Washington

Articles about voting issues in Washington State.

Tab for Inslee special election up in air | HeraldNet.com

Apr 132012

State election officials learned Wednesday they won’t be getting an extra $1 million to cover the costs of a special election to replace U.S. Rep. Jay Inslee. Lawmakers did not include any money in the state budget they passed Wednesday before adjourning and heading home. House and Senate budget writers of both parties discussed adding a proviso into the budget to cover some or all of the estimated expenses but couldn’t reach agreement, said Sen. Ed Murray, D-Seattle, chairman of the Senate Ways and Means Committee. ”It was a last-minute thing. It was the last day,” Murray said. “It was a large number and there was no time to scrub it.” Read More »

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Washington Comments Off Topics: Jay Inslee, Sam Reed, special election

Obscure laws dictate who picks up tab for special congressional election | Kitsap Sun

Apr 122012

Jay Inslee and Sam Reed are both right. A special election to pick a replacement for Inslee in the 1st Congressional District could cost state taxpayers close to $1 million, as Secretary of state Reed says. But the extra election won’t cost that much, as Inslee says. ”The overall cost (of the 2012 election) doesn’t change,” Kitsap County Auditor Walt Washington said. Well, it changes a little, he said. Putting another choice on the primary and general election ballots adds maybe $5,000 to each election in Kitsap County. But while the overall bill is pretty much staying the same, the state is required to pick up a little more of the tab because it is a special election.  Read More »

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Washington Comments Off Topics: election costs, Jay Inslee, Sam Reed, special election

Details from political dust-up over “costs” of special election to replace Jay Inslee | News Tribune

Apr 112012

Why would it cost $1 million to have a special election to fill the final six weeks of Jay Inslee‘s term in Congress? The answer may be that it doesn’t. But that wasn’t the first question asked today. That designation went to Washington State Republicans who held a press event at the likely Democratic gubernatorial nominee’s Seattle campaign headquarters. In an event titled “Send Inslee the Invoice,” state GOP chairman Kirby Wilbur wants to know why Inslee won’t pay for the election he caused. Wilbur is trying to help the governor campaign of Republican Rob McKenna. Inslee triggered the issue when he resigned his seat in Congress to devote his time to the campaign for governor. The assumption was that the seat would go unfilled for the final eight months of the year and be filled by one of the people running to replace him in Congress. But Inslee resigned late enough so as not to trigger a stand-alone special election for his unexpired term. instead, whichever candidate won the full, two-year term would have taken office early to fill out Inslee’s unexpired term. Read More »

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Washington Comments Off Topics: election costs, Jay Inslee, redistricting, special election

Partisan brawl over cost of special election for Inslee's former congressional seat | Seattle Times

Apr 102012

Republicans continue to pound Democratic gubernatorial hopeful Jay Inslee over the expense of the special election to pick a temporary replacement for the 1st District congressional seat he abandoned last month. State GOP Chairman Kirby Wilbur called a news conference Monday morning in downtown Seattle to demand that Inslee pay for the special election. ”He could pay this bill, rather than stick it on taxpayers,” Wilbur said. Secretary of State Sam Reed’s office has estimated the special election could cost the state close to $1 million. But it turns out that figure is misleading. The bulk of that “cost” is merely a budgetary shift to the state from the three counties involved in the special election. Read More »

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Washington Comments Off Topics: election costs, Jay Inslee, Sam Reed, special election

Special election to replace Inslee for 1 month | Seattle Times

Apr 032012

Washington state will hold a special election in November to replace former U.S. Rep. Jay Inslee for just one month – an election expected to be confusing for voters, burdensome for candidates and costly for the state. Democratic Gov. Chris Gregoire and Republican Secretary of State Sam Reed said Monday that the state is required under the U.S. Constitution to hold such a vote to fill a vacant seat. Inslee, a Democrat, resigned from his position last month to run for governor. The November election, which will take place on the same ballot as the presidential vote and other state races, is likely to be particularly confusing to voters because Congress is also transitioning to its new district boundaries. The special election will be focused on the old 1st District boundaries that Inslee represented. Voters will also be deciding who will represent the new 1st District. Read More »

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Washington Comments Off Topics: Christine Gregoire, Sam Reed, special election

Local Washington GOP apologizes for turning 1,500 away from caucuses in Kennewick | Tri-City Herald

Mar 052012

About 1,500 people were turned away from pooled Benton County caucuses in Kennewick by event organizers after rooms at the Three Rivers Convention Center reached capacity this morning. Some potential caucus voters said they arrived at 9 a.m. to find the large hallways at the convention center packed to the rafters and were told no more people could enter the caucus rooms. Ray Swenson, a Richland lawyer, criticized local GOP officials for poor organization and said the results today should be invalidated. ”I think it’s illegal,” Swenson shouted to a gathered crowd, many of whom were filming him with cell phone cameras. “The Republican party leadership is taking away our freedom.” Read More »

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Appeals court upholds Washington state's open primary system | latimes.com

Jan 212012
Top_Two

In a decision that could foreshadow survival of California’s new “top two” primary system, the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals on Thursday upheld a similar Washington state ballot initiative that changed the way voters choose candidates in primaries. Both states’ voters approved measures allowing the top two vote-getters in a primary to advance to the general election, regardless of party affiliation. The format replaced closed primaries, in which each party chose a candidate for the general election. Read More »

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California, Washington Comments Off Topics: open primary, top two primary

Ninth Circuit Upholds Washington State Top-Two System | Ballot Access News

Jan 202012

On January 19, the 9th circuit upheld the Washington state “top-two” system. Here is the decision. The part of the decision about ballot access is very short. It quotes the dicta from the U.S. Supreme Court decision Munro v Socialist Workers Party that says the burden on minor parties is slight as long as their candidates can run in the primary. But it does not mention the holding in Munro v Socialist Workers Party, that there is no constitutional distinction between a petition for ballot access to the November ballot, and a prior vote test. Read More »

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Washington Comments Off Topics: ballot access, top two primary

Secretary of State Sam Reed asks lawmaker to trim election costs | Kent Reporter

Jan 102012

In an effort to save money and make the elections process more efficient during these tight budget times, Secretary of State Sam Reed is asking the Legislature to lower the cost of producing the statewide Voters’ Pamphlet, eliminate the primary for judicial races with fewer than three candidates, and implement other ideas to reduce elections costs for the state and counties. A second bill in Reed’s modest legislative package aims to reduce the backlog of out-of-state research requests for the State Library’s small research staff. The State Library is a division of the Office of Secretary of State. The third measure in the package would allow participants in the Address Confidentiality Program, which is also run by the agency, to register in a domestic partnership confidentially.

Read More »

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Washington Comments Off Topics: election costs, voter education

Computer ‘hiccup’ caused late ballots for local voters | The Issaquah Press

Nov 172011

King County Elections officials attributed the cause for late ballots to more than 11,000 Eastside voters — including more than 900 in Issaquah and Sammamish — to a computer “hiccup” in the days before the office sent out ballots.

The elections office sent ballots to the impacted voters in late October, about a week after other voters received ballots in the mail. Officials traced the delay to the glitch from late September. Read More »

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Washington Comments Off Topics: ballots, computer malfunction

Ballots’ journey juggles security, transparency | The Issaquah Press

Oct 272011
ballot-vote-county

King County Elections places a huge mail order each year. Officials must secure enough ballots for more than 1 million voters spread across a county larger than Rhode Island. Then, the elections office is responsible for ensuring a secure — and hassle-free — process to distribute, authenticate and tally ballots on a strict deadline.

The complicated process starts on a printing press in Everett and ends in a tabulation machine in Renton. The voter is situated in the middle, black ink pen at the ready. The job to print almost 1.1 million ballots is delegated to a commercial printer. The elections office oversees the process as Everett-based K&H Election Services prints and inserts ballots into envelopes. The printer creates ballots for King County and jurisdictions across the United States. Then, ballots stacked on pallets await shipment to voters. Read More »

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Washington Comments Off Topics: election security, transparency

Port Orchard’s City Council rescinds 'code city' resolution to avoid election cost | Port Orchard Independent

Aug 252011

Port Orchard’s City Council members faced a decision Tuesday that Councilman Jim Colebank equated with “blackmail” or “coercion.” They could reverse a decision they made for citizens that they believed to be right, or they could incur a cost of up to $30,000 to let the citizens vote on the decision themselves. They voted for the cheaper option, but they weren’t happy about it.

The council wanted to give city government the authority to operate in a less restricted manner, by changing the city’s operating status from “second class” to “code,” and voted to do so in late May after several sparsely attended public hearings on the issue.

But Gil and Kathy Michael, who run the Cedar Cove Inn on Seattle Avenue overlooking the waterfront, collected about 550 signatures to put the issue before citizens in the next election. Read More »

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Washington Comments Off Topics: election costs, special election

Voting by mail fails to increase turnout in King County | Seattle Times

Aug 122011

When King County shifted to an all-mail voting system in 2009, it was supposed to increase voter participation. A progress report published Thursday makes the tentative conclusion that it hasn’t.

“It is interesting to note that voting by mail appears to have made no difference in election turnout,” wrote Mike Alvine, the report’s author and an analyst for the Metropolitan King County Council. Turnout was about the same — about 53 percent — in two comparable general elections, one before and one after the county implemented vote-by-mail. Read More »

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Washington Comments Off Topics: Vote by Mail, voter turnout

Complying with minority languages requirements | From Our Corner

Jul 222011
WA Secretary of State Blog Voting

If you ever wonder why our state or a certain county provides ballots or elections material in some language besides English, it’s because we’re complying with a federal mandate resulting from the Voting Rights Act of 1965.

The minority language provisions of the Voting Rights Act were added in 1975. These minority language mandates are found in Section 203 of the VRA.  The way it works is that if at least 10,000 (or over 5 percent) of the voting-age citizens in a voting jurisdiction are members of a single language minority group and are limited-English proficient, that jurisdiction has to provide any registration or voting notices, forms, instructions, assistance, ballots and other  elections-related info in that minority language. Read More »

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Pierce County Washington's polls are closed, scanners sent packing - State now all vote-by-mail | The News Tribune

Apr 182011

There’ll be no last hurrah for Pierce County’s optical-scanner voting machines. No red-white-and-blue farewell to the last traditional polling places in Washington. No one-last-chance for 85-year-old Erika Cranmer of Lakewood to exercise the democracy she cherishes so by helping conduct an election at her neighborhood polling place; nor for 90-year-old Morry Kenton of Gig Harbor to make his 70th in-person trip to a traditional voting station.

We all knew the Legislature approved statewide all-mail voting last month, forcing Pierce County – the only holdout – to fall in line with the state’s other 38 counties. Close your polls, legislators said. All-mail elections are more cost-effective. Read More »

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Washington Comments Off Topics: paper ballot, Vote by Mail

Disappointing Reversal on Transparency and Security for Washington Elections | Verified Voting Blog

Mar 082011
VV_logo_128

A bill aimed at reducing restriction to voting for military and other overseas voters passed the Washington State Senate by a 47-1 vote on Friday.  Senate Bill 5171 contains many provisions that will certainly make voting easier for Washington citizens living overseas including moving the primary election date two weeks earlier and meeting requirements of the Federal MOVE Act for mailing of absentee ballots 45 days prior to the election. We strongly support those provisions.

However, the bill also will allow for the acceptance of absentee ballots returned by email and fax. In addition to requiring, by affidavit, that voters returning their ballots electronically forego the secrecy of their ballot, it also makes the state’s elections vulnerable to tampering and error.

Read the full article at the Verified Voting Blog

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From the Verified Voting Blog, Washington Comments Off Topics: email voting, fax voting, internet voting
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