Pennsylvania: Lackawanna County’s old voting machines dropped off at recycling center | The Times-Tribune

Lackawanna County’s 525 touchscreen voting machines only tallied results for three elections before the state decertified them in 2007. Now, parts of them will find new life in other machines. The county dropped off the defunct voting machines at Lackawanna County Recycling Center on Wednesday, taking advantage of the operation’s free electronics recycling that runs through the end of the month. “I had hoped to find a buyer over the years, but I was unsuccessful,” Director of Elections Marion Medalis told commissioners before they approved disposing of the system.

Texas: State’s Tab Defending Voter ID $3.5 Million So Far | The Texas Tribune

More than five years after Republicans fast-tracked legislation limiting the forms of ID accepted to vote in Texas elections, state taxpayers are still picking up the tab for defending the nation’s strictest voter identification law in court. The state has spent more than $3.5 million defending the law in the five separate lawsuits it has spawned, records obtained from Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton’s office show. Whether that spending is a “shameful waste” or the cost of fending off the federal government depends on whom you ask. Paxton’s legal team is battling the U.S. Department of Justice, minority groups and other opponents who argue — thus far successfully — that Senate Bill 14, passed in 2011, discriminates against minorities, elderly and poor Texans most likely to lack acceptable government-issued IDs.

Zimbabwe: Electoral Commission: We Can’t Register Voters Because We’re Broke | VoA News

Zimbabwe’s electoral body said on Tuesday it was failing to register voters at any given time in lockstep with the country’s laws due to crippling financial constraints. And given its dire straits, the Zimbabwe Electoral Commission (ZEC) said it was only registering new voters in areas with by-elections. Critics say the failure to keep the process open is jeopardizing thousands of prospective voters and undermining the country’s electoral system.

California: How insufficient election funding can hold back voter turnout | California Forward

A recent post-election panel held by The Future of California Elections (FoCE) to assess the state’s recent primary election revealed a number of issues. FoCE is a collaborative statewide group funded by the James Irvine Foundation and dedicated to modernizing elections and increasing voter participation. As one might expect, the voter experience varied widely across the state but a number of problems related to potential disenfranchisement were called out including some confusion among poll workers and voters. Voters who registered as No Party Preference should have had the option to vote using a cross-over ballot in the Democratic primary. But, not all poll workers offered the alternative ballot and many voters didn’t know to ask for it. In other cases, voters also had mistakenly registered for the American Independent Party – thinking they were independent of any party – rather than registering with no party affiliation. Those voters couldn’t vote for any of the major party candidates.

National: Will your voting machine work on Election Day? | CBS

Voters in Polk County, Florida, will be using 16-year-old machines on Election Day this November, and they are either nearing or have already surpassed their average lifespan. The region, which encompasses parts of the greater Tampa Bay area, is one of many jurisdictions in more than a dozen states that are using voting machines that are 15 or more years old in this year’s election cycle, a report from the Brennan Center for Justice revealed last September. Two years ago, ahead of the 2014 midterm elections, a 10-member commission President Obama formed to figure out how to prevent long lines at the polls after the 2012 presidential election warned that the state of voting technology was an “impending crisis.” Lawrence Norden, a co-author of the Brennan Center report, told CBS News that while a lot of jurisdictions have bought new equipment or have developed plans to do so, there are still a number of places that are dealing with even older machines. An overwhelming majority of the country — 43 states — will be using electronic voting machines that are at least 10 years old in this year’s election, the Brennan Center report said. These machines last around 10 to 20 years before conking out. Many election officials, the report said, want to replace their aging equipment in the next five years, but a lot of them do not yet know where they’ll find the money.

Ohio: Senate bill causes voting rights controversy | Times Leader

A Senate bill was passed that would make it more difficult for citizens to petition a court to keep polling places open after hours on Election Day in Ohio. People seeking to keep the polls open after hours for emergency reasons would have to pay a cash bond to be determined by a judge. The legislation, Senate bill 296, was sponsored by Cincinnati Republican Sen. Bill Seitz and was passed along a purely party-line vote in both the House and Senate. It will go to the Governor’s desk to be either signed or vetoed. Regarding his legislation, Seitz stated “most courts to consider the question (of keeping polls open longer) have held that the courts have no power to extend Election Day voting hours because the legislature, and not the courts, set the voting hours. Sadly, in both the November 2015 and March 2016 elections, rogue courts in Hamilton County issued orders extending polling hours. These orders cost Hamilton County taxpayers $57,000, and forced the inside poll workers to stay around for an extra 60 to 90 minutes after already working a 14-hour day.”

West Virginia: Fayette County will stick with paper ballots | Fayette Tribune

Fayette County’s General Election results in November should come in more quickly than they did in this month’s primary, but for the county commission, moving away from paper ballots completely is not a viable option. County Clerk Kelvin Holliday said all three early voting locations will offer only electronic voting in November. Earlier this month it took county employees more than three hours just to run early voting and absentee ballots through the paper ballot machine. Final results were not released until after 3 a.m. The county expects to have six iVotronic voting machines in Fayetteville for early voting, which is the busiest of the three early voting locations. By switching to electronic early voting, they hope ballot counting time will be cut down, but making the entire election electronic voting only isn’t possible.

Arkansas: In 5 counties, ballot systems set for update | Arkansas Online

Secretary of State Mark Martin will provide an estimated $2.1 million worth of new voting equipment to five counties, his office announced Tuesday. The five counties are Chicot, Cleveland, Jackson, Randolph and Washington. The counties are scheduled to receive the voting equipment and have it operational for the upcoming school elections in September, the Republican secretary of state said. They will join five other counties for which the state this year purchased new election equipment, at a cost of nearly $3 million. The voting equipment will include new voting machines, tabulating machines and software. The counties will use the Express Vote Universal Voting System, which is a touch-screen machine, said Chris Powell, a spokesman for Martin.

Arkansas: State awards Washington County $1.2 million in new voting equipment | Arkansas Online

The state has awarded Washington County about $1.2 million of election equipment, said Jennifer Price, election commission coordinator. “We are getting the new voting equipment,” Price said. “We’re excited.” The Quorum Court accepted the equipment during its meeting Thursday. The county put aside $420,000 for the equipment. Election commissioners have said they were worried the state wouldn’t provide equipment in time for the general election Nov. 8, which is expected to have a large voter turnout. The county’s equipment is from 2006 and was starting to break down, Price said.

Arizona: Fewer voters in Arizona election, but latest cost $1M more | Associated Press

Fearing another botched election, Arizona’s most populous county opened twice as many polling spots for a special election this week than for the March presidential primary. This go-round cost about $1 million more, even though Maricopa County election officials knew far fewer voters would turn out to vote on education funding and pension overhaul plans. But those officials say the extra spending was necessary to rebuild lost confidence after some people waited as long as five hours to cast their vote for the Democratic and Republican nominees for president. The county cut the number of polling places from 200 in 2012 to just 60 in March to save money. Tuesday, there were 116 places to vote, county elections department spokeswoman Elizabeth Bartholomew said Thursday.

Zambia: Opposition Groups Unhappy With Ballot Printer Choice | VoA News

Zambian opposition parties denounced the choice of a Dubai-based company to print election ballots, and suggested that corruption and plans for vote-rigging played a role. The parties reacted after Zambia’s electoral commission announced Al Ghurair Printing and Publishing had won the contract to print the ballots that will be used in the August 11 general election. Jack Mwiimbu, head of legal affairs for the United Party for National Development (UPND), accused the electoral commission of trying to rig the polls for the governing Patriotic Front. He says the party has proof of some Zambians celebrating after the electoral commission announced the contract. He also questioned the cost of the contract — $3.5 million, a figure he says is $2 million higher than what the government paid previously.

Utah: State trying to decide how to run future elections – by mail, paper ballot or electronically | The Salt Lake Tribune

Officials are asking legislators how they want to hold future elections — by mail, by paper ballot or electronically — because that may make a difference of millions of dollars in replacing old voting machines. Mark Thomas, state elections director for Lt. Gov. Spencer Cox, said a committee is now studying options for replacing machines statewide that are nearing the end of their lifespans. A recommendation is expected early next year. But Thomas asked the Government Operations Interim Committee for some guidance on Wednesday. If the state helps to buy new electronic machines to conduct traditional, in-person elections with new machines at hundreds of polling places statewide, it would cost an estimated $10 million to $15 million, he said. But if the state moves to vote mostly by mail, the cost would be much less — $2.2 million to $3.2 million — for fewer high-speed optical scanners to count paper ballots.

New Mexico: Auditor: Elections are chronically under-budgeted by secretary of state | Albuquerque Journal

State Auditor Tim Keller, in a report released today, says the Secretary of State’s office has been chronically under-budgeting for elections over the past decade. Keller says that has led to the need for $25 million in emergency loans, grants and special appropriations from the state to pay for elections. “Repeatedly using emergency funding mechanisms for routine, regularly scheduled elections runs against commonsense budgeting principles,” Keller said in a statement. Secretary of State Brad Winter, however, told the Journal the problem is not that the office has underestimated how much elections will cost, but that it has been under-funded.

Kansas: Johnson County election process adds tech upgrades with iPads | The Kansas City Star

Voters in Johnson County, get your index fingers ready. You’ll be signing your name on an iPad when you show up at the polls for the primary and general elections this year. The voting process will go further into the digital age this year with new hardware and software to replace the big poll books the election commission has used for decades. Poll books hold a list of voters for each precinct. One of the first tasks of voting involves telling a poll worker your name to be sure you’re in the right place, then signing under the ruler in the poll book to record that you’ve voted. That will change this year because the county elections commission is updating its equipment, moving more of it into an electronic system. The Johnson County Commission on Thursday approved a measure to budget $936,000 to replace of administrative software and buy iPad Air 2 tablets so they can be in place by July for advance voting in the August primary. The county already had about $836,000 in an account reserved for new equipment. The action adds $100,000 to that.

Arkansas: Secretary of state says new voting equipment in the works | Pine Bluff Commercial

Arkansas’ voting equipment is out of date and Secretary of State Mark Martin said Tuesday his office is trying to improve it. Speaking at the Pine Bluff Rotary Club meeting at the Pine Bluff Country Club, Martin, who is in his second term, said that currently there are five counties in the state that have updated voting machines, paid for by reductions in his office’s budget. “We’ve cut $2 to $3 million from my budget and been able to buy machines without any appropriations from the Legislature,” he said.

California: Jerry Brown gives counties $16.3 million more for election costs | The Sacramento Bee

Gov. Jerry Brown signed legislation Friday that directs $16.29 million to counties to help pay for expected high turnout in the June 7 presidential primary and to process a coming deluge of petitions from groups seeking to qualify November ballot measures, including one championed by the Democratic governor. Assembly Bill 120’s signing comes a few weeks after Secretary of State Alex Padilla alerted Brown to a “surge” of voter interest in the June election because of the high-profile Republican presidential primary. As they plan for that, county election officials face the prospect of trying to verifying as many as 9.4 million petition signatures, Padilla wrote the governor. Orange County Registrar of Voters Neal Kelley called the money “a huge help.” “It absolutely goes a long way to assisting us in juggling this kind of perfect storm: the initiatives colliding at the same time we’re producing ballots and tallying ballots,” said Kelley, the president of the California Association of Clerks and Election Officials.

Arizona: Botched Maricopa ballots will cost taxpayers $400,000 | KPNX

Maricopa County taxpayers will have to fork over almost $400,000 to make up for a misprint on 2 million ballots in a May special election. Half of the money will come from the county recorder’s office budget, and the remainder will have to be approved by the County Board, recorder’s office spokeswoman Elizabeth Bartholomew told 12 News Monday. The botched ballots come in the wake of a presidential primary fiasco last month that saw hours-long waits in line. County Recorder Helen Purcell admited she “screwed up” by cutting the number of polling places by 70 percent from four years ago. The U.S. Department of Justice is investigating what happened. Separate lawsuits have been filed in county and federal courts, alleging citizens were deprived of their right to vote.

Wisconsin: Democrats Call For Statewide Voter ID Education Campaign | Wisconsin Public Radio

Some Wisconsin Democrats are calling for the GOP-controlled state Legislature to fund a statewide campaign to educate voters about Wisconsin’s newly enacted voter ID law. State Rep. Chris Taylor, D-Madison, was joined at a Capitol news conference on Thursday by the Wisconsin League of Women Voters and poll workers from across the state, who shared challenges some voters faced during the presidential primary earlier this month. The primary was the first real test of the law, which went into effect earlier this year after a series of legal challenges. Though Republicans have said high turnout proves the voter ID law is working just fine, opponents to the law point to long lines at polling places and obstacles some voters faced while trying to cast a ballot.

Arkansas: 7 election commissioners ask state for new poll equipment | Arkansas Online

Election commissioners from seven counties in Northwest Arkansas decided Wednesday to ask legislators to pay for new software and equipment before the November elections. Commissioners said they are worried upgrades won’t happen before the general election Nov. 8. Equipment and software are old and could break down, commissioners said during the Northwest Arkansas County Boards of Election Commissioners meeting. “We are in a dire situation,” said Bill Taylor, Crawford County commissioner. “The old stuff is gradually failing,” said John Lyon, Crawford County commission chairman.

Alabama: Runoffs consume time, money for low turnout | Times Daily

Rep. Mike Ball, R-Madison, said the simple fact is people aren’t interested runoff elections. “People don’t take them seriously,” said Ball. “Look at the participation — that tells you what people think of runoffs.” He referred to the lack of interest in the state’s April 12 runoff elections. According to the Alabama Secretary of State’s website, there are 1.35 million registered voters, but during Tuesday’s runoff elections just over 65,000 people voted. “It’s sad that this happens, but people forget about runoff elections,” said political science expert Bill Stewart, professor emeritus at the University of Alabama. Stewart said most states don’t have runoff elections anymore because they draw a small percentage of voters. That was evident in the Shoals. Out of 108,168 registered voters in Colbert, Franklin and Lauderdale counties, only 5,711 people voted in Tuesday’s runoff election.

Ghana: US to support Ghana’s elections with $4.5 million | Ghana Web

The United States government has pledged an amount of 4.5 million dollars to support Ghana’s election which comes off on November 7, 2016. The EC will be getting one third of the money for voter education and to support other activities relating to the elections. This pledge from the United States comes barely two months after the British government also announced a 4 million pound support to the Electoral Commission to help run an effective election. The Electoral Commission in December 2015 submitted a budget of 1.8 billion Ghana cedi to parliament for approval to effectively run the 2016 elections. Parliament approved 1.2 billion of the said amount but this was further slashed to 826.8 million cedis by the Finance Ministry on grounds that there is a ceiling on the total amount it can release for elections.

New Zealand: Time is running out for go-ahead for online voting trials | Manuwatu Standard

Online voting trials are looking increasingly unlikely to take place at October’s local body elections in Palmerston North, Whanganui and six other centres. The Department of Internal Affairs will only say a decision is expected to be announced “shortly”. But at least one Palmerston North City councillor is concerned that with six months to go, time is running out. The council has set aside $100,000 in the budget included in its proposed Annual Plan that is out for consultation. Cr Aleisha Rutherford, who pushed for Palmerston North to sign up for the online trial, said councillors were telling residents who asked in discussions about the Annual Plan that it was “highly unlikely” the money would be spent.

Florida: New law will boost supervisor of elections pay | St. Augustine Record

A new law will increase salaries of supervisors of elections statewide. But the St. Johns County Supervisor of Elections Vicky Oakes said she’s not sure whether she will take the increase, though she said she supports her fellow supervisors. The legislation, signed Wednesday by Gov. Rick Scott, is expected to raise supervisors’ salaries by a per-county average of $18,450, according to a report by the News Service of Florida. That’s more than $1 million statewide. The law, set to take effect Oct. 1, would change numbers used for salary calculation for supervisors of elections to match those currently used for property appraiser, tax collector and clerk of courts, according to the bill and Florida statutes. The formula uses county population to determine salaries.

New York: A $200,000 Ballot Error and Other Misprints at New York City’s Board of Elections | The New York Times

The New York City Board of Elections has a proofreading problem — and even small mistakes are turning out to be costly. The board was forced to spend more than $200,000 in overnight postage last month to send corrected absentee ballots for the coming presidential primary, after it discovered an error in the Spanish version of the ballot. The mistake was discovered around the same time the board realized it had made another error: A recent notice sent to 60,000 newly registered voters included the wrong date for a Sept. 13 primary election for state and local offices. The board then mailed out a correction that may have inadvertently confused voters about the date of the higher-profile presidential primary on April 19.

Maine: Bill Would Change Maine to a Closed Primary Gets Party Support And Push Back From Independents | MPR

The grass-roots appeal of Maine’s town-meeting style presidential caucus system has long been touted by Maine political leaders. But the heightened interest in this year’s presidential contests resulted in long lines at many of the local caucus sites, prompting some voters to turn around and go home. NOW A bill that would reinstate the presidential primary process first used by Mainers 20 years ago is gathering bipartisan support. During Washington County’s Republican caucus, the room quickly filled up and the parking lot was soon crammed to capacity. Rep. William Tuell, an East Machias Republican, says organizers had underestimated the level of interest in the presidential primaries. The aftermath, Tuell said, was not pretty. “Some traveled long distances to find out they could only vote in a short window of time, others got discouraged and left, Tuell said. “I know several people who saw the parking lot full and passed right on by.”

Illinois: Budget mess could mean long lines, headaches on Election Day | The State Journal-Register

A sweeping new election law that was intended to increase voter turnout in time for the presidential contest and a critical U.S. Senate race may instead cause greater frustration among voters due to Illinois lawmakers’ inability to agree on a budget, with officials warning of possible long lines, fewer safeguards against voter fraud and other costly headaches come November. The bill, pushed through the Legislature in the final weeks of Democratic Gov. Pat Quinn’s term, required several changes that traditionally benefit Democrats, such as same-day voter registration and expanded early voting. While those pieces of the law will be in place come Nov. 8, some local election officials say they’ve stuck with the bill for additional equipment and staffing. And the nearly $4 million that state election officials said they’d need in the first two years for other changes wasn’t approved by the Legislature. The standoff between Republican Gov. Bruce Rauner and majority

Voting Blogs: Election technology and the Legislature: NCSL election technology toolkit | Katy Owens Hubler/electionlineWeekly

The “impending crisis” in voting technology identified by the Presidential Commission on Election Administration (PCEA) two years ago is well-known in the election community, and starting to get noticed in other circles as well. We at the National Conference of State Legislatures (NCSL) have been having conversations with our constituents – state legislators and legislative staff – on this topic for the last two years. We’ll continue to work with legislatures on how they might be able to assist their local election officials as part of our Elections 2020 project. As part of the project we are bringing together legislators, legislative staff, and state and local election officials for a daylong meeting in a given state to discuss the topic of election technology. When did counties last purchase voting machines? What was the funding source? When might current equipment need to be replaced? What money is set aside for funding new equipment? We’ll conduct these meetings in a series of six states before the year is out. Local election officials are on the ground every day – they know the issues and they know how election law works in practice. Communication is key – legislators want to hear about how a given policy might affect their constituents (and election officials are their constituents!).

United Kingdom: EU referendum: Historic vote on Britain’s future will cost UK taxpayers £142m | International Business Times

The historic referendum on the UK’s membership of the EU will cost British taxpayers’ more than £142m ($200m, €179m), according to the Conservative government. Cabinet Office minister John Penrose said the total cost for the 23 June ballot had been discussed and agreed with the Electoral Commission. “This includes the expenses incurred by Counting Officers in running the poll, grants to the designated lead campaign organisations, the delivery by Royal Mail of campaign mailings from those organisations, and the cost of the central count,” the Tory MP informed parliament on 23 March.

National: As 2016 race goes on, states debate election costs | Associated Press

Arizona officials are getting tired of footing the $6 million bill for the state’s presidential primary and want to foist the cost onto the political parties as states around the country weigh the cost of the contests. Colorado may go the other direction, bringing back state-run primaries. Utah lawmakers voted to scrap primaries in favor of caucuses in the two most recent presidential election cycles. States have come up with various ways to handle the contests every four years, and cost is a factor. About a third hold primaries for governor, Congress and other races at the same time as their White House primaries to save money on poll workers, locations and ballots, said Wendy Underhill, elections program director with the National Conference of State Legislatures.

Illinois: Aging voting machines in Clark County, statewide need replaced | Springfield News Sun

A sensor in a voting machine in Green Twp. stopped working during the primary election this week, which elections officials locally and statewide said is a symptom of Ohio’s aging voting machines that need upgraded soon. The Presidential Commission on Election Administration called the aging voting machines an “impending crisis” in a 2014 report to President Obama. It could cost $150 million to $175 million to buy new voting equipment statewide, a recent state report found, and there’s likely little federal money available now like there was a decade ago. The Ohio Secretary of State’s Office has been developing a plan to upgrade voting equipment statewide by the 2020 election.