Florida: Election supervisors want up to 14 early voting days | Tampa Bay Times

Hoping to avert future voting meltdowns, Florida election supervisors will urge the Legislature to restore up to 14 days of early voting and expand voting locations. They also want lawmakers to limit legislatively backed constitutional amendments to 75 words on the ballot, a requirement for citizen amendments. Lawmakers' insistence on publishing the full text of several ballot questions, totaling more than 3,000 words, contributed to the longest ballot in Florida history and was a big factor in bottlenecks at the polls last fall.

Florida: Florida’s ballot problem | Herald Tribune

When Gov. Rick Scott recently listed ways he thinks Florida could reduce voting difficulties and long polling lines, he drew the most attention for a change of course in suggesting that more early voting might help. But another idea Scott raised may have more far-reaching implications for public policy in Florida, and might even be more difficult to accomplish than the politically volatile suggestion about early voting. The 2012 ballot was several pages in many places, most notably in Miami where voters had to wade through 12 pages because of a number of local issues. It was lengthened by legislators, who put 11 constitutional amendment questions on it, some of them written out in full. "In Miami-Dade County, the ballot read like the book of Leviticus – though not as interesting," said Senate President Don Gaetz. In short, "it was just too long," Scott said late last year on CNN.

Florida: Lawmakers file bills to reinstate early voting Sunday before Election Day | Bradenton Herald

In response to the long lines that plagued South Florida polls, two Miami lawmakers have filed legislation to reinstate early voting the Sunday before Election Day. The proposals by Republican Sen. Miguel Diaz de la Portilla and Democratic Sen. Gwen Margolis follow a recommendation from a Miami-Dade advisory group examining what went wrong in the November presidential election. The group made additional suggestions Monday, including allowing voters to return absentee ballots in person at their polling places on Election Day, and setting a goal for how long the average voter should wait in line at the polls.

Florida: ‘Obvious’ Voting Problem, The Long Ballot, May Have No Easy Fix | WLRN

When Gov. Rick Scott recently listed ways he thinks Florida could reduce voting difficulties and long polling lines, he drew the most attention for a change of course in suggesting that more early voting might help. The 2012 ballot was several pages in many places, most notably in Miami where voters had to wade through 12 pages because of a number of local issues. It was lengthened by legislators, who put 11 constitutional amendment questions on it, some of them written out in full. "In Miami-Dade County, the ballot read like the book of Leviticus – though not as interesting," said Senate President Don Gaetz. In short, "it was just too long," Scott said late last year on CNN.

Florida: A Growing Stack Of Early Voting Bills | WLRN

Republican  State Sen. Miguel Diaz de la Portilla of Miami was an early and enthusiastic supporter of cutting back Florida's early voting period from 14 to 8 days in 2011. He called it a "voter friendly" bill that would save money. "Generally, early voting in Miami-Dade County has not been very efficient, " Diaz de la Portilla said at the time. "What you see more often than not is that there is a trickle of two or three people a day at a very high cost to keep those public libraries and polls open. ... We felt it was an efficiency measure." But now that Floridians have made it painfully clear they prefer the inefficient trickle to the lengthy waits in long lines they endured on election day, de la Portilla has filed a bill to restore some of the early voting time that he voted to take away two years ago.

Florida: St. Lucie County Election Supervisor Responds To Report | WPTV

After a chaotic election experience that led to cries of incompetence, St. Lucie County's longtime elections supervisor talked about what went wrong in November, and what she plans to do to make things right in the future.  Gertrude Walker says this past election was full of new experiences. "We never had a multi-ballot election, that was another twist," Walker said Monday. But it was old equipment Walker claimed was at the heart of many of the problems her office faced on Election Day.

Florida: Sponsor of law that pared Florida’s early voting days proposes to add one day back | Palm Beach Post

The Senate sponsor of the bill that cut the number of early voting days in Florida from 14 to eight has filed a new proposal that would add back one day — the Sunday before Election Day – after criticism that eliminating that “Souls to the Polls” day was meant to reduce black turnout in the presidential election. But some critics say nine days are not enough for large counties, including Palm Beach, where some voters waited in line for eight hours to cast ballots in 2012. And the latest proposal filed by Sen. Miguel Diaz de la Portilla, a Republican lawyer from Miami who was instrumental in shortening the number of early voting days in a 2011 election bill (HB 1355), is a departure from what the state’s supervisors of elections are seeking.

Florida: Republicans file their first bill to address elections reform in 2013 | Tampa Bay Times

The long-awaited Republican response to the long lines that plagued many Florida precincts was turned in today. It's a bill sponsored by Sen. Miguel Diaz de la Portilla, R-Miami, that adds a day of early voting -- the Sunday before the election. The Republican controlled Legislature and Gov. Rick Scott had been criticized nationally for reducing the number of early voting days from 14 in 2008 to eight days. Though Republicans had been resistant to add early voting days as a way to reduce long lines before November's election, they have since said they would consider expanding the number of days.

Florida: Republicans rethinking election law | TBO.com

In the wake of Florida's Nov. 6 election fiasco, Republican state legislators and Gov. Rick Scott acknowledge the massive election reform law they passed amid partisan controversy two years ago needs to be revised. Scott, who signed the new rules into law and initially defended the conduct of the Nov. 6 voting, has since said Floridians "are frustrated" and the state needs "bipartisan legislation … to restore confidence in our elections." Republican legislative leaders who solidly backed the election reform bill two years ago now say it needs revisiting. "The only 10 laws that were divinely inspired and could never need any amendment came down from the mountain with Moses," said state Senate President Don Gaetz, a Niceville Republican.

Florida: Central Florida discouraged voters: Long lines at polls caused 49,000 not to vote | OrlandoSentinel.com

After working a 10-hour shift on Election Day, painter Richard Jordan headed to his east Orange County polling place at about 4:30 p.m. Based on more than a decade of voting, he expected to be in and out in minutes. Three hours later, Jordan's back ached, he was hungry, thirsty — and nowhere near a voting booth. So he left. As it turned out, his Goldenrod Road precinct didn't close until 11 p.m. "The line just wasn't moving," said the 42-year-old Democrat, who added that he now regrets not voting. "It was so depressing." Like Jordan, as many as 49,000 people across Central Florida were discouraged from voting because of long lines on Election Day, according to a researcher at Ohio State University who analyzed election data compiled by the Orlando Sentinel.

Florida: Ballots not counted, voters’ mistakes doomed thousands of votes | MPTV

The election ended on Nov. 6, but more than a month later, ballots were still trickling in. They won't be counted. They'll go in the stack of ineligible ballots already piled high with those that were missing signatures, or those from voters who showed up in the wrong precinct. In an election so crucial to voters that many were willing to stand in lines at the polls for hours, hundreds threw their votes away — mostly through simple mistakes. "That happens every election,'' said Broward Supervisor of Elections Brenda Snipes, "and it really is unfortunate.''

Florida: Three-step election reform | HeraldTribune.com

Here is what Gov. Rick Scott recently said, during an interview with CNN about Florida's elections: "We need to have bipartisan legislation that deals with three issues. One, the length of our ballot. Two, we've got to allow our supervisors more flexibility in the size of their polling locations and, three, the number of days we have. We've got to look back at the number of days of early voting we had." We couldn't have said it better. In fact, Herald-Tribune editorials focused on the 2012 general election have emphasized those same three points.

Florida: Miami-Dade grand jury: Absentee voting fraud clouds confidence in tight election results | MiamiHerald.com

Florida and Miami-Dade County should tighten rules for voting by mail and make it easier to vote early in order to prevent fraud and plug “gaping holes” in absentee voting, a Miami-Dade grand jury has concluded. To prove their point, grand jurors made an astounding revelation: A county software vendor discovered that a clandestine, untraceable computer program submitted more than 2,500 fraudulent, “phantom” requests for voters who had not applied for absentee ballots in the August primary.

Florida: Miami-Dade elections report: County to blame for some problems | Miami Herald

The waits of up to seven hours at some Miami-Dade polls during last month’s presidential election occurred in part because the county failed to estimate how much time it would take to fill out 10- to 12-page ballots, did not open more early-voting sites and decided not to draw new precincts this year as planned, a report issued Wednesday concluded. A last-minute surge in absentee ballots that overwhelmed the elections department staff, and a 12-hour Election Day breakdown of a machine that sorts the ballots also delayed the final results tally by two days, according to the department’s after-action report.

Florida: Charlie Crist trashes Gov. Rick Scott in Senate hearing over bad voting ‘joke’ | MiamiHerald.com

In a prelude to a long and bitter campaign, former Gov. Charlie Crist pointedly criticized Gov. Rick Scott during a U.S. Senate hearing Wednesday over an elections law that led to voting troubles and helped turn Florida into a “late-night TV joke.” Crist’s Senate Judiciary Committee testimony came just hours after a new poll showed he’s more popular than the current governor, who is preparing to face his predecessor on the 2014 ballot. Before and since Election Day, Scott has been under fire for an elections law he signed that cut back the days of in-person early voting and increased the size of voters’ ballots, which led to embarrassingly long lines.

Florida: Former Governor Urges Congress to Consider New National Voting Standards | The BLT

Former Florida Governor Charles Crist Jr. on Wednesday urged Congress to consider new national standards to make voting easier and more accessible. Speaking at a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing on voting rights, Crist, who was a Republican when he was governor from 2007 to 2011 and is now a Democrat, said senators should "think long and hard" about national standards that include a "lengthy" window for in-person early voting, and other "common sense provisions." In Florida, many people who wanted to vote early during 2012 election had to wait in lines for hours, making the state "a late-night TV joke," he said. "I think that what all of us want are free, open and fair elections for everyone," Crist said.

Florida: As Charlie Crist testifies before Congress on Florida’s voting problems, Gov. Rick Scott voices support for changes | Tampa Bay Times

Former Gov. Charlie Crist condemned Florida's election law before the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee on Wednesday, accusing the Republican-controlled Legislature and Gov. Rick Scott of bringing changes "designed to encourage a certain partisan outcome." Crist, who registered as a Democrat last week and is a potential rival to Scott in 2014, spoke of "horrifying lines" voters endured and called for a reinstatement of early voting days that were cut before the election. But a couple of hours before the hearing, Scott himself was calling for change, saying on CNN that supervisors of election need flexibility on the size of polling locations and that early voting could be expanded.

Florida: St. Lucie elections office plans personnel changes after visit from Florida Secretary of State | TCPalm.com

Florida's top elections official said he expects changes in the St. Lucie County elections office, and Supervisor of Elections Gertrude Walker confirmed Tuesday personnel moves are on the way. Walker reassured her plans won't cost anyone a job, however. "We're rearranging, that's all," Walker said Tuesday. "Nobody is going to be going anywhere." Walker said she'll be reassigning responsibilities in her office after Secretary of State Ken Detzner visited last week to discuss election woes. The changes will be specific to information technology and how votes are tabulated. They also will address redundancies, Walker said.

Florida: Governor Rick Scott admits voting errors | Pensacola News Journal

Acknowledging the debacle in counting all the votes in Florida election day, Gov. Rick Scott said the state must consider adding early voting days and shortening the ballot to avoid the long lines that plagued elections in some counties this year. Scott suggested in interviews Wednesday aired on CNN and WNDB radio in Daytona Beach that local supervisors of elections should have more flexibility on polling locations in order to allow for more voting machines where they’re needed. But the most surprising thing the Republican governor suggested may be that he and GOP legislators may have erred in reducing the number of early voting days from 14 to eight for the 2012 elections.

Florida: Former Gov. Charlie Crist to testify in U.S. Senate about Florida election law | Palm Beach Post

Former Florida Gov. Charlie Crist will testify about the electoral process in Florida on Wednesday before the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee in Washington. Crist left the Republican Party at the end of his gubernatorial term in 2010 to run for the U.S. Senate as an independent when it became apparent he would lose the primary to Marco Rubio. Last week he registered as a Democrat and he has told The Palm Beach Post he is weighing whether to run for governor as a Democrat in 2014. Crist has been critical of changes made to Florida election laws by the GOP-controlled legislature and Republican Gov. Rick Scott in the past two years.

Florida: Miami-Dade Group Meets To Consider Election Law Changes | CBS Miami

For the first time Friday, Miami-Dade’s election task force agreed to five ideas to prevent another election fiasco. The proposals are meant to avoid a repeat of the 8 hour lines to vote and days to count the votes. This is just the second meeting for the Task Force but due to an upcoming vote by the Miami-Dade Commission they forced the proposal through.  The commission will vote next week on a delegation agenda for their Tallahassee legislators.

Florida: Miami-Dade group stresses need to restore voting Sunday before Election Day | MiamiHerald.com

Miami-Dade County wants more early-voting days — but how many more is up for debate. Mayor Carlos Gimenez and his appointed elections supervisor, Penelope Townsley, asked the Florida secretary of state earlier this week to consider supporting restoration of 14 voting days, up from the eight days offered this year. But a county election advisory group agreed Friday to ask state lawmakers for only one more day of early voting: the Sunday before Election Day. “I’m not sure that you’re going to get 14 days out of the state Legislature,” Gimenez conceded.

Florida: Provisional-ballot law prevented little fraud but forced extra work | Tampa Bay Times

It's the most unreliable way to vote, a last resort in which half of the ballots are disqualified. Created by Congress a decade ago, the provisional ballot was intended as a final attempt to preserve the right to vote for someone whose eligibility is in doubt. Florida saw a surge in such ballots in 2012 even though turnout was nearly the same as four years ago. The reason: a much-maligned law approved by Gov. Rick Scott and the 2011 Legislature that, among other things, required people moving to a different county to vote provisionally if they didn't change their address a month before Election Day.

Florida: Provisional ballots spike, but Florida elections supervisors say they’re not needed | MiamiHerald.com

A new law resulted in a spike in the number of provisional ballots this election year. But elections supervisors say there’s no evidence they’re needed and they just cause extra paperwork. It’s the most unreliable way to vote, a last resort in which half of the ballots are disqualified. Created by Congress a decade ago, the provisional ballot was intended as a final attempt to preserve the right to vote for someone whose eligibility is in doubt. Florida saw a surge in such ballots in 2012 even though turnout was nearly the same as four years ago.

Florida: St. Lucie recount costs more than $20,000 | Palm Beach Post

Decisions by local election officials to recount all early votes cast before Nov. 6 will cost taxpayers $21,355, according to figures provided by the office of Supervisor of Elections Gertrude Walker. That expense includes at least $2,272 for sheriff's deputies, who ordered spectators out of the Supervisor of Elections Office moments after A Nov. 11 recount, then stood watch over crowds of disgruntled partisans the following weekend.

Florida: Elections chief, in St. Lucie, says recount deadlines may be too tight for counties to meet | Palm Beach Post

Emerging from three hours with the elections supervisor of St. Lucie County on Thursday— the only county that missed the deadline for filing final election results — Secretary of State Ken Detzner said he was concerned that current deadlines may not give counties enough time to complete recounts. Detzner said he has asked his staff to research the length of time other states give their election officials to conduct recounts. St. Lucie County missed the deadline by 8 seconds, Walker said. “Clearly when there is a recount, there needs to be a reasonable amount of time,” Detzner said, acknowledging that election workers in St. Lucie worked through the night to meet the deadline and that election laws need to reflect what is humanly possible.

Florida: Dems to Justice Department: probe Florida election law | Palm Beach Post

A divided U.S. Commission on Civil Rights will not convene hearings on Florida’s new election law, despite a request from the state’s six Democratic members of Congress, who charged that the measure intentionally limited access to the polls by blacks and many other Florida voters. But four members of the deadlocked commission – all Democrats – are independently requesting a U.S. Justice Department probe into the origins of the law, HB 1355, passed last year by the state’s Republican-controlled legislature and signed by GOP Gov. Rick Scott. And U.S. Rep. Alcee Hastings, D-Miramar, said Thursday that after four newly-elected Democratic congressmen are sworn in next month, bringing the state’s Democratic delegation to 10, he also hopes to take the issue directly to the Justice Department with their backing. “I’m going to try to get all 10 to sign on and we’ll see what the Justice Department does,” Hastings said. “After all, we have a smoking gun here.”

Florida: Elections chief defends voting laws as he begins listening tour | Tampa Bay Times

Hillsborough County election officials articulated some of the same points as voter rights advocates when asked Monday how to solve long lines and improve the democratic process at Florida's polls. Return early voting to 14 days, from eight during this year's general election, they advised. Don't tamp down voter registration by placing additional restrictions on third-party groups. And don't limit early voting sites to libraries and government buildings. The response from Department of State interim general counsel Gary Holland, on at least that last point: "Talk to the Legislature."

Florida: Absentee ballots rejected over signatures; more than 1,400 Central Florida votes thrown out over signatures | Orlando Sentinel

Marine recruit Wesley Layman Clemons thought he'd done everything possible to vote while he was in training at U.S. Marine Corps Recruit Depot Parris Island in South Carolina this fall. He requested an Orange County absentee ballot, filled it out, signed it, sealed it, stamped it and mailed it. Tuesday, he found out from a reporter that his ballot was thrown out — and his vote didn't count in the Nov. 6 election. The reason: His signature on the ballot didn't match an earlier one that was on file in the election office, a problem that caused more than 1,400 ballots to be rejected across Central Florida this fall.

Florida: What could go wrong when voting absentee? Plenty, it turns out | MiamiHerald.com

Absentee ballots are often touted as a pain-free, easy way to cast a vote without having to stand in long lines at a polling station. But nearly 2,500 Miami-Dade County voters had their absentee ballots rejected this election in what amounts to a wake-up call for those who ignore or fall prey to the pitfalls of not voting in person. In Broward and Palm Beach counties, about 2,100 and 1,400 absentees were rejected, respectively. A majority of absentee ballots were rejected because they arrived well after Nov. 6 at the elections office. Many voters were angry. They cast their mail-in ballots from home for convenience, only to face a greater inconvenience when their vote didn’t count.