked me to join his staff, part-time, to assist in election-related matters. We worked out an arrangement whereby his office paid Auburn for my time.

Meanwhile, an important court case was developing. It arose in 1984 when two African Americans brought suit against the governor and attorney general over several issues related to elections. Among the most important was that blacks, particularly the poor and elderly, were intimidated by white poll workers. US District Judge Myron Thompson ordered that the case would be a class action including, as plaintiffs, all black citizens of Alabama and, as defendants, the authorities for appointing poll workers in all but 2 of the 67 counties. At the request of the court, the parties negotiated an agreement to appoint black poll workers in proportion to their presence in the voting age population. Very little happened, partly because Alabama had no administrative mechanism to effectively implement the agreement statewide.

In 1988, the plaintiffs returned to Judge Thompson seeking enforcement of the earlier ruling. In this case, they complained about the lack of black poll workers and about a state law that limited voters' ability to obtain assistance at the polling place. There was now a new governor and Don Seigelman had moved on to become attorney general. They wanted to settle the case. Secretary of State Glen Browder agreed to become a defendant and manage the implementation. The parties worked out a plan that became the basis for a new court order. I became the coordinator for the project.

## The Case

The court order required not only that the defendants cease discriminatory practices, but also that they undertake a positive program to overcome the effects of past discrimination. The program would include the following:

The program would last through 1992, three election cycles.

## The Training and Certification Program

There were just over two months between the court order and the 1988 general election. The court-approved plan left many practical questions unanswered, and it was clear that the defendants could not run back to federal court to get clarification every time an issue arose. So, the governor, the attorney general, the secretary of state and the plaintiffs each agreed to appoint a representative to an oversight board that could make decisions as the program progressed. As the secretary of state's representative, I served as the coordinator of the board. One of the best decisions that we made was to schedule a regular meeting each week until the fall election. We could always cancel the meeting if no decisions were needed.

Complicating the 1988 schedule was the fact that poll workers had already been appointed under state law. The oversight board agreed that the training program could not be expected to affect the appointment of poll workers in the first year of implementation. Instead, we reached agreement with the probate judges, who were by state law responsible for training and integrating new training materials into regular county schools for poll workers. The secretary of state contracted with CGS to develop the training materials and manage the program. The instructional program that we had developed under the earlier grant became the basis for the new one, allowing a quick response. We still had to modify the material to cover the new procedures for assistance in voting and to print copies for use in the schools. Meanwhile, the plaintiffs and defendants recruited volunteer trainers, who attended the instruction on how to use the training materials. The trainers, in turn, participated in 129 county schools for poll workers, handed out the new material and highlighted the changes in law and procedure.

After this first implementation, the oversight board held a meeting in Montgomery, the state capital, to get input from the appointing boards, all of whom were invited to attend. We used this information in the design of the first full iteration of the program in 1990. This time we held the schools in the spring so that we could certify attendees to the appointing boards in time to influence their choices of poll workers. The idea of certification raised the question of whether there should be a test to provide a measure of competence. The oversight board, including the plaintiffs' attorney, decided to include a simple test. It would consist of ten questions drawn from the material provided to the prospective poll workers, who were encouraged to use the material to answer the questions. Thus, the test measured the ability to read and apply instructions. In order to get the tests graded in time, we used scan sheets that were shipped to Auburn for reading. We would learn that some attendees, especially the elderly, were not familiar with scan sheets and had difficulty filling them in.

In order to ensure uniform presentations around the state, we created a "sound and slide" show. This was before the time of computer-based programs and Liquid Crystal Display (LCD) projectors. We used 35 mm slides and cassette tapes to give an overview of normal polling place procedures. We also provided a handheld flip chart (Fig. 2.1) on how to deal with unusual situations, including the need for assistance in voting.

**Fig. 2.1** State of Alabama poll workers guide

The idea was to teach the basic polling process and provide job aids to cover the major exceptions that could occur. The open book test was designed to give poll workers experience using the job aids. The probate judges or their representatives covered voting equipment and any other county-specific issues. Counties used different voting equipment—paper ballots, Automatic Voting Machines (AVM) and Shoup lever machines and, in one case, punch cards.

This plan required a substantial local effort. We coordinated with the probate judges to find locations and to set dates for the schools. Yet we needed additional local support for things such as providing and setting up audio-visual equipment, receiving and distributing instructional material, and collecting the tests and forwarding them to Auburn. For this purpose, we turned to the Alabama Cooperative Extension Service (ACES), which had offices in each county. As a land-grant university, Auburn housed ACES, and the director agreed to help us at no cost to the program because of their public service mission.

Meanwhile, we had to recruit and train the trainers. As before, each member of the oversight board was tasked with providing a list of names. Persons on the list were invited to attend one of seven train-the-trainer schools around the state. Those who attended were asked to conduct schools in one or more counties as part of biracial teams. Because the plaintiffs wanted to demonstrate a break from traditional county election administration, trainers were not scheduled to teach in their home counties. They would be reimbursed for travel and given a standard meal allowance, but not paid for their time. A total of 85 trainers, 63 volunteers plus project staff, conducted 145 workshops and administered tests to 13,616 prospective poll workers. Almost all (97 percent) of those who took the test passed and had their names certified to the appointing boards. The boards were then able to appoint racially balanced teams of poll workers and satisfy the requirements of the court order. The program was repeated in 1992 in substantially the same fashion.

## Lessons Learned

The circumstances of the court-ordered training program were unique and unlikely to be repeated. Nevertheless, I think there were a few lessons that can be used in other settings.

Communication was very important. We tried to keep all parties involved and to learn about and respect the constraints of local authorities.

Being able to get decisions in a timely manner was imperative. Unexpected developments occurred throughout the program and the project team had to be able to respond quickly. The creation of the oversight board and the pre-scheduling of weekly meetings proved to have been essential.

Volunteers could be responsible partners in public service. They were difficult to schedule because of time and travel demands, but once they accepted an assignment, they almost always fulfilled it. There were a few cases of automobile breakdowns; the trainers had to use personal vehicles and travel out of their home counties. Yet there were no cases in which a volunteer simply failed to show up without notice. And because the trainers were assigned in teams and we had backups available in project staff, we were able to conduct all schools, although with only one trainer in some instances.

Coordination was critical. The many different parties involved and the tight time constraints forced project staff to spend many hours scheduling and rescheduling to meet program commitments. Coordinating the volunteers was especially challenging because we were asking them to break their normal work or family routines and travel away from their communities, sometimes at night. We had not counted on the cost in terms of staff time to manage that part of the program.

The level of cooperation between state and local governments, between former opponents in the court case, and between representatives of different political parties was surprising and very encouraging. Of course, a federal court order is a big stick, but it never had to be used.

Election officials often face unexpected demands that exceed the resources of their own offices. Outside organizations and individuals can sometimes help in surprising ways. As has been demonstrated more recently in natural disasters like Hurricane Michael in 2018, individuals and offices from outside the normal realm of election administration can rally to meet unusual needs, in which case having a mechanism for coordination is even more important than usual.

**Open Access** This chapter is licensed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/ by/4.0/), which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence and indicate if changes were made.

The images or other third party material in this chapter are included in the chapter's Creative Commons licence, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the chapter's Creative Commons licence and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder.

## Reflections on the Creation and Implementation of Voting System Guidelines

*Donetta Davidson and Tom Wilkey*

**Abstract** For some, it may be difficult to remember a time when we had no electronic voting equipment—no scanners accepting paper ballots, no touch screens—whereas the voting system today is the result of decades of work by federal agencies and groups of election officials about voting systems and technology. We participated in these efforts over several decades in different roles over time. This case reflects our observations and experiences about how the current certification system came to be, and reflections about how improvements can be made.

**Keywords** National Association of Election Directors • Election Center • Voting system guidelines

D. Davidson

United States Election Assistance Commission, Silver Spring, MD, USA

Colorado Secretary of State, Denver, CO, USA

T. Wilkey (\*) United States Election Assistance Commission, Silver Spring, MD, USA

New York State Board of Elections, New York, NY, USA

### The Role of NASED

One of the keys to the current certification system is the role played by NASED, the National Association of State Election Directors. Formed in 1989, NASED is the national professional association of state chief election officials in the states, the District of Columbia, and the US territories. Both of us were involved in the formation of this group, and both served as one of its presidents during the early years (Donetta in 1994 and Tom in 1996). Around this time, it had also become obvious that standards would be needed for electronic voting equipment that was already in use and beginning to become more widely popular. The idea of standards had been discussed for about a decade, including a study commissioned by the Federal Election Commission (FEC), and its report in 1983 from the National Clearinghouse on Election Administration (housed within the FEC) that performance standards for voting systems were necessary.

NASED's role in standards began during conversations with the FEC as the federal agency was developing standards, which were published in 1990. NASED agreed to serve as the certifying agency for the new voting system standards. This meant developing the first handbook for voting system accreditation, which NASED did in 2001. It also meant accrediting a number of testing laboratories, and these were initially known as Independent Testing Authorities (ITAs), then voting system testing laboratories (VSTLs). The labs that were accredited evolved from labs that had been involved in similar work for the federal government.

During this time, the Election Center also played a key role. The Election Center is the only organization established for training election administrators and other election professionals. It offers professional certification through its Certified Elections Registration Administrator (CERA) program, which is operated in partnership with the Auburn University Graduate Program in Election Administration and its Master of Public Administration program. When NASED agreed to take on responsibility for voting system certification, it set up an Accreditation Board. The Election Center stepped in to assume the role of secretariat for NASED and the Board. These links provided election officials with a ready-made opportunity to share information widely across the Election Center membership, which reached local election officials and others in the election community who were not members of the national associations of state election directors or secretaries of state, NASED or NASS (the National Association of Secretaries of State). The Election Center continued as the NASED secretariat for more than 25 years, until 2018.

In 2002, the Help America Vote Act (HAVA) transferred responsibilities of the National Clearinghouse on Election Administration out of the FEC to the newly formed Election Assistance Commission (EAC). Related to voting systems, the EAC was tasked with the responsibility of developing new voting system standards that would now be known as voluntary voting system guidelines (VVSG), and implementing a national testing and certification program for voting system hardware and software. HAVA established a new set of administrative groups around voting system standards that replaced the functions that NASED had performed and expanded their reach. These included the Standards Board, the Board of Advisors, and the Technical Guidelines Development Committee (TGDC). The Standards Board has 110 members: 55 state election officials are selected by their respective chief state election official and 55 local election officials are selected through a process supervised by the chief state election official. The Board of Advisors has 35 members who are appointed by various organizations of state officials related to election operations, including NASED and the Election Center. The TGDC has 15 members including the chair chosen by the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) and the other members chosen by NIST and the EAC.

Both of us were involved quite a bit during the transition to the EAC and afterward. Tom was appointed in 2005 as the first executive director of the EAC, and Donetta was appointed in 2005 as a Commissioner, and Donetta chaired the TGDC during her tenure; both stepped down in 2011.

### The Help America Vote Act

When the Help America Vote Act (HAVA) was adopted in 2002, it created a situation where things were actually backwards if what we wanted were modern voting systems that satisfied a set of national standards. Instead of beginning with the creation of the first set of VVSG standards and requirements, and getting those out so that manufacturers could build the equipment, the approach was to tell everyone they had to have new equipment by a certain day. States in turn bought old, legacy equipment that some states are still using today.

At the time, there was a conflict between accessibility and moving away from old punch card type machines. The law was clear and had more about accessibility than security. At NIST there was an expert on accessibility, and there was another expert on the disability community on the TGDC. Together they pushed for accessibility to be a part of HAVA so that every voter could vote independently without any help. That was clear from the beginning of the creation of HAVA because it had to be done.

During the development of HAVA, it seemed like direct recording electronic (DRE), touch screen machines, would be better for accessibility. The activists were sure that they were not secure or accurate. The press picked up on this immediately and influenced the public's understanding of the DRE machines. Many counties went to paper ballots as a way to protect themselves from bad press and public opinion. Paper activists could be fairly aggressive at times. A few years ago, Donetta came out to observe one of the election audits in Colorado. When asked why she voted years ago not to require paper when Colorado uses paper today, Donetta remarked that some states had laws that allowed them to buy equipment that didn't use paper. She didn't want those states to be forced to buy entirely new systems. Further, at the time, the procedures and rules for handling paper were not secure across the states and counties.

### The TGDC

The TGDC faced several challenges including forming its membership and starting up a process. Both of these would be easier today because something is already in place, but at the time the structure was just a shell. At the EAC, we fought for a vendor to be on the TGDC, though a lot of people did not like that. But we thought we needed at least one vendor. Ed Smith was on the committee for the TGDC to represent all of the vendors, and he did a good job representing the entire community, not the particular vendor he worked for.

The process for developing the rules for equipment through the TGDC was hard and took a long time. We found that NIST had extensive knowledge, and that just blew us away. It was also challenging because it was easy for technical experts to talk over your head. They are scientists and work on testing on all kinds of things from rockets to election systems. It took a great deal of time for experts and election officials to find common ground on how to talk about things, and this improved over time.

There was one conversation about bar codes that was quite controversial. Election Systems and Software (ES&S) actually got caught putting bar codes on the ballot that related to the voter. The activists on the committee were up in arms about this. One advocate proved that she could track someone down to the voter name through the bar codes. ES&S changed this obviously, but bar codes are still controversial. They are still allowed, but cannot be used in ways that track them to the voter.

Part of the reason that creating the VVSG standards took so long at first was because we had to develop the process. Now each stage takes less time because the process is already in place. At one point, we had standards ready but we couldn't adopt them because we didn't have a quorum. Once they got a quorum, the commissioners decided to add more things before adopting them, which created an even longer delay. They did this because technology had changed, and then the new ideas had to go back to the Standards Board for approval. There is also a comment period, and additional time was added because of the federal Paperwork Reduction Act. The Paperwork Reduction Act was created before the widespread use of computers and requirements still applied at the time that caused delays.

The EAC timing for certifying equipment also took a long time at first. Some of what looked like delay on the part of the EAC was really due to the approaches taken by the vendors. Equipment vendors were bringing in equipment for testing before even testing it themselves and, not surprisingly, problems would be found. As a consequence, we at the EAC published a certification chart that showed the different stages of the process and how much time each took. This allowed observers to see that what looked like an EAC delay was in part because the vendor had to go back and correct problems which took them months to fix. Now vendors are so much better about checking all of their equipment and testing it before the equipment goes in for federal testing.

There is a vendor committee now, as well as an activist committee. NIST and TGDC members come to those meetings so everyone can hear them. The process has improved by having these groups involved. The TGDC is small and not much of its work is open to the public—they can come, but there are no comments from the audience. So it's important to have these committees and to listen to what the people on the committees have to say. This gives more input which helps the process.

The Advisory Board has not been very manageable because there are so many people on it. The Board has become wiser about how they do things, working in subcommittees, because when the whole committee is all together, the people with the loudest voices have the room. The representation on this is also important. In some states the Secretary would go, but if the Secretary wasn't that involved in the election side of the work in that state, the Secretary would send a staff member. This works in some cases, but not in others. And the rules require that no state can have two members of the same political party, so that also affects who is on the Board.

### Choosing New Equipment

Today, election system manufacturers will often have a variety of machines so they can work with the different demands from the states. These demands emanate from state law, the preferences of the procurement officials and preferences of the public. In addition, some states require certification from both the EAC and the state office. This costs vendors almost double. Some states like California have even more rigid testing standards. Certification costs are paid by the vendors and can be significant; the certification cost depends on how long it takes the system to be certified. The cost can range usually from \$50,000 to \$500,000, though in one case it went as high as one million. Small changes to state laws can cost the vendor about \$50,000 in certification costs for each occurrence.

State associations are also involved in the equipment selection and certification process. Some states have strong associations and others do not. When Colorado Secretary of State Wayne Williams wanted to adopt a new system, he pulled in the activist community, the county clerks who are the elected officials responsible for running elections, and the county commissioners. These groups all had the opportunity to weigh in on the vendors and give their opinions. Some of the vendors listened to the opinions of these groups, and some did not. This is what graded some of the vendors down in this process. Some of the counties tested these systems and we watched that process. Each state manages its voting system selection process differently. Some secretaries of state get very involved in this and have strong opinions; in other states, local election officials have more say.

### Conclusion

The national VVSG system has taken more than 30 years to develop to this point, and the entire voting system environment is entering a new phase. The states are looking at new equipment to replace the systems purchased with HAVA funds; virtually every system has ended its useful life in one way or another. New trends are coming, with the use of commercial equipment such as iPads and ePollbooks, and new processes like ballot on demand where voters are issued onetime use access cards that are activated to the voter's ballot style. With new methods come new and easier ways to assist all types of voters with disability. Security is also a concern in a new way, now that election systems are part of the US critical infrastructure. What we have seen through the development of this system, from the earliest stages with NASED, is that the election community continues to operate in a way that incorporates the information from technical experts along with the experiences and opinions of election officials who use these systems. From our experiences and observations, it would not have been possible to develop our current system without the many critical conversations that brought forward the input of local and state election officials.

**Open Access** This chapter is licensed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/ by/4.0/), which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence and indicate if changes were made.

The images or other third party material in this chapter are included in the chapter's Creative Commons licence, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the chapter's Creative Commons licence and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder.

## Improving Voting for Overseas Citizens, Military Personnel and Their Dependents

## *Kamanzi Kalisa*

**Abstract** US citizens living overseas as well as active duty military personnel have unique and long-standing challenges in exercising their right to register and cast their vote by absentee in US elections—lack of physical mobility, residing in remote areas, varying laws and policies, as well as limited access to voting information and the actual voting process. The complex US overseas election system is further complicated by the administrative role played by all 50 states, the District of Columbia, and the territories. This case study will explore the work of The Council of State Government's Overseas Voting Initiative from 2014 to 2018 and the initiative's efforts to improve the voting process for American military personnel, their families, and civilian citizens residing overseas.

**Keywords** Working group • Research • Best practices • Policy

• Data • Technology

K. Kalisa (\*)

The Council of State Governments (2014–2018), Lexington, KY, USA

<sup>©</sup> The Author(s) 2019 31

M. Brown et al. (eds.), *The Future of Election Administration*, Elections, Voting, Technology, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-18541-1\_4

US citizens living overseas have unique and long-standing challenges in exercising their right to register and cast their vote by absentee ballot in US elections. Many active duty military personnel lack mobility and live in remote areas abroad. Compared to US citizens living stateside, overseas citizens have limited access to the voting process. The US overseas election system is complex in design and administration as it involves the coordination of federal, state, and local governments to carry out their legal responsibilities. The time associated with transmitting ballots overseas and back as well as varying laws, policies, and procedures administered in the 50 states, the District of Columbia, and territories are other realities facing overseas voters.

To help improve the US military and overseas voting process, The Council of State Governments (CSG) in 2013 partnered with the US Department of Defense's Federal Voting Assistance Program (FVAP) to launch the CSG Overseas Voting Initiative. FVAP is mandated by federal law for establishing and maintaining a program to assist all eligible US service members and overseas citizens in registering to vote and casting ballots. The primary purpose of this \$3.2 million initiative is to improve the voting process for American military personnel, their families, and civilian citizens residing overseas. CSG is uniquely qualified for this effort as it maintains decades of experience convening forums that foster the exchange of insights and ideas to help state officials shape public policy. Founded in 1933, CSG is the only national membership organization serving all three branches of state government and offering unparalleled regional, national, and international opportunities to network, develop leaders, collaborate, and create problem-solving partnerships.

Serving as CSG's Director of Election Policy and Programming for over four years, I oversaw the convening and support of bipartisan working advisory groups of state and local election administrators focused on policy, technology, and survey analysis that promote evidence-based best practices as well as facilitate data standardization policy solutions affecting over 5 million US military and civilian overseas eligible registered voters. Previously, I served as the State of Georgia's Help America Vote Act Program Manager for the Georgia Secretary of State in Atlanta, with an \$85 million budget for election administration in 881 local jurisdictions in the State of Georgia. The Help America Vote Act is a federal election reform law which provides funding for states to modernize voter registration systems, improve election administration, expand disability access and voting technology for voters stateside as well as for those residing overseas (e.g., members of the seven uniformed services, members of US Merchant Marine, US citizens employed by the federal government residing outside the United States, and other private US citizens residing outside the United States). In that role, I had the privilege and honor of hosting international election observation delegations representing Rwanda, Japan, Ethiopia, and China that involved firsthand demonstrations of election administration, election campaigning, voting, counting and tabulation processes, and other issues related to the overall electoral process in the United States.

The CSG Overseas Voting Initiative Policy Working Group was created to examine military and overseas voting recommendations from President Barack Obama's Presidential Commission on Election Administration as well as other successful programs and practices across the country. This working group was a very important starting point for the Overseas Voting Initiative as it identified military and overseas voting barriers that election administrators could focus on and proactively address in their official roles without the creation of new laws or expanding their office budgets. The policy working group's recommendations focused on voter communication, voter registration, and US military community engagement.

With respect to voter communication, the policy working group recommended that election administrators communicating with US military and overseas voters use clear, concise, accessible written and verbal communications at every step in the voting process. Furthermore, election information and materials should be designed in a manner that makes it as easy as possible for all voters to understand. Specific suggestions include providing checklists to the voter explaining step by step how to vote and return ballots would help improve the overall voting experience and process. Also, state policymakers should refrain from prescribing specific language for voter communications into statute and instead provide local and state election officials with some degree of flexibility to tailor communications as circumstances require. The working group also recommended that election administrators make effective use of websites and social media (Twitter, Instagram, LinkedIn, etc.), create more user-friendly electronic ballot return envelopes, communicate to voters when the ballot application is accepted, and provide as much information as possible to voters about what is on the ballot.

With respect to voter registration, overseas citizens and the dependents of military and overseas citizens registering to vote can be difficult because of variations in state voter registration requirements and postal reliability problems in certain countries. The policy working group recommended that if states provide online voter registration for their voters then they should incorporate the same service for overseas and military voters. When this CSG effort first began, 29 states administered online voter registration systems, now 38 states provide this service and the number is climbing. The Federal Post Card Application was initially created to simplify the US overseas voting experience by condensing a voter registration request and ballot request into one singular form for use in federal elections. Since then, states have accepted the form but have placed varying validity timeline limits. The working group recommended that all states treat the Federal Post Card Application as a permanent request for voter registration and establish a default validity period for the ballot request.

With respect to US military community engagement, the policy working group featured and recommended existing and successful state and local partnerships across the country as examples to follow. Successful and innovative partnership examples include direct outreach that involves the recruitment of military spouses to work and volunteer in local and state election offices. Another example is, a focus on social media and the sharing of FVAP videos and written content on local and state election administration websites as well as working with military installations and their voting assistance officers (Fig. 4.1).

**Fig. 4.1** Overseas voting initiative

The CSG Overseas Voting Initiative's Technology Working Group was created to explore the role of technology in the military and overseas voting process and determine how technology can be used to make further improvements. States have long been innovators in the use of technology in elections. Identifying and disseminating best practices has long been a strength of CSG and this working group built upon the existing work pioneered in many states. The technology working group's recommendations focused on unreadable/damaged ballot duplication, common access card/digital signature verification, and data standardization/performance metrics.

In all 50 states, the District of Columbia, and territories, certain qualified voters can cast paper ballots using a vote by mail or absentee voting process. Many of these voters are in fact US military and overseas voters. According to the US Election Assistance Commission's Election Administration and Voting Survey, in the last midterm national election (November 2014), more than 14 million absentee ballots were cast nationwide. Through the course of a ballot's delivery from a voter overseas to their local election office stateside for tabulation, a ballot can be torn or damaged, accrue coffee spills, wrinkles, and tears. Ballots can also be filled out using inappropriate marking devices. With respect to unreadable/damaged ballot duplication, the technology working group recommended that states and local jurisdictions administer a ballot duplication process for unreadable and damaged ballots that is appropriate for the number of paper ballots they process. Also, whether a jurisdiction uses a manual or an electronic ballot duplication process for unreadable and damaged ballots, there should be clear procedures employed that ensure auditability. Technologies for ballot duplication of unreadable and damaged ballots should be easy to use and promote transparency not only for election officials, but for external observers as well.

The US Department of Defense is the largest employer in the world. The Common Access Card (CAC) also commonly referred to as the CAC is the Defense Department's standard identification for active duty personnel, civilian and contractor employers. It also meets the security requirements of two-factor authentication as well as digital signature and data encryption technologies. The technology working group recommended that all states should incorporate the use of CAC cards in the US military and overseas voting process by accepting the card's digital signature as a voter identity verification requirement. States and local election officials should also coordinate with FVAP to develop CAC digital signature educational resources to better inform voters about the technology and process.

There is an abundance of election information and data being tracked and maintained in the states that can be used to understand the effectiveness of the US military and overseas voting process. A long-standing problem has always been that states track, categorize, and identify voting behavior and corresponding transactions differently which doesn't allow for an accurate apples-to-apples comparative analysis. To address this issue, the technology working group recommended that state and local election officials work with FVAP and the US Election Assistance Commission to adopt and implement the Election Administration and Voting Survey Section B Data Standard, recognizing that it is the best vehicle for standardizing military and overseas voting data being tracked in the 50 states, the District of Columbia, and territories. The working group also recommended that CSG and state election officials should work with FVAP to identify a method or partner agency that can support automated data collection and validation to ensure the continued use of this standard that solely focuses on the US military and overseas voting community. Lastly, FVAP should continue to work cooperatively with the US Election Assistance Commission and the National Institute of Standards and Technology to establish data repositories and related standards to support the long-term sustainability of the Election Administration and Voting Survey Section B Data Standard.

All the work detailed in this article made significant progress in improving the US military and civilian overseas voting process. However, additional priorities were identified throughout the course of the work. Beginning this year in 2019, The Council of State Governments and the Federal Voting Assistance Program are partnering again to educate state policymakers about overseas voting issues. This new five-year, \$3.9 million effort will further help uniformed services personnel and other US citizens overseas vote in federal elections. This new partnership will allow state policymakers to better understand FVAP's mission and election administration best practices serving US military and overseas voters. In addition, the partnership will access better data to evaluate the impact of federal election laws as well as the market viability and usability of electronic blank ballot delivery systems in use in the states.

**Open Access** This chapter is licensed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/ by/4.0/), which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence and indicate if changes were made.

The images or other third party material in this chapter are included in the chapter's Creative Commons licence, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the chapter's Creative Commons licence and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder.

## Assisting Voters, Language Access, and the Role of Election Administrators

*Jill LaVine and Alice Jarboe*

**Abstract** While the federal government under the 1965 Voting Rights Act (VRA) Section 203 requires election jurisdictions to provide language assistance to voters, there is no financial support and not enough detailed information from the government to make this a success. Election jurisdictions must find the location of the voters through extensive outreach programs, mailings, and media efforts. This is a very costly undertaking and often still does not reach the voters who really need the assistance. If a jurisdiction does not meet the needs of their voters needing language assistance, they can be sued by the Department of Justice (DOJ). Community organizations and advocacy groups can be helpful in identifying voters who need assistance, but often they have their own agenda. Election officials want to assist voters for the right reason—so the voter can be an informed voter. But this can be difficult unless we have the information we need, the financial support, and without the constant fear of being sued.

**Keywords** Language access • Sacramento County • Language support

• Language advocacy organizations • Federal language requirements

J. LaVine (\*) • A. Jarboe

Voters for Sacramento County, Sacramento, CA, USA

<sup>©</sup> The Author(s) 2019 39

M. Brown et al. (eds.), *The Future of Election Administration*, Elections, Voting, Technology, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-18541-1\_5

Voters who are non-English speakers and whose native language is one that has historically been associated with discrimination at the polls (Asian, Alaskan Native, Native American, and Spanish) are entitled to language assistance under the Voting Rights Act (VRA). Sacramento County has been covered under VRA Section 203 for Spanish language for almost 20 years and for Chinese language starting in 2011. In addition, any California jurisdiction that has a non-English speaking population of any language that meets a 3% threshold is also covered under state law. For Sacramento, this means that there are five languages in addition to Spanish and Chinese that have language coverage, including Hmong, Korean, Punjabi, Tagalog, and Vietnamese. For our county's 500 polling places, about 200 of them are staffed with a Spanish speaker. We have about 20,000 registered voters who want materials in Spanish.

The concept of providing language assistance seems relatively simple provide voting materials to voters in English and another language—but it is a complex undertaking. On a primary ballot, for example, the possibility of 7 languages times 9 parties at each polling place means there could be 63 different versions of every ballot. The cost is high both in potential for precinct worker confusion and in budget requirements.

## Who and How This Work Is Done

The work of providing language assistance is part of everyone's job inside an election office. Outreach takes the lead on this, but registration staff has to correctly enter the information, another unit needs to prepare the ballot design, and another unit develops the precinct worker training. Still other units are responsible for adjudicating cast ballots, budgeting for the additional language support, and overall management of the language access program. There are also community groups that assist with registration and identifying needs. For example, the CAPITAL (Council of Asian Pacific Islanders Together for Advocacy and Leadership) group has meetings and election office outreach staff attend to encourage registrations. Much of this work is done by outreach staff after normal work hours.

One of the hardest parts of offering language assistance is planning the staffing needs for language speakers at the polls on Election Day. California law requires that a precinct worker is there the entire time, from opening to closing. In addition, we have an internal assessment to test workers on languages, and our outreach staff also tests the potential workers. Members of the Chinese community in particular will volunteer to come for a few hours to work on Election Day but not for the entire day. County and state employees like social workers are more helpful as they will work through Election Day and they are already certified in the language. If a potential voter comes to a polling place that does not have a language speaker to help them, we have a phone service, LanguageLink, a live language translation service that serves a voter in most languages, in a three-way conversation. The election office pays for this phone-based service out of the election budget.

### Issues with Outreach

One of the most challenging issues that election officials face in language coverage is identifying the voters who need language assistance and understanding their cultural needs. In some cases, people will read the same language but speak it differently (e.g., Mandarin Chinese and Cantonese Chinese), so, although these voters use the same printed ballot style, they need different audio versions. There are also differences in demand by age of voters. The older generation wants their ballots in Chinese; the younger generation wants their ballots in English.

The Department of Justice (DOJ) has suggested that the election office search its voter registration rolls for voters with particular surnames in order to identify group members and their locations. It doesn't work people intermarry, and change names, and surnames are dispersed across the county. We can use birthplaces because we get that information on the California voter registration form, but if they come to the US at an early age, they speak English. Birthplace information is not on the federal voter registration form, so if voters register through the federal form the information is not available. The Geographic Information System (GIS) staff take the birthplace information from the Census and mail information to voters asking about language preference. When that information comes back, registration staff marks the voter's file with their preferred language, and then input this into a GIS map so we can also identify which polling places will need that language support.

In the case of identifying those who may need Spanish assistance, we mailed out response cards to all voters—and have identified 500 from the cards. In addition, we had outreach staff at their community activities and groups. The resources we've invested in trying to find out who needs this assistance is tremendous.

We also had to quickly learn Chinese cultural norms before we could go to their outreach events. Colors, clothes, particular greetings matter at certain meetings—for example, we avoid wearing white because it is tied to death. We also learned there was a Chinese group that supported one political cause in China and they wanted us to advertise in their newspaper, while another group said, "Don't you dare or we'll not participate with you anymore." So we had to choose which newspaper would reach the largest number of voters in the most positive way with a limited budget.

Another issue occurs when we place the Chinese translation portions on our ballots. We put all three languages (English, Spanish, and Chinese) on one ballot and on all of our materials. If we place the Chinese version first, people get angry and contact us about the wasted cost. If we don't put all the languages on one card then we may not reach that one voter and the DOJ comes after us.

#### *Outreach*

Outreach staff have a tough job. There is a mismatch between the population the Census captures and the actual market for language assistance within the community. The Census data doesn't provide enough specific information about the particular people who need language assistance. This makes our job harder, and if we are noncompliant, we can be sued. The data from the American Community Survey (ACS) is organized by Census tract, however, California doesn't use Census tracts for voting precincts, they don't match up with district lines. ACS now reports population estimates from Census data every five years instead of ten, which will likely increase demands for language assistance and also give us more information.

Marketing to those who may need language assistance is also very challenging. We don't have a local Chinese paper or radio or TV station; these media outlets come out of San Francisco. As a result, anything we advertise or promote has to be generic; outlets won't pick it up if the information is specific to Sacramento only. There are no outlets for Tagalog, Vietnamese, Hmong, Korean, or Punjabi.

### The Role of Advocacy Organizations

In the beginning, we didn't have information on where the people who needed assistance were concentrated, and advocacy groups pushed us to do this work. In response, we mailed everything in two languages. The expense related to this practice was significant, as anything election related has to have a court certified translation in compliance with California Election Code.

Other advocacy groups regularly monitor our polling places to make sure we are doing what we are supposed to as well as what they want us to do. They provide us feedback after elections noting what needs to be improved, and sometimes this is helpful, though at other times the advocates are not correct and have their own agenda. We work with these groups to improve their feedback by attending meetings in which they train their observers. California Election Code is complex and the observers often do not know what to look for.

#### *Costs*

We do not have enough support to do this. We are pulled very thin. A Chinese speaking staff member has to work at the front counter, do outreach in the community, work at precincts, check voter registration cards, figure out how to enter that into our system, speak to the press, and go to citizenship classes to teach about voting. This is also true for our staff Spanish speaker. But we do not have the resources to pay them for all of these levels and types of work—all we can do is give them a language differential.

While language assistance is a federal requirement, there is no federal financial support. Support for language assistance administration comes through a statewide association of counties, the California Association of Clerks and Election Officials (CACEO). For uniformity in the state to comply with the language requirements, we have CACEO as a sounding board. We also run our procedures by our Secretary of State (SOS) for blessing on implementation, but they can't provide their official stamp of approval for legal reasons. While we are not required to provide all election materials in the languages that meet the 3% state threshold, we are to provide a translated ballot and attempt to find a poll worker to help. We are required by the SOS to report our efforts. The state is supposed to tell us which precincts voters who need language assistance are in based on the ACS data, but they don't.

We are providing language assistance to too many people—or at least it seems that we are providing language assistance to many more than need it or will use it. The Census determinations force us to provide Chinese language assistance but we have had only 500 voters request assistance. Without considering individuals, we are spending 80% of our money trying to reach the 20% of the voters who may need assistance. In 2013, implementing outreach and assistance for Spanish language speakers cost the county \$200,000. Our expense in that year for Chinese language outreach and coverage was equivalent. The expense for other languages is even greater.

## How Should We Fix This System?

It is most important to have language assistance on Election Day. During registration, staff have more time, but on Election Day, there is immediacy. It is a given that the election official will provide the opportunities. It makes sense to make the voter responsible for requesting language help, rather than making elections officials responsible for finding the voter.

There are also multiple voting system issues that come up when adding another language. The voting equipment that we use hasn't caught up to our needs because until just recently we only had one or two languages. Even though our voting system allows us to use different languages, font to support all the languages needed wasn't available or certified by California for use on the system. The vendors were not prepared for the multiple numbers of character-based languages on the same piece of equipment.

In thinking about the issues related to adding Chinese, for example, our voting system was not state-certified for Chinese. This means that our office in conjunction with the voting system vendor had to have the system retested and go back to make corrections. We were under a deadline to get this done but we couldn't get the Chinese piece to work. We really need some type of DRE (direct-recording electronic, or touch screen) machine for something like that—optical scan is simply too limited for the volume and types of languages we have now. But DREs have largely been banned in the state—we are only allowed one per polling place. In our county, we do have Ballot Marking Device (BMD) machines that anyone can vote on, which helps. We have a classification of "voters with specific needs" that covers language and disabilities and we have monthly statewide meetings to work on polling place surveys, accessibility issues, and language requirements, and so on.

A BMD has limitations with the different languages and the required audio files. To address this, we have to increase our BMD machines at each polling place, which increases the cost significantly, and we have to identify where to send the BMDs or send every type of equipment to every polling location. When we add the fourth language, we won't be able to do this, and we will have to target where to send equipment; this is where we get sued.

There is also a fear of the Department of Justice and the language advocates. When we get sued, it is the county that covers the cost of the lawsuit. It is easier to enter into a consent decree, but then we are bound by the terms of the decree for a specific term even if the issues are resolved or become nonissues in the following years. We never know where the advocates are coming from, and no matter how closely we work with them even above and beyond what is required in code—it is never enough.

We would like to get rid of the fear and actually just provide the service to those who need it. This is the right thing to do and We would like to do it for that reason.

**Open Access** This chapter is licensed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/ by/4.0/), which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence and indicate if changes were made.

The images or other third party material in this chapter are included in the chapter's Creative Commons licence, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the chapter's Creative Commons licence and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder.

## Accessibility Issues for Poll Sites and Voters

## *Bruce Adelson*

**Abstract** Polling locations that are accessible to all voters is a cornerstone of elections being free and fair for all voters. Although we often think of accessibility as it relates to voters who have physical disabilities, accessibility can also be related to the comfort that voters feel when entering the place that has been designated for in-person voting. This case discusses these definitions of accessibility and others that have been addressed by legislative action and decisions made by courts in the United States.

**Keywords** Voting • Accessible • Equal • Convenient • Comfortable

Voting accessibility is essentially about making voting easier, open, and available. Voting accessibility is often used as a term of art to mean accessibility to people with disabilities, without the presence of physical impediments to voting. Such impediments can be ballots without accessible alternatives for blind people and polling place doorways too narrow for wheelchairs.

B. Adelson (\*)

Federal Compliance Consulting, LLC, Potomac, MD, USA e-mail<EMAIL_ADDRESS>
<sup>©</sup> The Author(s) 2019 47

M. Brown et al. (eds.), *The Future of Election Administration*, Elections, Voting, Technology, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-18541-1\_6

Voting accommodations for people with disabilities essentially provide equal, level playing field access to voting so as not to infringe on "fundamental voting rights" and cause "irreparable injury" to voters. 1For voters with disabilities, accessibility to voting and voting accommodations include talking voting machines for blind voters, as a federal court decided on the eve of the 2016 presidential election. Failure to provide such machines "and all other accessible voting technology available for persons with disabilities" violates federal guarantees against disability discrimination.2

Accessibility, though, encompasses more than disability accommodations. Accessibility means openness, availability, the quality of being able to be reached or entered or easy to use. In this definitional context, accessibility is impacted and influenced by considerations of race, language, and culture. More than questions of legality and voting requirements, such as those of the Voting Rights Act of 1965,3 accessibility in voting also includes the very subjective notion of a voter not being discomfited when entering a polling place.

This subjectivity of comfort played out in real time in 2004, when a rural Southern county attempted to move a polling place to a building that had been a Ku Klux Klan (KKK) headquarters as recently as the 1970s. Although the county reportedly did not realize the history of its proposed new voting location, the same county immediately realized the problematic effect such a polling place shift would have on African-American voters, especially those old enough to have lived through this county's KKK and Jim Crow eras. These voters were so upset and adversely influenced by having to choose whether to vote in this problematic building or not vote at all that many planned to stay home on Election Day. This ostensible polling location was thus not "accessible" in the term's definitional sense to those voters, which is evident from the county's reversal of its decision to move the polling with the encouragement of the US Department of Justice.

<sup>3</sup> 42 U.S.C. §§ 1973 to 1973aa-6.

<sup>1</sup>*League of Women Voters of North Carolina v. North Carolina*, 769 F.3d 224, 247 (4th Cir., 2014).

<sup>2</sup>*Gray et al., v. St. Louis City Board of Election Commissioners*, Case No. 4:16-cv-01548, (W.D., Mo., 2016). The author was the Americans with Disabilities Act consulting expert for plaintiffs in this case.

Anecdotal examples abound of such accessibility affecting and influencing decisions whether or not to exercise the fundamental right to vote. The following anecdotes are among the most telling.

The San Carlos Apache Nation is located in southeastern Arizona and encompasses three Arizona counties—Gila, Graham, and Pinal, with the Pinal County portion virtually uninhabited.

In 2002, the U.S. Census Bureau determined4 through population analysis that Gila and Graham Counties must provide election information in the Apache language under Section 203 of the Voting Rights Act.5 Election information as defined by Section 203 includes: "any registration or voting notices, forms, instructions, assistance, or other materials or information relating to the electoral process, including ballots…. [The 203 requirements] should be broadly construed to apply to all stages of the electoral process, from voter registration through activities related to conducting elections, including, for example the issuance, at any time during the year, of notifications, announcements, or other informational materials concerning the opportunity to register, the deadline for voter registration, the time, places and subject matters of elections, and the absentee voting process."6

For Native American and Alaska Native languages that are historically unwritten, as is Apache, only oral assistance concerning election information and material is required.7