HELP AMERICA VOTE ACT. PUBLIC HEARING. University of Missouri, Saint Louis. MARCH 10, 2003. APPEARANCES Panel Members: Judy Taylor. Betsy Byers. Richard Struckhoff. Gary Stoff. Reported by: Celena D. Moulton, RPR. MS. ZIEGLER: I'm Maureen Ziegler, and it's my pleasure today to welcome all of you, visitors, faculty, staff administrators and members of the Secretary of State's office and the Saint Louis City and County Board of Elections. I want to welcome you all. Thank you for taking part in this really important hearing. I know there's going to be a lot of good work being done here today. Thank you very much for visiting, and that is the end of my job. I'm going to turn it over to the representatives from the Secretary of State's office. MS. BYERS: Hello on behalf of Secretary Blunt for the public hearing on the Help America Vote Act. It's good to see people interested in the election process. And with this recent Federal legislation, how it will impact elections here in the State of Missouri. The Help America Vote Act, it has quite a few requirements for the State to comply with. One of those requirements is that we put together a State plan to implement the provisions in the Help America Vote Act. And as part of that requirement, we have organized a plan committee and we have people represented, election authorities from around the State of Missouri. We are required to have the election directors for the two largest jurisdictions on the State Planning Committee. In Missouri, that includes election directors from Saint Louis County and Jackson County. So we have four representatives from those areas. We also have representative election authorities from rural areas around the state. We have people on the committee who are considered stakeholders in the process. And this is representatives from groups that respect the disabled. We have people on the committee that represent poll workers, election judges, minority groups, what we consider stakeholders in the election process, which is a variety of people that includes all of us. So we try to get a wide variety of representation on the Stakeholder Committee. We have funds that we're going to be receiving from the Help America Vote Act. Part of those funds are what we call the punch card buy-out. And it gives the counties the option, if they so choose, to participate in the buy-out program. The Federal legislation provides partial funding of that buy-out program. If a County chooses to participate, then they will get, possibly, it provides up to $4,000 per precinct to participate in that buy-out and to purchase new equipment. As we know, $4,000 probably won't cover the cost per precinct to participate in purchasing equipment that is more modern, more advanced, using advanced technology and accessible for the disabled. One of the requirements in the Help America Vote Act is that each polling place must have a piece of equipment that is accessible to the disabled. So on the State Plan Committee, that's a big charge of what we have to do is to look at the accessibility issues, to look at the types of equipment that we have and also look at the election procedures that we have in place right now in the State of Missouri and to see how we can improve upon those procedures. Part of the funds outside of the punch card buy-out and equipment purchasing is provided to improve the elections process. So as we work in our State Plan Committee, we are also going to be looking at ways that we can improve the process and implement new procedures in the State of Missouri. On our State Plan Committee, like I said, there are representatives from all different walks of life, we have imposed upon ourselves a June 1st deadline to put together our State Plan. In order to be eligible for Federal funds, we need to get this in by the beginning of their fiscal year for this year. And we anticipate moving very quickly to get this plan done. We have publication requirements at the state level and also at the Federal level. We are holding public hearings around the State of Missouri. We had one last week in Kansas City, this week in Saint Louis. On the 19th we will be in Jefferson City. On the 26th we are in Springfield and on the 27th we are in Poplar Bluff. So we're trying to get input from the public on what they feel might be the best way to not only spend the money, but improve the election process itself. Some may not require funds to do that, and some may. As we put the State Plan Committee together, we decided it might be easiest to get organized in a way that we can divide and conquer. We set up three subcommittees for the State Plan Committee. One is training and education, the other subcommittee is equipment and accessibility, and the last is database, provisional voting and voter ID. Those three subcommittees pretty much touch base with every area of the State Plan that we have to address. I haven't spoken much on the Database Committee, but currently the State has a centralized voter registration database that does not comply with the Help America Vote Act. We will be looking at that to see what we need to do, what's necessary to update that and to make it in compliance. The committee outside of equipment accessibility, which I mentioned earlier, is the Training and Education Committee. This turns out to be one of the largest subcommittees within our committee. And it's very important that we train poll workers, election officials and voters on the different aspects of the voting process. So that one is going to be an interesting committee, and they've already met -- they met in Jefferson City the last week of February. We started the work, and it's going to be a challenge, one we look forward to, but it's one that's going to take a lot of input, and that's where why we're here today. We'd like to get input from as many people as possible on our State Plan. With me, I'd like to introduce chairs or co-chairs of the subcommittees that are represented within the State Plan Committee. To my far left is Richard Struckhoff. Richard is the County Clerk in Greene County, and Richard is co-chair with Pat Conway, the Buchanan County Clerk, on the Database Provisional Voting and Voter ID Subcommittee. Next, to my left is Judy Taylor. Judy is the Democratic Director of Elections for Saint Louis County. Judy is co-chair on equipment and accessibility. The other co-chair is Gilbert Powers, who is a Clerk in Johnson County. To my right is Gary Stoff. He is Republican Director of Elections with Saint Louis City. He is co-chair on the Training and Education Committee, along with Sharon Turner-Bowie, who is the Democratic Director of Elections at the Kansas City Board of Elections. So before I turn it over to them, they're going to give a quick overview of what their subcommittees have been charged with and what their plans are. I would like, again, to thank you for being here today. And, of course, Secretary Blunt had planned on being here today, but his traveling schedule had a conflict, so he's not able to attend. He's at a speaking engagement in Springfield. So Richard is up here, he's down there. So with that, I'd like to open it up to the chair subcommittees. And after that, we will get the input from the people here, which is why we're here today in the first place. So we'll turn it over Richard. MR. STRUCKHOFF: I'll be very brief. I'm more interested in hearing what you have to say. Fortunately, I'm chairing or co-chairing the subcommittee where the work is almost all done. It's great. As she mentioned, we're in charge of provisional voting, which Matt Blunt pushed through the legislature last year. We've already tried it once. There were a few wrinkles that we weren't expecting, and we'll have to make some changes. But the one big change in provisional voting that's going to be coming up at least for election authorities is that we'll have to provide public access to those people who voted provisionally either through the internet or a 1-800 number or some other technology. We're really not sure how we're going to do that. As an election authority for Greene County, I'm really hoping the State will pay the cost of that. Under Voter ID we also -- it's almost as though Matt Blunt had an inside source in Congress that got a laugh in Kansas City. Matt's dad is Roy Blunt, whose is a Congressman who actually served on the committee that passed the Federal law, the Help America Vote Act. So we already have adopted in the State of Missouri most of the provisions that are in HAVA for identification of voters. As far as the database, Betsy already explained to you that we had a database, state-wide database, in Missouri for some years now. The only problem is it's not up to the minute. Some of our counties are only sending their updates once a month. Some larger counties like ours are sending ours once a week. So we're going to have to make this real-time, according to the Federal law. And not everyone is in agreement as to what that's supposed to mean. So we're looking at a major, major expenditure of funds to do that. So these are our three areas, and I look forward to hearing your testimony today. MS. TAYLOR: My name is Judy Taylor and I'm co-chair of the Equipment and Accessibility Subcommittee. The focuses that we're focusing on is disabilities, alternative languages and second chance voting. And our subcommittee met last week, also, and we felt that we were kind of spinning our wheels until we get the public input as to what they want for their voting equipment. And there's funds out there, and we would certainly like to use them to make all this available for everyone and give everyone the chance and the opportunity to vote a secret private ballot. And we just look forward to all of your comments. MR. STOFF: Good afternoon. My name is Gary Stoff, and I'm co-chair of the Education and Training Subcommittee with my Democratic counterpart in Kansas City. We likewise met last week as a subcommittee. And within our subcommittee, we have five sub-subcommittees dealing with five separate issues. One is voter information, the second is poll worker training, the third is college poll worker and youth participation, the fourth is the administrative complaint process, and the fifth is military and overseas voting. If my memory serves me correctly, I think I see a couple of my fellow subcommittee and sub-subcommittee members who are here today, which is good to see. All five areas are of interest to us, but we're particularly interested in and wrestling with the problems of voter education and our poll worker training. I don't think the City of Saint Louis is unique in dealing with its poll workers in the sense of recruiting, training and retaining, and similarly in trying to encourage voters to become informed of the issues and to come out and cast their vote. So any suggestions that you have for the committee here today is certainly most welcome. I will take those back with me to the next meeting of our subcommittee, and we'll pool all those ideas and hopefully come up with some good recommendations for the Secretary of State. MS. BYERS: As Gary mentioned, the State Plan Committee, acting as an advisory committee to the Secretary of State, is working on that plan to present to the Secretary for his review. And I do want to note that we have a stenographer here, a court reporter, who will be taking down all the information that's shared today. And we will have that available for anyone who would like to have access to that. Also, this gives us, as well as the Secretary, an opportunity to review that testimony and discussion and have that in hard copy to refer to as we put together our State Plan. So with that, we'd like to open it up for public comment. We do ask that you fill out a witness form so that we can track who gave the testimony to the report that we are having done. They are available at the corner of the desk up here on the table at the front of the room. If you need assistance on completing those, just let us know. We have staff from the Secretary of State's office here. First of all, myself, Betsy Byers. I don't believe I introduced myself. I'm Co-director of Elections in the Secretary of State's Office. I am the Democratic Director of Elections. The Republican Director of Elections was at the Kansas City hearing last week, so we're dividing it up, trying to get the whole state covered. Also from the Secretary of State's staff we have Katharine Barondeau, who is assistant general counsel in the back of the room. And Pam Backs, who is an election specialist with the Election Division. So if you need any help or anything from our office, we are more than happy to provide assistance or information to you. UNIDENTIFIED SPEAKER: I just have a couple of questions. I don't understand -- before you all do the testimony, what is Second Chance? I am an election judge, and I haven't heard of that. MS. TAYLOR: Second Chance is if you make a mistake, you can review it, if you over-vote or under-vote your ballot. UNIDENTIFIED SPEAKER: Yes, ma'am. I just hadn't heard it referred to like that. And also I'd like to talk -- Mr. Stoff made a comment. I've been an election judge for four years, and what is the current procedure to try to get more people to vote? And then maybe later I can talk to you if you have some ideas about that. MR. STOFF: Okay. I'd be pleased to chat with you. I think our primary interest here is receiving your input, you and the other members who are here. I can tell you that in the City we publicize elections, we make appearances at neighborhood association meetings, church meetings. We have information posted at libraries and on the website. And we also work through the respective parties, committee structures to get information out to the voters about issues that are on the ballot. UNIDENTIFIED SPEAKER: I am just not familiar. And by me being a judge -- I live in public housing, and a lot of people just aren't out in the community to know about how to vote. MR. STOFF: Absolutely. I'd be happy to chat with you. MS. BYERS: And as part of the State Plan, I think, too, that we'd like to hear what people think and if you have ideas or things you'd like to share with us, success stories, we'd sure be interested in hearing that to see if that might be something we'd like to implement with the State Plan. MS. TAYLOR: We have Sheri Keller and Michael Keller. MR. STRUCKHOFF: Sheri, just for the record, could you state your name and where you're from? MRS. KELLER: Sure. My name is Sheri Keller, Saint Louis, Missouri. MR. STRUCKHOFF: Thank you. MRS. KELLER: Good afternoon. Thank you for the opportunity to speak to you today. My name is Sheri, as I said, and I am a registered voter in Saint Louis City. In the past, I have also been a registered voter in Columbia and Springfield, Missouri. And just as an aside to my testimony, I would like to say that I have been treated very well, with respect and dignity at all of those polls. As the current law allows, at times I have requested a Democrat and Republican to assist me with marking my ballot. At times I have also taken, as the law currently allows, a registered voter with me to assist me in marking my ballot. Due to my disability, I have never been able to cast a secret ballot independently. It is for this reason that I believe the Help America Vote Act is so important. With the implementation of this legislation, any voting system purchased with Federal funds after January 1, 2006 must be fully accessible and allow all voters, including those with disabilities, the ability to cast a secret, independent and verifiable ballot. Another important part of this legislation, I believe, is a non-supplantation clause to bar local election authorities from supplanting Federal funds into their general operating budget. In closing, I would like to make one more point. The technology is available to allow me to cast a secret ballot independently. However, I believe that it is essential to ensure that voting is truly accessible to all persons in Missouri. Thank you very much. MR. STRUCKHOFF: Thank you, Sheri. Sheri, can I ask you a question? MRS. KELLER: Sure. MR. STRUCKHOFF: I notice that you're reading braille. In Kansas City, we also have visually impaired people who gave testimony. And one of the questions that we asked each one was if they read braille or not. I think you answered that. Number two, we asked them what percentage of the visually impaired do you believe can read braille? Any idea? MRS. KELLER: I don't know. MR. STRUCKHOFF: They estimate somewhere less than 1 percent of visually impaired people. MRS. KELLER: I'd say it's higher than that. MR. STRUCKHOFF: Would you have an estimate or is there a source that we can go to on that. MRS. KELLER: American Printing House for the Blind would probably be the best source, in Louisville, Kentucky. And I think some type of speech enlarged print would probably hit the most -- or the largest percent of the population, to be honest. MR. STRUCKHOFF: And that was my next question. Would braille reach or help the largest percentage of visually impaired people in your estimation. MRS. KELLER: I would say probably not, although I'm really strong on braille literacy. So you're kind of challenging me now from a philosophical standpoint. But I would honestly say that probably speech would be a more universal form. MR. STRUCKHOFF: Some type of audible system? MRS. KELLER: Right. MS. TAYLOR: If you had an audible system that would review your ballot, that would be acceptable. MRS. KELLER: Yes. MR. STRUCKHOFF: Have you tried out any system yourself? MRS. KELLER: I have. I'm not going to be good on the name of one. MS. BYERS: I know that we had Paraquad, was it last year? MRS. KELLER: Exactly. The one dialing system that was there, if you were there. MR. STRUCKHOFF: Was that the E-Slate? MS. BYERS: It was Hart. MR. STRUCKHOFF: Hart. I think that's Hart's E-Slate. That's what several of the folks who testified in Kansas City talked about. MRS. KELLER: Yes. It was very good speech, and certainly user friendly, I would say, from what I saw of it. Anything else? MR. STRUCKHOFF: Thank you, Sheri. MS. TAYLOR: Michael, would you like to speak? MR. KELLER: She said basically everything I would say except to make sure that everything is accessible for all disabilities as far as locations for polling places. That's all I have to say. MS. TAYLOR: Kelly Anthony. MS. ANTHONY: Good afternoon. My name is Kelly Anthony, for the record. I am the Director of the Missouri Disability Vote Project. I work at Paraquad, which is the Center for Independent Living here in Saint Louis. I'm also a member of the Education and Training Subcommittee for the State Plan Committee. I just have a couple of things on the equipment stuff before I get into my testimony. The Hart system was the best rated system at our accessible voting technology exposition that we held last year. The reason for that is there are several systems out there that do have the audible ear phone system, however, most of the screens, when you turn on the headphones, most of the screens go dark or go blank. While this may work for voters who are entirely blind, for low vision voters, that created a problem. They would still like to be able to see the ballot. MR. STRUCKHOFF: Did they explain why? MS. ANTHONY: Why it went blank? I think it was just the way the technology was built. They thought that -- MR. STRUCKHOFF: I'm wondering if that was intentional so people couldn't look over the shoulder of the blind voter. MS. ANTHONY: It's possible. I really don't know what the intentions were. But I do know that the screen staying on helped most of our low vision folks who were testing the equipment. But I also know that manufacturing companies, since this law has passed, are scrambling to come up with technology. So while that's the best system out there now, of course to our advocates, better technology is on the way, I think. MR. STRUCKHOFF: And I hate to interrupt. But I have seen the E-slate at some of the conferences we attend on an annual basis. I don't recall that it had a paper trail, an individual, verifiable paper trail. MS. ANTHONY: I think it can be done. I know that system is widely used in Texas. MR. STRUCKHOFF: Harris County, I think, has bought the system. MS. ANTHONY: Yeah. MR. STRUCKHOFF: It was my understanding that that was one of the downsides of the E-slate, it did not produce a voter verifiable ballot. MS. ANTHONY: Which is important. MR. STRUCKHOFF: It's very important. In fact, now many of the people in the Silicon Valley are rallying against these new systems because they don't provide that back-up, and you're completely at the mercy of a programmer. MS. ANTHONY: Right. And the poll workers have to be very carefully trained if something were to go wrong. MR. STRUCKHOFF: Exactly. MS. ANTHONY: And I think that once those come to light, that the technology will move forward with that. Again, my name is Kelly Anthony. I'm here representing the Help Missouri Vote Coalition, which is a coalition of almost 40 citizen organizations around the state, and I have a list of them here. We represent disabled voters, voters of ethnic minorities, older adults, clergy, teachers and other citizen organizations. While each of the organizations in the coalition has a specific interest in being a part of the coalition, the underlying principles for why we are working together in the coalition are mutual. And those principles are to ensure that every legitimate voter in Missouri, every legitimate voter's ballot is counted, and that all eligible citizens have the same access to casing a secret and independent ballot inside their polling places as their non-disabled counterparts. We know as a coalition that HAVA, the Help America Vote Act, was passed as a direct result of the problems that we saw in the election process during the 2000 elections around the country. And many of the organizations participating in this coalition represent the constituencies that were most negatively effected by those problems in Missouri during the 2000 elections. And we have is a very high stake, obviously, in seeing that those problems are addressed, especially now with the opportunities that we are getting with the Federal funding coming directly into the State to begin to solve some of those problems. We feel that was a successful implementation. Missouri has as great deal of opportunity to develop the most accurate, efficient and accessible process. Along with this opportunity, however, comes responsibility. Missouri policy-makers, the Secretary of State's Office and the State Plan Committee members. When we're setting a high standard for improvements to and changes in the elections process, we need to be careful that we don't create more barriers to voting and that we are not burdening the voter further. In this state, there's a good deal of talk about elections fraud. I'm sure it's the same in other states. And it's an understandable debate. Fraudulent voting depletes the integrity and accuracy of our elections process. However, again, we have to be careful that when we're dealing with these issues of fraud, we aren't creating more barriers to the honest, legitimate voters in this state. Our feeling as a coalition is that there are going to be those individuals who want to deceive the system, and that they will find every way that they can. If they want to commit voter fraud, then they're going to find a way to do it. I liken voter fraud and election fraud to bank robbery. No matter what we do, we haven't been able as a society to stop bank robberies, but we don't make it harder for people to use the bank. What we do is we prosecute people who commit bank robbery. People know the penalties for committing that crime and security is heightened and there are procedures in place. But these procedures, again, don't make it harder for you to get into the bank. The same should be true for the voting process, we feel as a coalition. The Help Missouri Vote Coalition is working to ensure that our elections process is set up to encourage all eligible citizens to vote at the highest level of participation possible. We feel that minimal compliance with HAVA, in other words, the State simply meeting the Federal guidelines, is not enough for true election reform to occur. And again, this is an opportunity to make some real changes in the election process. And the State should be looking above and beyond what is required and to begin looking at the constituencies that have the most to gain from this law. And that's why we've addressed and prioritized several voting needs for our community. Sheri mentioned earlier the non-supplantation clause. We feel this is very important at the local level. The Federal law states that the State entities who are receiving these Federal funds can't supplant Federal dollars. We'd also like to see that clause extended to local election authorities to ensure that the funding is being spent to where it's intended. It's not that we don't trust the election authorities, it's just that, particularly the disability community has had promises made in the past, and those promises so often take much longer than should be deemed appropriate, according to the disability community, for those changes to occur. The other items are provisional ballots, a system of when somebody's provisional ballot doesn't count, that a voter registration card is mailed to them or somehow the envelope on the voter ballot acts as a voter registration card. We want to see that as a uniform practice around the state. A centralized voter list we feel is also very important, being able to access that in real-time. We'd also like to see disability entities and poverty entities linked into that database so that those entities are held accountable for the voter registration activities and that that's an efficient and effective way of registering voters who are served by those entities. We'd like to see developed no later than August of 2004 a uniform poll worker training around the state to deal with the proper ways of distributing and handling provisional ballots, so that it's the same around the state, to address the needs of voters with disabilities and for voters whose English is not their native language. We want to see a uniform system developed so that all poll workers around the state know the process and that a person with a disability in Rolla, Missouri will have the same opportunity as a person with a disability voting in Saint Louis City, they're able to vote in the same way. We also urge the -- and we're working with the Legislature and the State Plan process on this. We urge Legislators that if an election authority waits until the very last waiver period for this Federal funding, if they wait until the last one, which is if they're not in compliance by January 1st, 2006, they're able to apply for again a third waiver in which they can come in compliance by January 1st, 2007. The disability community has been shut out of the elections process as long as this country has been around. And so we feel that as an incentive for election authorities to make themselves accessible, that any system purchased after January 1st, 2006 with Federal funds, those systems must be completely 100-percent electronic and accessible. So if an election authority waits until January 1st, 2006 to begin thinking about implementation, then they'll have to pay more money. We'd also like a see a Voter's Bill of Rights. These would be statute changed. There are things that are already in law, already voter's rights. We'd just like to see them uniformly posted at every polling place in the country. I have here for each of you those priorities, and a list of the coalition members. Again, we feel minimal compliance is not sufficient. That's why we've set out our own priorities based upon what our constituencies have experienced in the past in the election process. These priorities will give Missouri the ability to say that our elections follow the letter and spirit of the Help America Vote Act, empowering citizens through the election process. And that's my close. And I would be happy to answer any questions. MR. STRUCKHOFF: Kelly, have you seen the term "disability" defined in the Federal law? MS. ANTHONY: Most commonly what is used is under the Americans with Disabilities Act. MR. STRUCKHOFF: Was it specifically referred to in this bill? MS. ANTHONY: I don't think it was specifically referred to. MR. STRUCKHOFF: How would you define it? MS. ANTHONY: I would use the Americans with Disabilities Act guidelines. MR. STRUCKHOFF: So if we have a system that Sherry can use, but if Christopher Reeves can't, then that's not an allowable system? MS. ANTHONY: Right. Although you'll find most of the systems can accommodate all voters, not just voters with disabilities, but all voters, as a matter of fact. And that the systems that are being developed now actually have modifications and accommodations that can be fitted onto the equipment. For instance, if a voter with quadriplegia wants to vote, there's a sip and puff method that we've seen, as well as the headphones. And, actually, I haven't seen too many systems who are calling themselves fully accessible that allow one and not the other. I think that the manufactures are aware that disability includes blind and low vision voters, it also includes voters with upper mobility disorders. MR. STRUCKHOFF: And since the technology that you have seen and the technology that I've seen, I'm not sure even comes close to all of the disabilities that you just described, would the disabled communities say, "Okay. We will be all for a waiver if all of us can go in and be able to cast an independent vote." So what I'm saying is, and as you stated earlier, the technology is changing every day and improving, hopefully. So if the State of Missouri were to ask for a waiver until January of 2006, would you be opposed to that? MS. ANTHONY: Not the 2006 waiver, but definitely to the 2007 waiver. We feel that by setting accessibility guidelines, you're not limiting election authorities to the purchase of equipment by simply saying accessible means that blind voters are able to cast a ballot, accessible means that voters with upper mobility disorders are able to cast a secret ballot. That's enough to put into place the systems that need to be there. And there are systems out there that do fit these needs already. And that market is only going to grow as this law starts to take effect in states. And so we feel that we can go ahead and set some really specific guidelines and that we are not limiting or not getting ahead of ourselves. MR. STOFF: I'm glad she is on our subcommittee. MS. ANTHONY: Also, the ACLU of Eastern Missouri, a coalition member that couldn't be here today, asked me to read a letter. Would it be okay if I read the letter? MR. STRUCKHOFF: Sure. Just state who it's from. MS. ANTHONY: It's from Matt LeMieux, who is the Executive Director of ACLU of Eastern Missouri. "Dear Committee Members: In March 2001, the American Civil Liberties Union in Eastern Missouri filed a lawsuit against the Saint Louis Board of Elections with the hope of fixing the many flaws in the City's voting procedures that resulted in thousands of people being disenfranchised on the eve of the 2000 presidential election. The ACLU also filed suits in several other jurisdictions seeking to correct voting flaws. One of the common themes in each of those cases was the lack of money at the local level to address serious voting issues. The passage of the Help America Vote Act will allow many cash-strapped jurisdictions like the City of Saint Louis to fulfill its duty to ensure that every person who is willing and able can cast their vote. To be consistent with the spirit of HAVA, we believe that the following measures must be taken at the state level: The adoption of rules allowing for smooth administration of a provisional ballot system that seeks to count as many votes as possible; the creation of an expansive, centralized voter list; uniform poll worker training; a rule that bars local election officials from placing Federal HAVA funds into their general operating budget; the creation of and posting on election day of a Voter's Bill of Rights. The passage of HAVA could be the most significant voter's rights legislation in the past 30 years. We believe the success of this legislation depends upon the passage of clear guidelines that will address issues of accessibility, poll worker training and voter registration. We hope this committee will work to advance the spirit of HAVA by creating clear rules for implementation of this potentially ground-breaking piece of legislation. Sincerely, Matt LeMieux, Executive Director of the ACLU of Eastern Missouri. MR. STRUCKHOFF: Do you have a question for her? This is David Welsh. He is also on the subcommittee. MR. WELSH: I have two questions. The first one, the Americans with Disabilities Act and several acts refer to reasonable accommodations. This act does not refer to reasonable accommodations. It says "shall be accessible to all voters". Is that a higher standard than a reasonable accommodation in your mind? MS. ANTHONY: Yes. Reasonable accommodations, up until this point, have included, for instance, curbside voting, absentee voting has been used as an excuse -- we call it an excuse -- or as a reason not to make polling places accessible. In other words, local election authorities have often times interpreted reasonable accommodations to mean that people with disabilities don't need to vote within their polling place and don't need to vote by secret ballot. And actually, the Federal law further explains that voters who are blind and low vision have to have the opportunity to be able to cast a secret ballot under this Federal legislation. MR. WELSH: All right. Secondly, in saying all voters, you indicated that there is equipment available that would allow all voters to cast a secret ballot. Do you by any chance know any manufacturers who have such a system that would allow the person with a disability, let's say hearing and sight disabilities, to cast a ballot. MS. ANTHONY: I don't know about that. That's a really good question. I think the equipment that we've seen doesn't include somebody who is voting who has like a hearing impairment or is low vision and blind. I haven't seen the technology. It doesn't mean it's not out there. But the equipment that we've seen, the ones that were fully accessible for which I described earlier, those were simply devices that could be placed onto the equipment to allow for voters with those disabilities to vote. The system is actually accessible to all voters, so I can use the electronic voting system if I want. It's not limited to people with disabilities. MR. WELSH: I understand that. But fully accessible to the person with one or more disability, also. So that, to your knowledge, is not currently available. MS. ANTHONY: Not to my knowledge. But it's been a while since I've been working on the technology end of things. So things might be developed. I am not sure. But if somebody were blind and had quadriplegia, for instance, they would be able to cast a secret ballot with some of these systems. MS. TAYLOR: Is it in the FEC regulations? MS. ANTHONY: The FEC didn't set any regulations for this law, unfortunately. We wish they had, but they haven't set any yet. MR. STRUCKHOFF: Betsy, you have attended some Federal conferences. Was there a definition for disability that you heard? MS. BYERS: Not this one. Like Kelly said, not in the Help America Vote Act, there isn't a definition of disability. MR. STRUCKHOFF: That was the point I was trying to make, not really a point, but a question. What if we do have a voter who is Helen Keller meets Christopher Reeves? I mean, what system is there available or could there even be one that's going to allow this person to vote independently and in secret. MS. ANTHONY: I would turn that back over to the equipment subcommittee. I would think that that would really be something that they could look into. That could be a charge that they really look into it to see if that technology -- if it's not available now, is it being developed. MR. STRUCKHOFF: That's why I'm happy with my little subcommittee. MR. KELLER: Actually, if a person is deaf and blind, if they read braille and if they had braille output, they would be able to have a secret ballot if they read braille. MR. STOFF: Thank you. MS. TAYLOR: Is that all, Kelly? MS. ANTHONY: That's all I have. MS. TAYLOR: Thank you. Hunter Alexander. MR. ALEXANDER: Good afternoon. My name is Hunter Alexander. I am a registered voter in the County of Saint Louis. And I'd like to say that Missouri and all Missourians, just like myself, can be very proud of this state because we have recognized the need to reintegrate into our society ex-felons into the population of voters. We have a law in the books that allows them to regain their right to vote once they have completely served their debt to society and have been discharged from the penal system. So we can be very proud of that, because Missouri has led the nation in the attempt to make this population productive, tax paying and productive citizens again. However, we could do a little bit more, because what we've found is that most of this population, over 700,000 in the State of Missouri, is unaware that they have this right to vote once they have been discharged from the system. And so what I am here to do is represent that population of Missouri, those 700,000, and would like to know is there something being done to assist that population in re-enfranchising their rights to vote. This may be something that could be done in the Voter Information area of that committee. It may be something that could be done in the Voter Education area, also, of that committee. But it's a population that surely we want to continue to re-integrate into our society and make them tax paying and productive citizens again. Now, one way we could do this and it wouldn't cost anything is to ensure that in their letter of discharge when they leave the system that the information is included in the letter, that they have regained their right to vote, and also some instructions on procedures on how they can go about registering to do that. And this is something that's being done already. They are being given a letter of discharge. However, they are not being told that they have a right to vote. So it would be a simple matter of including that in the letter of discharge and having the probation and parole boards to include that as they give them their letter of discharge. Another means that we feel that would help also would be to make probation and parole officers similar to the motor voter registration process. Make those offices equipped so that as they are discharged from the system, they can automatically be registered to vote in the system. MS. TAYLOR: Mr. Alexander, I'd like to ask you a few questions, because you've hit something very near and dear to my heart. I do prison ministry. And I feel that when a person has paid their debt to society, that they should be allowed to be reinstated to vote. And I agree with you, a lot of them aren't. And the public is not aware that if a convicted felon is convicted, until he's sentenced, he still is allowed to vote. A question I would like to ask you is how far do you think we should go, you know? Do you have volunteers out there to give this information to -- I mean, 700,000, that's a lot of people, you know. And do you have volunteers out there to give this information to people that have paid their debt to society? MR. ALEXANDER: Yes. This year the American Civil Liberties Union of Eastern Missouri began a program, actually last year, began a program. It's called the Get Your Vote Back in Missouri Project, where we do provide this information to ex-felons. Now, what we have been doing is we have been providing those information packets to organizations that have contact with ex-felons. We've also provided information packets to the Board of Probation and Parole, also. So there is a limited number of volunteers that are out trying to distribute this information. But again, the majority of the ex-felons that are in our tate now have already served their debt to society, and hey are back in our society. But when they left, they were not informed. And what I found is that not only almost 100 percent of those ex-felons, but almost 100 percent of the general public is unaware that ex-felons have the right to vote, also. So there needs to be a means of getting information to ex-felons that are already out there. But ex-felons are leaving the system daily, also. So one simple process that wouldn't cost anything would be to make sure that that information is included in the letter of discharge as they leave the system now. So it would not serve all of those 700,000 that are already there, but it would correct the problem to ensure that future ex-felons, as they leave the system, they are informed that they have the right to vote. And also if we could make the probation and parole offices just like the motor voter program, where they also could go ahead and register them as they leave the system, that would also correct the problem, too, for the present and in the future. But the ones that are already existing is something that we're working on. We're trying to work with probation and parole to try to identify those 700,000 so that we can get the information to them, but it's a lengthy process. MS. TAYLOR: Are you aware of pending legislation now to stop convicted felons from voting, period? MR. ALEXANDER: No. I am not aware of that pending legislation. Would you tell me what that is? MS. TAYLOR: I don't have the House bill number. It's not on the calendar, and it hasn't been put before a committee yet. I don't have it in front of me. But I'd be happy to give you a card and check it. It's legislation you should follow closely. MR. ALEXANDER: Okay. I was aware of legislation that was presented but was later amended the next day, amended to state not that voters would not be given the right to vote, but that ex-felons would not be allowed to run for public office. MS. TAYLOR: No. This has that they should be denied the right to vote, period. MR. ALEXANDER: I am not aware of that. I would like to know what that is. I am aware of legislation that was presented in the Senate, though, by Senator Rich Days, which is Senate Bill 321, which would simply add one sentence in the current language that would simply say that the probation and parole boards would include in their letter of discharge information that ex-felons have the right to vote. And again, that would not cost anything. MS. TAYLOR: I am aware of that one, also. But there is another one out there that you should watch closely. MR. STRUCKHOFF: Let me just say that I would agree about the letter. I am not even sure that would require legislation. I think that could be executive ordered to that department of the State to add that language to the letter. But when you start to suggest that parole officers then become voter registrars, I think there are a number of election authorities in the room who kind of went, "Oh, no!" Because since then, since motor voters, we have made registrars out of a lot of people who never wanted to do it, and they daily show us that, that they don't want to do it. And to tell a parole officer that they're going to become a voter registrar, I think we're going into an area that I don't think we want to go. But I totally agree with you that just adding that language to the discharge letter would be a good idea. MR. ALEXANDER: Can I ask you guys to assist me in getting maybe -- in maybe asking the Governor to make that executive order? MR. STRUCKHOFF: I'm not sure the Governor would listen to me, but I'll certainly talk to my legislators. MS. TAYLOR: I would certainly be happy to make that request for you. MR. ALEXANDER: Thank you. MS. TAYLOR: Here's my card. Robert Schwartz. MR. SCHWARTZ: I guess part of what I wanted to say, this gentleman just covered. But I work at the Saint Louis Empowerment Center, and we deal with people with mental illness and a lot of homeless people. And I was part of the Get Out the Vote thing last year, and not one single one of our clients knew that as an ex-felon they were allowed to vote. They bucked me at every turn on, "Hey, we can register you here." "But I'm not allowed to. Nobody ever told me I could." And that disenfranchised fully half of our people. With our homeless population, we have got a problem with the identification thing. It's a problem for our guys, period, for getting a job, getting into a shelter. And there's nobody funding getting them an ID, and it's like a poll tax for this particular population. Most of my clients, if they get Disability, that's their total income. And while $10 doesn't seem like much to us, if it's a big percentage of your monthly rate, and you're carrying it around on your back and you lose it every month, that's a big chunk. And so those people will never have identification, and a lot of them are ex-felons. They're trying to rehabilitate themselves. We're trying to help them. And understanding the voting process is part of their rehabilitation, but they believe that they have been disenfranchised. The Motor Voter Law, when I first read about that, I thought, "Oh, my God. Are we under that? Are we supposed to be doing it?" And then I realized it had to come from Jeff City. I have been registering people for the last couple of years. I do it on a regular basis. It's wonderful that homeless people are allowed to use our center's address for their mail and a mailing address. They can vote from there. That helps. But that mandated thing -- you've had a lot of people that didn't want to be registrars, but at the same time, I know a lot of people that were willing to be registrars, but without that mandate from Jefferson City, they can't do it. MR. STRUCKHOFF: Have you been deputized to be a registrar? MR. SCHWARTZ: No. MR. STRUCKHOFF: Under Motor Voter, because of mail-in provision, really anybody can circulate voter registration forms. They'll give them to you for free. That's probably how you've been doing it. MR. SCHWARTZ: I do that, and then I funnel them through the League of Women Voters. MR. STRUCKHOFF: The other gentleman that testified, they can put a mail-in form in their discharge letter. The Secretary of State's office prints tens of thousands of those things all the time. So that would probably would be a good thing. It could say, "You're discharged. You can register to vote now," and enclose a form. MR. SCHWARTZ: Yeah. I don't understand the -- well, poverty, homelessness, mental illness, they're all barriers to people's understanding their voting rights. And it seems to be that if poverty agencies, mental health agencies and the Department of Corrections, yeah, they're are all overworked and they don't want anymore. But if they don't, we've disenfranchised such a huge section of our population. I don't know how to encourage them to come back into society if they don't take part in the voting process. And without that vote -- I need the education on how to bring them back into society. MS. TAYLOR: I wish I had an answer for you. MR. STRUCKHOFF: Thank you. MR. SCHWARTZ: You're welcome. MS. TAYLOR: Russell Ewell. MR. STRUCKHOFF: Russell, if you would state your name and address. MR. EWELL: Yes. My name is Russell Ewell, and my address is 7119 Orion, Saint Louis, Missouri 63121. MR. STRUCKHOFF: Go right ahead. MR. EWELL: I'm sorry. I'm just getting in late, so I don't know what has been said already, and I hate to repeat anything that somebody else has already stated. But I'm here as a member of the community. Also, I am a person with a visual disability, diagnosed as being legally blind. So I'm a part of the blind community. And I want to speak on that behalf as far as people that have never been able to cast a secretive ballot before. And all of my life, as long as I've voted, which has been about 20 years now, I've never been able to vote without someone assisting me, without there being someone there. And I'm not a hundred percent sure that they always cast the ballot that I would like to cast, even if it's a family member, as with the curbside voting. I know that that's available. And I also know that you can vote absentee. But I feel it is empowering for people to be able to come to the polls themselves, for it to be accessible to people with visual disabilities, with mobility disabilities to be able to come and take part in something that I believe is our right. I am excited about this whole process, because I believe that it's a chance to be able to talk to you all at this point where those decisions are being made. And I just wanted to make sure that I let people know that, as a person with one specific disability, that does not mean that I am not sensitive to people with other disabilities. And I really support the idea of making even the polls physically accessible themselves. MR. STRUCKHOFF: And I've asked this of every person with a visual disability. Can you read braille? MR. EWELL: No, I do not. Large print is my choice of texts. MS. TAYLOR: So a change of font size? MR. EWELL: Yes. MR. STRUCKHOFF: No other questions. Thank you, Russell. MS. TAYLOR: Why don't we take a 10, 15 minute break and come back and see if anyone else has anything they'd like to address the committee with. (Thereupon, a short recess was taken.) MS. TAYLOR: We have a David Kimble. MR. KIMBLE: Hi. My name is David Kimble, and I am an assistant professor of political science here at UMSL. And I have been doing some research over the last year or two on voting equipment, specifically, and election, some of them generally. I think that part of the motivation for the Federal Help America Vote Act was in response to the controversy in Florida in the presidential election 2000, and the situation of over-votes and under-votes, that some people mistakenly voted for too many candidates, and some people failed to vote for any candidates. So that's my research. I've looked at the last two major national elections from every county election return to look at what sort of things work in reducing those over-votes and under-votes, and what things tend to exacerbate the situation. Reducing under-votes and over-votes would help reduce election controversies in the future. And just a couple sort of things that I've found, one is that punch card ballots have the highest, on the average, a higher number of over-votes and under-votes than any other type of voting equipment. Any other type of voting equipment would certainly help reduce the number of over-votes and under-votes. And I know that the $4,000 per precinct isn't nearly enough to cover the cost of replacing them, and especially in the current economic times. It's a difficult decision to replace some equipment. But that's one, replacing punch card machines would certainly reduce the number of over-votes and under-votes. In terms of the newer equipment that's being marketed out there as replacements, the electronic touch screen voting machine and optical scan ballots that are counted at the precinct that have that second chance mechanism both do about the same. The centrally counted optical scan ballot, for the second chance mechanism, they don't do as well in that regard, probably not surprisingly. A couple other sort of interesting things that I found that might be worth considering, I think the Secretary of State's report on 2004 on election reform, one of the items that he recommended, or at least for consideration, was a uniform system for the State. I know there are certain political -- potential political problems with having the State tell all 116 voting jurisdictions which equipment they're going to use. But I did find in a handful of States, I think there are about six or seven that have a uniform system, and they have a substantially lower number of over-votes and under-votes of other states where different counties choose different systems. So it's at least worth considering, even though I know there's a downside to that, as well. Another interesting thing is the State of Nevada has a "none of the above" line on the ballot. And they didn't have the most modern equipment, but they have a really low number of under-votes and over-votes. It may hurt candidates' feelings to find out how many "none of the above" votes were tabulated, but that's another at least possibility I think that's worth considering. The final thing I've found is that at least for informational purposes, and to compare how different counties are doing, it helps to have basic information at the county levels in terms of how many ballots were cast, and ideally how many under-votes and over-votes there were. I think right now counties don't have to report that type of thing to the Secretary of State's office. It might help to tabulate and collect that information just for informational purposes and to sort of keep track of how reforms are going in terms of those things. And that's all I have to say. MS. TAYLOR: Okay. How long have you been studying this? Just since the 2000 -- MR. KIMBLE: Yeah. I've looked at the 2000 and 2002 general elections. MR. STRUCKHOFF: Are there any systems out there that you really like? MR. KIMBLE: In terms of the new ones? MR. STRUCKHOFF: Yeah. MR. KIMBLE: No. I think in terms of over-votes and under-votes, the touch screen and the precinct counted optical scans do about the same. I mean, I know there are other issues as well that I'm not certain enough for choosing between the two. I'd rather not recommend one or a different manufacturer. MR. STRUCKHOFF: In your studies, have you seen recently, apparently there's a backlash now on these touch screen systems that don't provide a voter identifiable vote. After they cast their ballot, they can't hold it in their hand and look at it to make sure that the system is recording their vote appropriately. Do you share that fear? MR. KIMBLE: A little bit, I guess. I mean, I guess the fear is that, you know, a hacker or somebody could hack into the electronic machine somehow and manipulate the vote outcome and votes. And election officials potentially might not know since there's no paper ballot, no paper trail. I am not an engineer in computer programs. But I think it would be nice to have some sort of paper trail. MS. TAYLOR: Basically, you can zero it down to any one machine that might have a problem. You can't see how a voter voted. And, you know, my theory on it, a paper trail would be a paper trail at the end. If you hand me my grocery receipt, I can spend $400 and I throw it in my purse, and two months later I throw it away. You know, and my groceries are probably worth more to me than my vote. You know, but I mean, how many people are going to keep that paper, and what are they going to prove with it? MR. STRUCKHOFF: Well, the system wouldn't require that the voter keep the paper. The paper would then be put in the ballot box and would be used for say manual recounts just to verify in certain precincts that the vote was accurate, similar to what we do with the punch cards. We manually recount so many precincts based upon how many votes we have. And, you know, I am a little bit -- I mean, I would love to have, as an election authority in Greene County, I would love to have all the counting done 45 minutes after the poll closed. But I know there are people in the opposite political faith in my county who would not trust that all of those machines were programmed in the same way. So they would like to see the paper back-up, especially when things get close. And you mentioned the election of 2000. Whenever things get that close, everything becomes a big issue. MS. TAYLOR: We differ on this subject. It's something we need to discuss elsewhere. Is there anyone else that would like to talk? MR. FORRESTER: Just as a rebuttal to what you were talking about, the paper receipt, the important thing to me as a voter is to have the paper receipt, more or less, is because before I leave that precinct, I can check that that device recorded as I would have my votes to be recorded. And if there is no way for me to do that, once I've touched that screen, you know, you lose that integrity as to, you know, if that is being recorded properly or not, where if you have the double check with the optical scan, I think that to have where it kicks it back out to you would seem to be a preferred method over something along those lines. MS. TAYLOR: Well, I mean even on the touch screen, it can tell you if you over-voted or under-voted. MR. FORRESTER: What I'm saying is if you don't get a print-out, what is there to ensure, other than on the print of that screen, that it's actually being tabulated in that regard? MR. STRUCKHOFF: It takes faith. MS. TAYLOR: Well, no. You do -- the Election Board has an audit to do, too. MR. FORRESTER: But, again, I mean, it's an argument we could have. I just think that it does give some integrity to the process if a voter can double check, you know, a system that would allow that, you know, that it was at least recorded their way. MS. TAYLOR: I think it would be very difficult in a presidential election or even a non-presidential, but a Congressional race, to keep the machines filled with paper all day long. MR. STRUCKHOFF: Certainly there would be hurdles. MS. TAYLOR: There would be a lot. MR. STRUCKHOFF: And you mentioned getting a ballot to the voter. We would take great steps to make sure that didn't happen, because we don't want voters going out with a piece of paper showing how they voted, because vote buying would then be rampant wherever that occurred. We go to great lengths to make sure that that doesn't happen now. So if this system is going to print out a ballot, we want to make sure that it's used as evidence that the machine is working properly. Plus, the other thing, David, when I go to these conferences and see these systems, you ask each one, you know, what kind of battery back-up do you have. Now, the State of Missouri is known for its thunderstorms and tornadoes, and sometimes the power goes out. Most of them will tell you that their back up battery will keep that information alive in there for 8 hours or 10 hours or whatever. You can't continue to use the system, but it will store the memory of all the votes in there for that period of time. So that's the other thing that makes me a little squeamish about totally electronic equipment. And I may have just to, you know, believe that they will solve some of those problems. And maybe the system you saw in Florida has solved it, but it makes me a little bit nervous. MR. KIMBLE: The back-up is something the manufacturers could work on. MS. TAYLOR: Thank you. Does anyone else wish to speak? Well, I'd like to turn the meeting over to Betsy. MS. BYERS: I'd like to introduce a few people here that are on the State Plan Committee. Some of them have testified, Kelly Anthony, representing Paraquad, is on the State Planning Committee; Reed Forrester, representing the Missouri Republican Party, Tom Stephens from the Missouri Federation of the Blind. Dave Welsh, we've mentioned Dave. He is the Republican director of elections for Saint Louis County. MR. STEPHENS: Change that to the National Federation of the Blind of Missouri, would you please. MS. BYERS: Anyone else? We'd like to thank them for coming, as part of the purpose of these hearings is to take in information and have as many committee members here as we can to hear what everyone has to say. And also, on that note, we mentioned earlier that we do have a court reporter taking down the testimony and comments given today. We should have that information available to the public. We are not exactly sure how long it will take. Hopefully in a week or two weeks we'll have all that in the office and organized. Also, we'd like to point out that we -- if it isn't up today, it will be up in the next few days, a page on the Secretary of State's website devoted just to the Help America Vote Act. And our web address is www.sos.mo.gov. And that is Secretary Blunt's home page. From there it will have a link to the Help America Vote Act. Included on that page is a schedule of hearings, State Planning Committee members, their addresses and contact information, minutes for the meetings that we have, some of the public comments that we're going to hopefully have available up on the internet, or links to that, links to summaries of the Help America Vote Act and other miscellaneous information on there that we think will be very helpful to all those interested. So please look at that today, or shortly this week we should have that up. We do have the room open until 5:00, and we'll be around if anyone shall happen to come in. You're more than welcome to stay. But I think at this time we'll take a break if no one else wants to give testimony or comment. Thank you very much for attending. We appreciate your presence here. CERTIFICATE OF REPORTER. I, Celena D. Moulton, Registered Professional Reporter and Certified Court Reporter and Notary Public within and for the State of Missouri do hereby certify that the that the testimony of the hearing was taken by me to the best of my ability and thereafter reduced to typewriting under my direction; that I am neither counsel for, related to, nor employed by any of the parties of the action in which this hearing was taken, and further, that I am not a relative or employee of any attorney or counsel employed by the parties thereto, nor financially or otherwise interested in the outcome of the action. CELENA D. MOULTON, RPR, CCR Notary Public, within and for the State of Missouri. My Commission expires July 8, 2006.