Crunch time! Only one week left in the session and legislators must pass a budget, expand Medicaid or develop some kind of statewide alternative on the fly, and while they’re at it, fix the election law that caused a mess in 2012. And that’s just the top of the to-do list. The Senate passed an election reform bill Thursday and the House must vote on it next week or try again next year. The bill’s supporters say it would prevent a repeat of the last presidential election — the long lines, the long vote count and the long ballot.
The good news is the proposal would allow early voting for 14 days – up from eight days. The bad news is those added days of voting would be up to local supervisors of elections.
The good news is the proposal would allow early voting on the Sunday before Election Day, a voting day popular in the black community where churches often organize “Souls to the Polls” voting drives. The bad news is this, too, would be up to supervisors of elections.
The good news is the bill would mandate ballot summaries of no more than 75 words on constitutional questions. The bad news is all kinds of exceptions are included so voters might again face long ballots with pages of legal verbiage.
Full Article: Florida Elections bill moves from consensus to contentious | News-JournalOnline.com.