While local registrars withheld comment on the matter, Democratic Registrar LeReine Frampton said she and her Republican colleague JoAnne Albanesi were looking forward to reviewing the full detail of what she described as a “compromise bill” that was voted out of the Legislature’s Government Administration and Elections Committee on March 31.

According to a release, Secretary of the State Denise Merrill joined the Registrars of Voters Association of Connecticut in praising the committee’s passage of Senate Bill No. 1051, An Act Strengthening Connecticut Elections.

By a vote of 13-2, the GAE committee approved a bill that will increase accountability and professionalism among Connecticut’s registrars of voters who are primarily charged with the responsibility of administering elections in Connecticut. Secretary Merrill had sought legislation to redefine the position of registrar from two partisan, elected positions for each city and town to a professional hired locally by municipalities.

In a compromise reached with the Registrars of Voters Association of Connecticut (ROVAC), SB 1051 leaves registrars as locally elected officials, but mandates training and certification, requires elections officials to follow the instructions of the secretary of the state, and provides for a removal process in the event of malfeasance or extreme neglect of duty.

The bill also allows the secretary of the state to temporarily relieve a registrar of voters from duty who has failed to meet required certification or is the subject of an investigation of any matter related to their duties. If the bill is enacted, registrars of voters will be required to pass a certification test and undergo yearly professional development and training, with failure to do so grounds for removal from office.

“After a lot of hard work, I am very grateful that we have bipartisan support for a very strong proposal that will greatly improve elections for Connecticut voters,” said Secretary Merrill. “I thank the ROVAC for working with GAE chairs Senator Steve Cassano and Representative Ed Jutila and my office to come up with a fair compromise that would mandate that registrars be certified and complete yearly training, and imposes real consequences for incompetence or neglect in carrying out their duties. In the end we all want the same thing: the best possible Election Day experience for Connecticut’s nearly two million registered voters. This bill also paves the way for some long-needed modernization and technological improvements to the voting process in Connecticut, something we have sought for years. I urge the General Assembly to support this terrific forward progress for election administration.”

ROVAC President Support

Melissa Russell, president of the Registrars of Voters Association of Connecticut, said, “ROVAC commends the GAE committee and the secretary of the state for finding common ground in addressing issues vital to the integrity of our democratic process. The removal of cumbersome reporting requirements, the implementation of a certification program for registrars and the addition of accountability factors for situations where the local election officials are not meeting the public’s expectations are all important parts of this new proposal. SB 1051 as approved by the GAE committee will reflect today’s expectations of voters and will modernize Connecticut’s elections.”

In addition to introducing new accountability and “professionalization” standards for registrars of voters, SB 1051 also expedites election results reporting by separating results from other statistics that often take longer to gather and report. The also streamlines voter registration deadlines to one week prior to Election Day, and permits local election officials to sign in voters online who are participating in Election Day registration.

The mandated training and certification for registrars of voters would be designed and implemented by the secretary of the state’s office. Under this bill, for a registrar to be removed from office, a complaint would have to be filed with the state’s attorney, who would then investigate and determine whether to file an action in Superior Court recommending removal from office. A full hearing would follow.

The bill moves to Senate floor, and may be referred to other committee before being taken up for a vote in that chamber.

Voting Technology Research

On that same day, Secretary Merrill announced her office released technological requirements developed by the University of Connecticut Voting Technology Research Center (VoTeR Center) to rate and review electronic poll book systems that could be used by poll workers to check in voters on Election Day.

Electronic poll books are computerized systems that replace paper-based voter lists, and have been shown to reduce Election Day lines at the polling place, and make voter history records and voter lists more accurate by cutting down on human transcription errors by poll checkers.

In releasing the requirements, Secretary Merrill is inviting vendors nationwide to submit their electronic poll book systems for review by the UConn VoTeR Center. The VoTeR Center, under the direction of computer science professor Alexander Shvartsman, will examine each system against the criteria developed by the VoTeR Center and the Office of the Secretary of the State, and will report back to Secretary Merrill by rating and scoring each system.

According to state law, Secretary Merrill must choose among the electronic poll book systems and make a list of acceptable vendors from which municipalities can purchase the technology to use in their local voting precincts.

“Local election officials and my office have been striving for years to bring electronic poll book technology to our voting precincts. These systems have succeeded in other states, providing poll workers with the tools to look up voters quickly, record voter histories more accurately, and reduce human error,” said Secretary Merrill.

“These requirements developed at UConn will allow my office to select the best vendors to provide electronic poll books that local election officials will find both user friendly and secure,” she added. “I invite all capable vendors to review these requirements and get into the Connecticut market on e-poll book technology. Through our collaboration with UConn, we can bring this new system to Connecticut in a way that is convenient for local election officials and safeguards the integrity of our voter registration database.”

“We are looking forward to evaluating electronic poll book systems on behalf of the secretary. The evaluation will be done in light of the published requirements that reflect the needs for reliability, security, integrity, performance, and ease-of-use,” said Professor Shvartsman.