Wisconsin: State to Allow Online Voter Registration? | MacIver Institute

The Assembly Committee on Campaigns and Elections held an informational hearing on the subject of online voter registration on Tuesday. The hearing did not focus on a specific bill, but legislators and speakers discussed how an online voter registration system has been implemented in other states. Currently, 18 states offer online voter registration, and four other states have passed legislation allowing it. Arizona was the first to allow online registration in 2002. Kevin Kennedy, Director and General Counsel of the Wisconsin Government Accountability Board, spoke for informational purposes only but highlighted many of the benefits of online voter registration. “Legislation that enables online voter registration would make a tremendous leap forward in the administration of elections in Wisconsin,” Kennedy said. “The basic voter registration data will be more accurate if it is entered online by the voter. Online registration eliminates data entry errors resulting from difficult to decipher paper forms.” Kennedy also said that online registration would reduce issues caused by large voter registration drives conducted by third-party organizations.

Libya: Benghazi Holds Municipal Elections | allAfrica.com

Benghazi residents on Saturday (April 19th) voted to choose their municipal council in an atmosphere of hope and optimism about a better future. The chairman of election subcommittee, Abdel Wahab al-Feki, expressed his relief over the smooth flow of election, which took place without any obstacles. He lauded the democratic transition and peaceful transfer of power in Benghazi from the local to the municipal council. He made the statement in a press conference held on Saturday at a tourist village by the subcommittee that oversees Benghazi municipal council election. The subcommittee mobilised more than 1,900 employees for at 128 election centres, al-Feki told the Press Solidarity news agency, noting that the armed forces provided support in securing and protecting election centres throughout Benghazi. “I hope the people will choose competent, effective and experienced candidates for the municipal council,” said Benghazi local council spokesperson Usama al-Sharif. “I also wish success to the candidates in this tough, although not impossible, stage.”

Afghanistan: For Now, It Is Ballot Over Bullet In Afghanistan | Eurasia Review

On April 5, 2014, the Afghan nation voted to elect what is supposed to be the country’s first post-ISAF and post-Karzai government. This was the third time that presidential and provincial council elections were held in the country since the overthrow of the Taliban regime over a decade ago. The entire election process, however, is supposed to conclude with the third round of parliamentary elections which should be due sometime next year. This basically means that the April elections mark the beginning of a long-drawn complex process extending over a year. The whole exercise in due course will test the strength and credibility of the Afghan institutions and the resolve of the Afghan people to take the political process to its logical conclusion. It is not merely about change in leadership; it is about ushering the country into a ‘decade of transformation’ (2015-24) by further institutionalising a relatively inclusive political culture which could cater to the rising scepticism as well as aspirations among the Afghan people. It is about building a political order which is in tune with the changing socio-political realities, mindful of the several challenges ahead, the most important being, how to keep the international community engaged. Like the incumbent president, the next leadership in Kabul too will have to confront similar challenges: managing divergent perceptions and factional interests, competing patronage networks and parallel power structures at the sub-national level, seemingly irreconcilable ideological positions of the Pakistan-sponsored Haqqani-Taliban network and, most critically, sustaining the current constitutional framework to the extent possible.

Colorado: After last year’s recalls, Colorado House Democrats pass change in law | The Denver Post

The Colorado House of Representatives passed, on a 37-28 party-line vote, a bill that will allow citizens to cast remote ballots in recall elections. Senate Bill 158 was being pushed by Democrats angered by the recalls last year of state Sens. Angela Giron and John Morse, who were voted out of office after their support for gun-control measures. A third Democratic senator, Evie Hudak, resigned rather than face a recall battle. Morse and Giron were removed after voter turnouts of 21 and 36 percent, respectively. Democrats argue that the outcome was, at least in part, the result of recall election laws, which effectively required voters to physically turn in ballots on a single day.

Louisiana: Bill requiring 20 percent voter turnout for tax election survives | Shreveport Times

Strong opposition to requiring at least a 20 percent voter turnout for an election for a property or sales tax to pass wasn’t enough to kill it. With only the Louisiana Association of Business and Industry for it and numerous groups like the Louisiana Municipal Association and Louisiana School Boards Association against it, SB200 by Sen. Bret Allain, R-Franklin, survived the Senate Revenue and Fiscal Affairs Committee when Chairman Sen. Neil Riser, R-Columbia, voted to create a 5-5 tie. That vote left the bill in committee to be heard later. “I’m talking about a higher standard,” Allain said. “These are tax elections where they’re taking people’s money.”

Editorials: Compulsory voting is counter-productive | David Moscrop/Ottawa Citizen

Sometimes I catch hell from friends or colleagues for my occasional but deliberate choice to abstain from voting. Their admonitions take the form of a variation on the theme of it being my civic duty to vote: as a political theorist I should know better; men and women fought and died so that I could; those who don’t vote shouldn’t complain, and I complain a lot, so I should show up or clam up. These arguments are easily enough dismissed. When I choose not to vote I have reasons. Often the candidates are weak, but there’s no option to decline my ballot. Sometimes the parties are senseless and none deserves my vote. Other times the outcome of the race has been pre-determined by demographic facts well beyond my control. Always the atrocious and severely-dated first-past-the-post system does a poor job of translating votes into seats. Every few years the idea of compulsory voting — a system in which electors are required by law to cast their ballot and in which those who do not are, strictly speaking, subject to fines or criminal charges or even jail time — creeps into our political discourse. Nearly two-dozen countries have mandatory voting laws on the books, although not all of them enforce the law.

Afghanistan: Early Results Suggest Abdullah-Ghani Runoff for President | Bloomberg

With 10 percent of votes counted in the April 5 election, Abdullah leads with 42 percent, compared with 38 percent for Ghani, according to the Independent Election Commission of Afghanistan in Kabul. A runoff will take place between the two top candidates if no single candidate obtains more than 50 percent of the vote. “The results will change,” Ahmad Yusuf Nuristani, the election commission chairman, told reporters in Kabul yesterday. “It is possible that one candidate is the front-runner in today’s press conference, and there will be another front-runner in the next press conference.” The Afghan government said voter turnout doubled from the previous presidential election in a show of defiance against Taliban insurgents who have sought to disrupt the poll. The vote paves the way for the first democratic transfer of power since the U.S. ousted the group in 2001.

North Dakota: State first in election performance | Bismarck Tribune

An independent nonprofit organization has released its third analysis of how each state conducts its elections and for the third time North Dakota took the top spot on the list. The Pew Charitable Trusts released its elections performance index Tuesday, which it has released every two years since the 2008 election cycle. Pew based its results using 17 election indicators including voter turnout, the percentage of military and absentee ballots that aren’t returned, online registration to vote and the wait time for being able to vote. With North Dakota being the only state in the country that doesn’t have voter registration, it is exempt from several indicators used in the performance index. In the areas North Dakota was ranked in, it rated above the national average in every single category. “When you see Pew looked at all 50 states and the District of Columbia, and North Dakota consistently ranks very high, that’s encouraging,” North Dakota Secretary of State Al Jaeger said.

Afghanistan: Experts: Afghan turnout boosted by social media | Deutsche Welle

The Taliban launched a series of attacks, focused mainly on the capital Kabul, just a few days ahead of Afghanistan’s landmark April 5 presidential poll. The militant group had threatened to attack polling stations during the vote and warned people against casting their ballots. But activists and ordinary Afghans reacted by taking to the Internet and launching a massive social media campaign where they expressed their determination to elect a successor to President Hamid Karzai, who has been ever since the fall of the Taliban 13 years ago. Karzai is constitutionally barred from seeking a third term. Pictures and slogans saying “Yes, I will Vote!” (main picture) circulated among thousands of Afghan social media users. The campaign paid off on April 5 when millions of Afghans took to polling stations to cast their votes despite the terror threats. The turnout was so high that many polling stations across the country ran out of ballot papers and Afghanistan’s Independent Election Commission (IEC) had to extend voting by an hour. The electoral body estimates that approximately 58 percent – seven out of 12 million eligible voters cast their ballots on Election Day.

Indonesia: Indonesians cast votes in huge one-day election | Mail Online

Polls opened Wednesday for nearly 187 million Indonesians eligible to vote in single-day legislative elections, a huge feat in the still-young democracy that’s expected to help clear the path for the country’s next president. After three weeks of peaceful outdoor campaigning, voters across three time zones cast their ballots for members of national as well as local legislatures and representatives. The voting took place at more than a half million makeshift booths from the eastern restive Papua province to the devout Muslim province of Aceh in the west. For many, the election was more about supporting a specific party than voting for individual candidates, to help boost the chances for their favorite presidential hopeful in the July 9 elections. Parties need to secure 20 percent of the seats in the House of Representatives or 25 percent of the overall vote to nominate a presidential candidate. Otherwise, a coalition must be formed with one or more parties to enter the competition.

National: Study: States Did Better Job Running Elections In 2012 | NPR

For all the criticism about long lines and other Election Day snafus, most states actually improved the way they handled elections between 2008 and 2012, according to a new study from the Pew Charitable Trusts. The report found that, overall, wait times at polling stations decreased by about three minutes over 2008, and 40 states and the District of Columbia improved their “election performance index” scores, which Pew calculated from 17 indicators that make up the index. Pew analyzed state election administration by looking at factors such as the availability of voting tools online, voter turnout, wait times at polling stations and problems with registration or absentee ballots.

Costa Rica: Unchallenged candidate wins Costa Rica vote | Associated Press

Opposition candidate Luis Solis easily won Sunday’s presidential runoff in Costa Rica, an expected result given that his only rival had stopped campaigning a month earlier because he was so far behind in the polls. What gave Solis, a center-leftist, cause to celebrate was a solid voter turnout in an election considered a foregone conclusion. Experts had warned that a low turnout would undermine the legitimacy of his government. In the run-up to the vote, he had appealed to Costa Ricans to cast ballots and set a goal of getting more than 1 million votes. Late Sunday, Costa Rica’s Supreme Electoral Tribunal announced that with 93 percent of voting stations reporting Solis had 1,258,715 votes, or 77.9 percent support, easily beating ruling party candidate Johnny Araya at 22.1 percent. Araya remained on the ballot even though he suspended his campaign because the country’s constitution does not allow for a candidate to drop out.

Afghanistan: Taliban’s Onslaught to Disrupt Presidential Elections Has Failed to Curb Voter Enthusiasm | Wall Street Journal

Lining up behind hundreds of fellow Afghans, Ghazanfar spent up to six hours each day over the past week waiting to register for Saturday’s elections. “Sun and rain, none of that has been a problem for me,” said Mr. Ghazanfar, a 46-year-old laborer in Kabul, who like many Afghans has only one name. “I am here to support a better future for Afghanistan.” The Taliban have launched a violent onslaught on Kabul and other Afghan cities in recent days, trying to disrupt the historic election. But, so far, the Taliban intimidation has failed to tamp down the enthusiasm of ordinary Afghans like Mr. Ghazanfar for the election, in which the country will pick a new leader after 13 years under President Hamid Karzai. Notwithstanding occasional violence and bureaucratic weakness that requires such registration waits, the country has gone through a full-fledged campaign, with crowded, nationwide rallies by the main candidates, and lively televised debates.

National: New G.O.P. Bid to Limit Voting in Swing States | New York Times

Pivotal swing states under Republican control are embracing significant new electoral restrictions on registering and voting that go beyond the voter identification requirements that have caused fierce partisan brawls. The bills, laws and administrative rules — some of them tried before — shake up fundamental components of state election systems, including the days and times polls are open and the locations where people vote. Republicans in Ohio and Wisconsin this winter pushed through measures limiting the time polls are open, in particular cutting into weekend voting favored by low-income voters and blacks, who sometimes caravan from churches to polls on the Sunday before election. Democrats in North Carolina are scrambling to fight back against the nation’s most restrictive voting laws, passed by Republicans there last year. The measures, taken together, sharply reduce the number of early voting days and establish rules that make it more difficult for people to register to vote, cast provisional ballots or, in a few cases, vote absentee.

Italy: Venice votes for independence in unofficial poll | EUobserver

A self-organised “referendum” over the independence of one of Italy’s wealthiest regions has resulted in an overwhelming victory for the separatist camp, but authorities in Rome have largely ignored the result, amid scepticism over the regularity of the informal, non-binding poll. Nevertheless, events in Veneto, the north-eastern region around Venice that is home to almost 5 million people, have attracted international attention, particularly from government-sponsored Russian media, keen to draw comparisons with the military-backed vote that sanctioned Moscow’s annexation of Crimea. Out of 3.8 million eligible voters, 2.3 million took part in Veneto’s independence “plebiscite,” organisers said Friday, after six days of voting through makeshift polling booths, via phone or the internet. The pro-secession camp was declared the winner with over 89 percent, against just under 11 percent for the unionists.

Editorials: European election: So what? | Deutsche Welle

During the last European Parliament election in 2009, fewer than half of Europe’s voters bothered to show up at the ballot box. What’s the EU doing to increase voter turnout – and what are its chances of success? For decades, the European Parliament in Brussels was seen as the place to put old politicians out to pasture. No wonder, then, that European citizens hardly spare much thought for Europe and its institutions. The numbers bear this out: Since the very first European election in 1979, voter turnout has steadily dropped. In 2009, only 43.3 percent of Germans exercised their right to vote, a figure also reflected in the average European turnout. The country with the lowest turnout was Slovakia, at 20 percent. There are many reasons that explain this voter disinterest, chief among them being that most European citizens aren’t familiar with the duties of the European Parliament and the extent of its authority. They’re unaware of how decisions made in Brussels and Strasbourg influence their daily lives.

Editorials: How the Fair Elections Act might actually hurt the Tories in 2015 | National Post

The federal government has recently introduced legislation aimed at significantly revising the powers of Elections Canada. Critics of the Fair Elections Act (Bill C-23) contend that the bill offers an electoral advantage to the governing Conservatives, suggesting that its provisions have been designed to suppress voter turnout among segments of the population traditionally unfriendly to the Conservatives. That may be true, though we would suggest there are at least two ways in which the Fair Elections Act might actually hurt the Tories come 2015. No wonder the Tories were so nervous. The government had been noticeably skittish about what Marc Mayrand would say before the Commons Procedure and House Affairs committee Thursday: not only had it kept the chief electoral officer largely out of the loop in the months before it introduced its landmark Fair Elections Act, but there was doubt whether he would even be allowed to testify about it afterwards. A promise to that effect had been made to the NDP’s David Christopherson the night before to persuade him to end his filibuster of the Act in committee. Yet on the day Mr. Mayrand’s testimony was interrupted by the calling of not one but two votes in the Commons just as he was scheduled to speak.

Massachusetts: Election reform bill will increase voter turnout, officials say | The Daily Free Press

In hopes of spurring an increase in voter turnout, an election reform bill is moving through the State House that would ensure early voting, online voter registration and pre-registration for 16 and 17-year-olds in Massachusetts. Under the new law, there would be an early voting period beginning 10 days before Election Day and ending two days before Election Day. Additionally, both online registration and pre-registration for teenagers coming up on their 18th birthday will make voting more convenient for residents of Massachusetts. Altogether, 32 other states so far have passed similar bills.

Editorials: What the Texas primary will – and won’t – tell us about voter ID | Michael Li/TXRedistricting

A number of news outlets have described the 2014 Texas primary as the first big test for the state’s voter ID law – and that’s true, to an extent. But it’s important to understand the limitations and caveats of the “test.” For starters, although voter turnout almost certainly will exceed the 8.55% of the state’s registered voters who turned out in November 2013 to vote on constitutional amendments, it is not clear that turnout will much exceed – if at all – the combined 16.6% of voters who voted in the 2010 Democratic and Republican primaries. That’s a far cry from the 38% of voters who voted in the 2010 general election (when Texas had the lowest voter turnout in the country) and even further from the 58.6% of voters who cast a ballot in the last presidential election. In other words, while the primary may be a stress test, over relying on it is a bit like using how a well a city does with a quarter inch of ice to predict how the city would do with a major snowstorm. Disaster with a quarter inch of ice – or in a low turnout primary – would be bad sign indeed, but the opposite can’t be said to be necessarily true.

Editorials: Fair Elections Act would suppress the student vote | The Varsity

The federal Conservative government recently announced the Fair Elections Act, a controversial proposal to amend the Canada Elections Act. Ironically, the act is being criticized for taking steps to suppress voter turnout by implementing new rules for verifying who is an eligible voter at the polls. This new piece of legislation poses significant issues for minority voters, low-income families, and, unfortunately, students. At present, eligible voters can vouch for another person’s eligibility, such as a roommate or neighbour, at polling stations, allowing them to vote. The Conservatives’ proposal places unnecessarily stringent limits on reasonable and useful forms of identification, which will inevitably prevent young people from voting. One form of identification targeted for elemination is vouching. While the act will leave 39 identification options, these are often onerous or impossible for students or marginalized voters. Other identification options — including providing phone bills, bank statements, or ID — work for voters who have a well-established life in the riding. Students — who often live in a given riding for only one federal election, and marginalized citizens — who might not have a mailing address or ID — rely on vouching to facilitate their democratic right.

New York: Albany looks into early voting to boost turnout | Times Herald-Record

On paper, it looks pretty simple. Albany legislators are proposing the state join 32 other states in allowing voters to cast their ballots in person a week or two early. Proponents say more opportunity to vote equals more votes. More votes means increasing the voice of the state’s voters. It’s not as if the state is outstanding in this regard, they say. New York had the country’s 44th-lowest voter turnout in 2012. The turnout nationwide was 58 percent. In Orange and Ulster counties, it was 72 percent and in Sullivan 60 percent. That was a presidential election year; in off-presidential election cycles, local voter turnout drops into the mid-30s or low-40s percent range. So why not try early voting, the state’s Democrat-dominated Assembly asks. Not so fast, members of the Republican-dominated Senate say.

Utah: Deal between Utah legislators, Count My Vote formally announced | FOX13Now.com

Leaders in the Utah Legislature and of the Count My Vote Initiative held a press conference Sunday at the State Capitol to officially announce that a deal has been made that will change the way Utahns elect their leaders. Utah legislators from both sides of the aisle, as well as officials with the Count My Vote initiative, are calling this a great compromise, and that’s because the deal includes both the caucus convention system as well as a direct primary election. But of course, not everyone saw it that way. “We are confident that the results will be a win for voter turnout and citizen engagement,” said Wayne Niederhauser, a Republican who is President of the Utah Senate. In a press release issued Saturday by CMV officials and Utah legislators officials stated: “The new legislation will preserve Utah’s caucus-convention system and provide a direct primary alternative based on gathering a threshold of voter signatures.”

Alaska: Anchorage Assembly votes to move 2017 election date to November | Anchorage Daily News

The Anchorage Assembly voted Tuesday to change the date of the regular municipal election from April to November starting in 2017. Assemblyman Chris Birch, who introduced the measure, said that moving the city’s elections would boost voter turnout, citing historical data that recent city races have drawn 20 to 35 percent of voters, while there has been a 50 to 60 percent turnout for recent state races held in the fall. The ordinance passed in a six to four split, with Assembly members Tim Steele, Elvi Gray-Jackson, Paul Honeman and Dick Traini opposing the change. Patrick Flynn was absent from the vote. Mayor Dan Sullivan has said he supports the switch. While some Assembly members offered other solutions to amp up voter turnout, like switching to mail-in votes or connecting voting to Permanent Fund Dividends, all who commented stressed the need to bring more voters to the polls.

Texas: Report: Texas lags in Hispanic voter turnout | The Horn

Low voter turnout among Hispanics in Texas plays a key role in preventing the Republican-dominated state from being politically competitive, according to a new report from the polling company Latino Decisions. In Texas, which is home to nearly one in five of all U.S. Hispanics, just 39 percent of Hispanics who were eligible to vote in the 2012 presidential election cast a ballot. That’s compared with 48 percent of eligible U.S. Hispanics, 61 percent of eligible white Texans and 64 percent of eligible white Americans. “If Hispanic voter mobilization efforts were successful in the state, Texas would be as competitive as Florida in statewide contests, including presidential elections,” said the report, which was commissioned by America’s Voice, which advocates for immigration reform. Twenty-five percent of Texas Hispanic voters said they were contacted by campaigns or organizations encouraging them to vote in 2012, the report said. The national average was 31 percent.

Editorials: Strength and weakness of the Vot­ing Rights Amend­ment Act of 2014 | Anna Massoglia/TheHill

In Shelby County v. Holder, the Supreme Court struck down Section 4(b) of the Voting Rights Act, which includes a provision mandating that specified states “preclear” any changes in election regulations with the federal government. The court upheld other provisions of the Vot­ing Rights Act intact, including Section 2, a permanent provision that prohibits racially discriminatory voting laws nationwide, but determined that Section 4(b) is unconstitutional. Section 4(b) constitutes the “coverage formula” used to apply Section 5. As enacted, Section 4 requires certain states and jurisdictions that were determined by the formula to have a history of racially unbalanced voting to preclear any changes in election regulation with the federal government, even changes as minor as moving a polling station from one building to another. The Court in Shelby found that the provision was unconstitutional because it was based on outmoded data from voter turnout in 1964, 1968, or 1972 elections. Further, many states and vicinities subject to preclearance no longer correspond to the same incidence of racial discrimination in voting. In fact, the Census Bureau has reported that black voters voted at substantially higher rates than whites in seven of the states covered by Section 5, a rate higher than many other states that remain unaffected by Section 5.

North Carolina: Voter ID laws challenge out-of-state voters | The Pendulum

Junior political science major Niki Molinaro has voted in every election since she came to Elon University. But new North Carolina voter identification laws may keep her out of the voting booth. Although she considers Elon her home, Molinaro, an official New York resident, must present a North Carolina identification card at the polls if she wants to continue voting in North Carolina. The bill, passed August 2013, does more than require voters to show a government-issued ID at the polls. It also shortens the voting period by one week and ends same-day voter registration. This is particularly a problem for university students who use their college ID cards as a form of identification at the polls. Beginning in 2016, they will no longer be considered acceptable. “I think the new law is meant to keep certain groups of people out of the elections,” Molinaro said.

National: Once-Obscure State Job Is Now Attracting Millions Of Campaign Dollars | NPR

Iowa was one of the few states that saw voter turnout increase in 2012. Brad Anderson is proud of the role he played in encouraging turnout there as state director of President Obama’s campaign. Now he’s running for secretary of state, which would put him in charge of overseeing elections. “I have a plan to make Iowa No. 1 in voter turnout,” Anderson says. The fact that a former Obama operative wants to run elections makes some people nervous. But he’s part of a trend of overtly partisan figures running for a job designed to be neutral when it comes to election administration. No fewer than three superPACs have been formed in recent weeks — two on the left, one on the right — with plans to spend millions of dollars this year influencing elections for what used to be a low-profile post in most states.

Editorials: Four things the District of Columbia can try to send election turnout through the roof | Norman Ornstein/Washington Post

Voter turnout in the District is generally abysmal. With rare exceptions — a presidential election with an African American at the head of the ticket, for example — turnout in the city falls at the lower end of a national spectrum that is pretty poor to begin with. In some ways this is no surprise; for those of us living in the District, voting can be a drag. First, we have no voting representation in Congress. Second, the general elections are almost always pro forma; the District is so overwhelmingly Democratic that the only contest that matters is the Democratic primary. Those issues aren’t likely to change anytime soon, but that doesn’t mean turnout has to remain at such low levels. The District is ripe for a dramatic experiment that could show how changing the rules and processes could significantly increase voter participation. Unlike North Carolina, Pennsylvania and Texas, where lawmakers have tried multiple ways to suppress votes to maintain partisan political advantage, the climate here isn’t hostile to voters. Rather, there is every reason for political figures, election officials and citizens to work together to create a healthier democracy. This creates a great opportunity to use the District as a laboratory for cutting-edge ideas.

Ohio: Husted: BOE can move, but locals choose early voting site | Cincinnati.com

Hamilton County leaders can move elections operations to Mount Airy, but the issue about where to put early voting remains unsettled in the wake of Ohio Secretary of State Jon Husted’s tie-breaking vote on the matter. The decisions have national implications. Ohio – and Hamilton County in particular – are key battlegrounds in presidential elections, and how elections are conducted here can affect whose votes get counted. In the 2012 presidential election, more than 24,000 people voted early, in-person, at the Downtown location. “They need to find a place everyone can live with,” Husted told the Enquirer. “I’m not trying to tell anyone in Hamilton County where their early voting should be.” Husted added: “Honestly, the current location is not the best location.”

California: San Diego county hopes to lick high elections cost with vote by mail | UTSanDiego

With a deluge of special elections running up big bills, San Diego County is pushing state legislation that would allow local governments to offer only mail-ballot special elections. “It could drastically reduce the cost and also it’s an opportunity to expand turnout because people will look at voting more as a 30-day opportunity than as a one-day opportunity,” said Assemblywoman Lorena Gonzalez, a San Diego Democrat who introduced legislation Wednesday. Under her Assembly Bill 1873, counties, cities and districts holding special elections could choose to send voters ballots that would be returned by mail or dropped off at predetermined stations. In-person voting would still have to be offered during regular elections, such as the upcoming June primary.