South Carolina: Richland County Council agrees to pay $100K in election-related lawyers’ fees | The State

RICHLAND COUNTY, SC — Richland County Council finally agreed Tuesday to pay more than $100,000 in bills for the lawyers who cleaned up the county’s November election mess. But not until after some unusual procedural moves, a change of heart by two members and the chairman’s threat to enforce a time limit for Councilman Bill Malinowski as he questioned charges for travel and telephone conversations. The council, which had put off the decision twice before, agreed to pay $72,423.10 for lawyer Steve Hamm to investigate Election Day problems and recommend how to fix them; $9,348.75 for lawyer John Nichols, who represented demoted elections director Lillian McBride; and $17,924.20 for Helen McFadden, who kept the election results from being overturned in court. “Who didn’t have a lawyer?” Councilman Greg Pearce muttered at one point.

New Jersey: Election Consolidation Bill to Save $12 Million Passed By Senate | Politicker NJ

Legislation sponsored by Senator Shirley K. Turner (D-Mercer/Hunterdon) to prevent wasting $12 million in taxpayer money on a special election was passed today by the New Jersey Senate with a vote of 22-15-1. The bill, S2858, would temporarily move the regularly scheduled November 5 General election to the date of the October 16 special election scheduled by Governor Christie to fill the vacancy in the U.S. Senate after the passing of Senator Lautenberg. Senator Turner has criticized the Governor for using his authority to schedule two special elections that will cost taxpayers approximately $24 million. “Governor Christie’s October surprise election on Wednesday, less than three weeks before the General election where his name is at the top of the ballot, is all about naked political ambition for national office,” said Senator Turner. “Having three elections every other month and a fourth less than three weeks apart will also cause voter fatigue, suppress voter participation, and cost millions of dollars.”

New Jersey: State Senate Passes Special Election Bills | Berkeley, NJ Patch

A pair of bills aimed at altering the special U.S. Senate election were passed in the state Senate Thursday following a spirited debate and with votes split along party lines. The first bill, sponsored by Sen. Shirley Turner, D-Mercer, calls for moving the Nov. 5 general election to the Oct. 16 polling date called by Gov. Chris Christie to elect a U.S. Senator to replace late Sen. Frank Lautenberg. The second bill, sponsored by Sen. Nia H.Gill, D-Bergen, would allow registered voters the opportunity to vote in the Nov. 5 election at the same time and polling place as the Oct. 16 special election. Both bills, which were each passed in the state Assembly on Monday, were passed 22-15.  They will now be sent to Christie for his signature.

New Jersey: Counties: Show Me The Money For Special Elections | South Brunswick, NJ Patch

While the state’s highest court killed off a challenge to the special election to fill New Jersey’s empty U.S. Senate seat, the Christie administration may be facing other hurdles as counties line up for state money needed to pull off the October polling. Gov. Chris Christie earlier this month called for a special election to be held Oct. 16 to fill the seat left vacant by Sen. Frank Lautenberg’s death. The move survived two court rulings in a Democratic challenge to Christie’s authority, and on Thursday the state Supreme Court put the matter to rest, saying it would not hear the challenge. But there’s a lingering issue of money. New Jersey’s 21 counties are realizing there’s little in their coffers to pull off a primary election and two general elections this year. And they want assurances from the state that they’re going to be paid, promptly and in full, for any expenditure they couldn’t have possibly planned for. “This could have horrible consequences,’” Bergen County Freeholder Chairman David Ganz said. “It will affect every county in the state, unless they have money to pay for these elections.’”

New Jersey: Assembly passes two Democrat-sponsored special election bills | NorthJersey.com

Democrats continued their fight today against the October special election Governor Christie ordered to fill the late Frank Lautenberg’s U.S. Senate seat. One bill that passed a Senate committee and the full Assembly would combine the general and special elections, moving the general from Nov. 5 to Oct. 16. Another, somewhat contradictory bill, would allow New Jerseyans to cast their general election ballot when they vote in the special election. That legislation also passed the full Assembly and the Senate Budget Committee. The two bills passed mostly along party lines, with Democrats in favor and Republican against. Democrats said the legislation would make it easier for voters to participate in both elections, while Republicans argued the proposals were unnecessary.

California: Lawmakers stick locals with costs of voting | Kim Alexander/The Sacramento Bee

The new state budget is here, and once again it leaves the state’s election system holding an increasingly empty bag. For years counties have relied on the state to help fund state laws that change the voting process and in turn, make extra work and cost extra money for counties. The last time election mandates were funded was 2009, when they accounted for about $30 million paid to all 58 counties. The largest in terms of dollars and impact is the permanent absentee voter program, which allows Californians to sign up to vote by mail in every election rather than reapplying each time. Since then, the money has been withheld by the state and counties have had to make do with less. At the same time, counties no longer get reimbursed for the cost of special legislative elections, despite their growing frequency. In Sacramento County, the amount of election funding withheld by the state amounts to approximately $1 million annually. The last time it was paid, in 2008-09, it amounted to 9 percent of the county’s total elections budget.

Minnesota: Anoka County getting new election equipment | ABC Newspapers

The Anoka County Board has awarded a contract for new election equipment that will be in place in time for the 2013 election Nov. 5. The new equipment plus election services from Election Systems & Software will cost up to $1,530,251.30 and replace the existing equipment, which is obsolete. A 10-year joint powers agreement was approved last year by the county, school districts and cities in the county that spells out a cost-sharing formula to pay for the new equipment, its maintenance and operations. According to Cindy Reichert, Anoka County elections manager, the software associated with the new equipment will begin arriving the week of June 24. But delivery of the 140 ballot counters that the county is purchasing under the contract won’t be delivered until August, Reichert said.

New Jersey: Bergen County freeholders: State should pay for special election; would cost county $3.6 million | NJ.com

The Bergen County Freeholders on Wednesday voted to seek a court order directing the state to reimburse the county for the special election to replace the late U.S. Sen. Frank Lautenberg. In a unanimous vote, the freeholders directed their attorney to file a “declaratory judgment action” in Hackensack Superior Court contesting the cost of the Oct. 16 election, as well as the Aug. 13 primary. It’s estimated that the two elections would set the county back $3.6 million. David Ganz, the board’s chairman, said the elections would tip the county over the state’s mandated 2 percent property tax cap to recoup costs, creating a “financial emergency” in Bergen County.

New Jersey: Monmouth County officials want state to pay special election cost up front | NJ.com

Monmouth County officials are happy to hold a special election for U.S. Senator in October, but they would like the state to pay the costs up front. “We budgeted for the November election and the primary, we did not budget for this election,” Freeholder Gary Rich said. “We are reaching out to the state and asking if they could to fund this up front.” At their next meeting, the Monmouth County Board of Chosen Freeholders will consider a resolution to request that the state pay for the Oct. 16 special election and the Aug. 13 party primaries. At issue are two elections, a primary and a special election, to fill the seat vacated by the late Frank Lautenberg. Typically, counties budget to equip and staff polls each election year, and are later reimbursed by the state. “With the special elections, the state is throwing the burden on the county, and I believe the county should be paid before them,” Freeholder John Curley said. “We’re struggling as a coastal county with all the problems from Sandy, now we’re left with towns that are devastated and the tax base is deficient.”

New Jersey: Freeholders Balk At Christie’s Special Election Decision | New Jersey Newsroom

Governor Christie seems to prefer slow jamming democracy more so than the news these days after deciding to contradict himself by calling for a special election, a stunt that will wind up costing the state roughly $25 million. It has caused much ire and confusion, and, in fact, lawmakers in one NJ county are going so far as to refuse to distribute the roughly $850,000 needed to fund the state’s special election for U.S. Senate in mid-October. While I still do not know exactly what the heck it is that Freeholders do and always just thought they were special people from the city of Freehold, however, are quite concerned over the needless economic burden the special election will have on tax payers. The Union County Board of Freeholders, for example, claimed the special election would create a “financial hardship” for the county. And adding more confusion, they said that they received no assurances from state officials that the county would be reimbursed for a portion of the special election’s costs. It should be noted that the board is all democratic, although freeholders aren’t exactly hardened Washingtonian partisans.

New Jersey: Objection To Christie’s $24 Million Senate Special Election Spreads Across State | Huffington Post

Republican county officials are now joining with their Democratic counterparts to question the cost of New Jersey’s special U.S. Senate election. The Boards of Chosen Freeholders in Bergen County and Monmouth County on Wednesday publicly questioned how they will be able to pay for the costs of the Aug. 13 special primary election and Oct. 16 special election without the state giving counties the money upfront. Gov. Chris Christie (R) has pledged that the state will pay the $24 million bill, but by reimbursing local officials who will pay the initial costs — a process that could take as long as seven months. Last week, the Union County freeholder board passed a resolution objecting to the cost of the October election. The Union County freeholder board is all Democratic, while the Monmouth County board is all Republican. Democrats hold the majority on the Bergen County board, but the resolution passed unanimously with GOP support.

New Jersey: Union County Freeholders decline to fund special U.S. Senate election | NJ.com

Calling Gov. Chris Christie’s decision to hold a special election to fill the U.S. Senate seat left vacant after the recent death of Frank Lautenberg just weeks before an already scheduled election fiscally irresponsible, the Union County Freeholders on Thursday night declined to allocate the roughly $850,000 to fund the special balloting day, scheduled for October. Freeholder Mohamed Jalloh said holding two elections within weeks at such a cost was an unnecessary burden on taxpayers. “To have a special general election three weeks before (the scheduled election), that doesn’t make any sense,” Jalloh said this morning. “I haven’t been given an good reason as to why we would fund this twice.”

Ohio: Lake County officials hopeful voting machine ratio is eliminated | News Herald

Lake County officials are optimistic a provision of state law that would force the county to purchase 54 additional voting machines this year will be removed as part of the state’s budget bill. A state law enacted in 2006 would require each county starting in 2013 to have one voting machine per 175 registered voters. The county has 152,878 registered voters and 864 electronic voting machines, so 54 additional machines would need to be purchased at a cost ranging from $100,000 to $200,000 — depending on if the equipment was new or used. Commissioner Daniel P. Troy said during a commissioners meeting Tuesday that a repeal of that ratio was included in the version of the state budget bill passed last week by the Ohio Senate.

Ohio: Law may require Lake County to spend $200,000 on 54 more voting machines | News Herald

Lake County commissioners and county election officials are concerned a provision in state law might force the county to purchase 54 additional voting machines this year. Commissioner Daniel P. Troy and Elections Board Director Scott E. Daisher discussed the matter during public comment at a recent commissioners meeting. Troy recently received correspondence from the County Commissioners Association of Ohio to make sure the commissioners were aware of a state law enacted in 2006 that would require each county to have a minimum ratio starting in 2013 to have one voting machine per 175 registered voters.

Illinois: No funding for online voter registration | The Southern

State lawmakers last week approved legislation giving Illinoisans the ability to register to vote online. But, in the annual rush to adjourn for the summer, members of the House and Senate left town without allocating any money to pay for the proposal. “It’s something that we’re going to have to figure out,” said Rupert Borgsmiller, director of the Illinois State Board of Elections. “We’ll have to make a silk purse out of a sow’s ear.” Under legislation now awaiting Gov. Pat Quinn’s signature, the state would establish a system for applicants to register to vote through the state Board of Elections website, using a driver’s license and the last four digits of a Social Security number.

New Jersey: The cost of Christie’s decision | Asbury Park Press

Using New Jersey Office of Legislative Services estimates, Assembly Democrats say that a special primary election and a special general election, as ordered by Gov. Chris Christie, will cost a total of $23.8 million. Assembly Speaker Sheila Oliver said Christie could have saved $11.9 million in taxpayer money by having the special election on the same date as the Nov. 5 general election. The cost estimate is based on two main components: the expenses of the counties and municipalities in administering the election and the salaries of poll workers conducting the election. According to the Division of Elections in the Department of State, the costs for items such as ballot printing and postage, processing, legal advertising, polling place rental and voting machine delivery for a special election would be approximately $6.5 million.

Illinois: Lawmakers approve no money for online voting registration program | Bloomington Pantagraph

State lawmakers last week approved legislation giving Illinoisans the ability to register to vote online. But, in the hubbub of the annual end-of-session rush to adjourn for the summer, members of the House and Senate left town without allocating any money to pay for the proposal. “It’s something that we’re going to have to figure out,” said Rupert Borgsmiller, director of the Illinois State Board of Elections. “We’ll have to make a silk purse out of a sow’s ear.” … Early estimates put the cost at about $1.5 million, with the bulk of that coming out of the board of elections budget. The Secretary of State’s office estimates the program will have a start-up cost of about $50,000.

Alabama: Madison County Considering Costly Special Election In Effort To Save Money | WHNT

Many lawmakers believe counties could benefit by having one office do everything two offices do now when it comes to handling money. Madison County Chairman Dale Strong favors consolidating the tax collector’s and tax assessor’s office. First, a decision must be made about what to do and that will cost you money. Madison County has two offices affecting people’s wallets. One is the Tax Assessor’s. It is the keeper of records. It places value on property. The other is the Tax Collector’s. It gets your money.

Idaho: Value of a vote: Low turnout election costs $15.80 per vote | KTVB

The May 21 election in Ada County saw extremely low voter turnout, with only 5.4% of registered voters going to the polls. With low turnout, 7 Investigates looked at how much each vote was “worth” in terms of the cost to the county taxpayers for each vote cast. On the May ballot in Ada County were issues from funding the Eagle City Hall to electing the board of the Greater Auditorium District and Kuna schools. Overall, 9,457 people voted. “I would say the voter turn-out was lower than we anticipated. I thought it would be below 10% for this election because it was still a very small district election, but I thought it would be much closer to that 10% mark as opposed to down to 5% where we actually ended up,” Ada County Chief Deputy Clerk Phil McGrane said.

Philippines: Overseas votes cost P1,310 each | Inquirer

They spent so much but showed very little for it. The Commission on Elections (Comelec) and the Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA) are being asked to explain where the P148.4 million they allegedly spent for the overseas absentee voting went with only 15 percent of voters abroad actually casting their ballots in the May 13 elections. Sen. Franklin Drilon, chairman of the Senate committee on finance, on Thursday said he would file the appropriate resolution for a review of the Overseas Absentee Voting Act (OAV) when the 16th Congress convenes in July. Drilon said in the weekly Senate news forum the turnout among the 737,759 registered Filipino voters abroad was “dismal to say the least.”

Colorado: El Paso County clerk says Colorado’s new election law will be costly | The Gazette

El Paso County will feel the pinch before the year is out from an elections bill that will kick in July 1. As a result of House Bill 1303, the upcoming November consolidated election in El Paso County will cost more, it will be tougher to find election judges and the likelihood of fraud will be higher, said Wayne Williams, El Paso County clerk and recorder. In the General Election in 2014, the impact will be more severe, Williams told the El Paso County commissioners on Tuesday. While the election in 2013 will cost an additional $134,212, in 2014 the county is looking at a whopping increase of almost $700,000. Most of the costs for this year’s election will be borne by school districts with upcoming board elections because counties bear the initial cost, then bill the jurisdictions. In the General Election, however, the county’s costs will soar.

California: Counties seek election cost relief | Press-Enterprise

It’s been an expensive few months for counties holding special elections to fill legislative and congressional seats. And it’s not over yet. San Bernardino and Los Angeles counties have had two special ballots already to replace former state Sen. Gloria Negrete McLeod, D-Chino, after her election to Congress in November. Now both counties will have to hold at least one, and probably two, special elections to replace Assemblywoman Norma Torres, who will be sworn in today as Negrete McLeod’s successor, in the 52nd Assembly District. Riverside, San Diego and Imperial counties had to put on a special election to replace former state Sen. Juan Vargas in the 40th Senate District. Fortunately for the counties’ coffers, then-Assemblyman Ben Hueso, D-San Diego, won the March 12 ballot outright, avoiding the need for a runoff. There are more special elections in the offing in San Diego, Los Angeles and the Central Valley. With each ballot costing around $1 million, counties are rallying around legislation sponsored by San Bernardino County that calls for state reimbursement of special election costs in 2012 and 2013.

South Carolina: Richland Council balks at paying ‘election mess’ legal fees | The State

Richland County should refuse to pay for the hours charged by a lawyer who helped negotiate a new county job for demoted elections director Lillian McBride, some on County Council said Wednesday. Others said Richland County has no obligation to cover any of the legal bills — more than $153,000 — for investigating what went wrong during Nov. 6 balloting and defending the election results in court. Councilman Seth Rose objected to the legal department’s request for the money, saying he’s frustrated the county had to boost funding for the elections office last year even though county officials have no hand in supervising its performance. That job goes to local legislators, who also set the funding. Ultimately, council members deferred action.

South Carolina: Botched Richland election cost taxpayers nearly $153,000 in legal fees | The State

Richland County taxpayers are footing the bill for nearly $153,000 in legal fees to investigate what went so wrong in the Nov. 6 election and to fend off protests that threatened to unravel the results. The expenses, detailed in a 46-page packet obtained by The State newspaper under South Carolina’s open-records law, include:

• $72,423.10 for lawyer Steve Hamm, hired at the request of the Richland County Board of Elections & Voter Registration, to uncover the web of mistakes that resulted in waits of up to seven hours for voters and a cache of misplaced ballots.

• $9,461.25 for a lawyer to represent the interests of elections director Lillian McBride, viewed as incompetent by her critics and as a scapegoat by her defenders. She since has been demoted to a deputy director.

National: Who Registers to Vote Online? | Huffington Post

A sensible, election administration reform is quietly sweeping the nation. According to the National Conference of State Legislatures, 18 states have implemented or recently adopted online voter registration, either initiating a new registration or updating an old one. Twelve other states have legislation winding its way through the legislative process. The reform is bipartisan in that both Democratic- and Republican-controlled state governments have adopted it, from Arizona to Maryland. Legislators are attracted to online voter registration because it offers substantial election administration savings. Arizona, the first state to adopt online voter registration in 2002, reports that over 70 percent of registrations are now conducted online. The old paper system cost 83 cents to process each registration form, compared to 3 cents for the online system.

California: San Francisco goes for the Guinness — 500-page ballot book blockbuster | San Francisco Chronicle

San Francisco voters this fall will be treated to some extra reading in the form of a 400- to 500-page ballot guide, thanks mostly to a referendum on the height of the 8 Washington waterfront luxury condo development. “It’s going to look like a phone book,” said Department of Elections head John Arntz. That’s because under city law, the Nov. 5 ballot book, which is mailed to 500,000 voters, must include the “full text” of the referendum as it was presented during the signature drive that put it on the ballot. In this case, that means the city must include more than 500 pages of documents, including those from the Planning Commission and Board of Supervisors’ hearings and even copies of studies on shadows that the condos may cast. And it is not going to come cheap.

Maryland: Contractor salaries questioned as state moves to paper ballot voting system | Maryland Reporter

State election officials are planning to spend up to $1.2 million to hire just five contractors working for nine months, a high-dollar figure that has shocked key lawmakers and voter advocacy groups watching as the state transitions from touch-screen voting to paper ballots. The transition, which is scheduled for the 2016 presidential elections, will move the state from computerized voting without a paper trail to optical scan paper ballots. Under the recommendation of State Election Board Administrator Linda Lamone, the state budgeted $1.2 million for the five positions handling the initial transition. The elections budget calls for the senior project manager position to receive up to $350,000, the deputy project manager $300,000, two business analysts $210,000 each and a technical writer $170,000. The budget figures are estimates, since the elections board has not yet selected contractors. … State Election Board Deputy Administrator Ross Goldstein defended the expenses. In an email, he stated that the state estimated the cost using an existing state agency master contract for consulting and technical services. In that contract, vendors stated how much they will charge for a given service. “We used an average from different vendors under the master contract to come up with our estimates for each of the labor categories we need,” Goldstein stated.

North Carolina: Voter ID price tag put at $3.6 million | News Observer

The proposed new voter photo ID law could cost as much as much as $3.6 million to implement – the price of providing free photos to those without driver’s licenses, and voter education efforts, officials said. The voter ID bill cleared another hurdle Thursday when it was approved by the House Finance Committee by an 18-10 party-line vote. It is scheduled for a full House vote next week.The legislative staff prepared an analysis of how much it would likely cost to implement the law requiring voters to provide a photo ID by the 2016 election. It would also require a trial run for the 2014 election.

Pakistan: ‘Prohibitively expensive’: Election Commission opposes online vote for expatriates | The Express Tribune

The Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) took an unexpected U-turn when it opposed an online voting system for overseas Pakistanis, terming it expensive, time-consuming, and impracticable. In its report submitted to the Supreme Court on Monday, the ECP contended that facilitating eligible overseas Pakistanis to cast their votes in the upcoming general elections was not advisable.
Quoting the unanimous decision of a committee comprising officials from ECP, NADRA and IT ministry, the commission stated that allowing overseas Pakistanis to vote through an uncertified computer system could be disastrous for the electoral process. The Supreme Court had earlier directed the secretaries of law and justice, information technology, foreign affairs, ministry of oversees Pakistanis and the ECP, as well as the chairman NADRA to undertake coordinated efforts for devising a mechanism which would enable overseas Pakistanis to cast their votes in the coming polls.

Canada: Citing budget cuts, Elections Canada delays pilot project on Internet voting | Vancouver Sun

Budget cuts at Elections Canada have pushed a pilot project on Internet voting off the agenda indefinitely. The body that runs Canada’s federal voting had hoped to introduce online voting for byelections held in 2013, in an effort to see whether making voting more convenient would help boost participation. But according to figures in the agency’s recently tabled report on planning and priorities, spending will fall from $84 million in 2012-13 to a forecasted $74 million in 2013-14. “As part of the fiscal reductions taking place across government, we took an eight-per-cent decrease in our budget,” said Diane Benson, an Elections Canada spokesperson. “So a lot of it is focusing on core priorities we have to deliver for the next election.”