[IP] Ohio Secretary of State Blocks New Voter Registrations
Begin forwarded message:
From: Reuben Halper <reuben@xxxxxxxxxxxx>
Date: September 28, 2004 3:09:05 PM EDT
To: Dave Farber <dave@xxxxxxxxxx>
Subject: Ohio Secretary of State Blocks New Voter Registrations
Ohio Secretary of State Blocks New Voter Registrations
By Jim Bebbington and Laura Bischoff
Dayton Daily News
Tuesday 28 September 2004
Boards of elections told to strictly follow two provisions.
DAYTON - Voters-rights advocates are criticizing two recent decisions
by Ohio Secretary of State J. Kenneth Blackwell that they say will
unfairly limit some people's ability to vote Nov. 2.
Blackwell's office has told county boards of elections to follow
strictly two provisions in Ohio election law:
• One requires Ohio voter registration cards be printed on thick,
80-pound stock paper.
• The other ordered boards to strictly interpret the rules regarding
provisional ballots, the ones cast by voters who move before the
election but are still registered in Ohio.
The paper-stock issue is frustrating Montgomery County Board of
Elections officials, who have a backlog of registrations to complete.
If they get an Ohio voter registration card on paper thinner than
required, they are mailing a new card out to the voter. But if they
still have the backlog by the registration deadline, Oct. 4, voters
will not have another chance to get their correct paperwork in, said
Steve Harsman, deputy director of the Montgomery County board.
"There is just no reason to use 80-pound paper," Harsman said.
In Montgomery County there is a backlog of around 4,000
registrations, Harsman said. A few hundred could be affected by this
provision, he said.
Cuyahoga County board of elections officials are ignoring the edict
because they have already had an avalanche of new registrations
submitted on forms printed on newsprint in The (Cleveland) Plain
Dealer.
"We don't have a micrometer at each desk to check the weight of the
paper," said Michael Vu, director of the Cuyahoga County Board.
Blackwell's office has given the Cuyahoga board a special
dispensation to accept the newsprint registration forms. The
requirement is because the forms are designed to be mailed like
post-cards and must be thick enough to survive mechanical sorters at
the U.S. Post Office, according to Blackwell's spokesman Carlo LoParo.
"Our directive stands and it is specifically in place to protect new
registrants to make sure the forms are not destroyed," LoParo said.
Confusing the matter further is a national registration form
available off the Internet at the federal Elections Assistance Agency.
That form must be accepted by Ohio boards regardless of what it is
printed on, Blackwell has said.
The heavy-weight paper was a requirement when the cards were kept for
years, were used to keep track of when a person voted, and were the
main way to check signatures to combat voter fraud and verify
petitions. But many boards, including both Montgomery and Cuyahoga,
scan the signatures into a computer database and no longer record
voting history on the cards.
The League of Women Voters of Ohio on Thursday called on Blackwell to
clarify his position. League national president Kay Maxwell said she
knows of no other states that are requiring the 80-pound paper stock
for voter registration cards. "This is the first I've heard of it," she
said on Thursday in Columbus.
The other directive forbids poll workers from giving a provisional
ballot unless the person can prove they live in that precinct. Peg
Rosenfield, spokeswoman for the league, said she interprets federal to
be less restrictive. Rosenfield says people who show up at the wrong
precinct should be given a ballot and allowed to vote on the non-local
races.
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