June 2001 Press Release

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Press Release
For Immediate Release  Contact: Martha Trombley
802-828-2148
June 2001

Markowitz Congratulates Legislature On Passing Election Reform Laws

Secretary Markowitz Calls Election Reform a Major Accomplishment of the Legislative Sesssion

Deborah Markowitz, Secretary of State

 

Montpelier. Secretary of State Deb Markowitz today offered her congratulations to the Vermont legislature for making a great start in reforming Vermont’s Election Laws. This legislative session Governor Howard Dean signed into law three Acts relating to the conduct of elections in Vermont. Calling it a "major accomplishment of the session," Markowitz said, "the House Local Government Committee and the Senate Government Operations Committee worked hard this year to craft and pass bills that will modernize and improve Vermont’s election laws and enhance public confidence in our democracy."

"At a time when our country is grappling with the need to improve our voting systems, and public cynicism about politics and government is at an all time high, it is more important than ever to ensure that Vermont’s elections are conducted in a free and fair manner," Markowitz said.

In addition to cleaning up Vermont’s election laws by repealing out-of-date provisions and updating others to comply with modern election procedures, this newly signed legislation makes some important changes from prior law to start July 1st of this year:

• The new law updates our absentee ballot statutes to encourage more Vermonters to vote by absentee ballot. Among the revisions, the new law changes the terminology from absentee ballot voting to "absentee or early voting." This is designed to dispel any remaining notions that absentee ballot voting is only for voters who are sick or disabled. The law also allows voters to pick up an absentee ballot at the clerk’s office and to return it at a later date. (In the last election nearly 20% of Vermont’s voters chose to vote using an absentee ballot. Markowitz says she expects that this trend will continue to grow.)

• The new law seeks to prevent voter fraud by increasing the state penalties from $50 to $1000, making voter fraud a criminal felony.

• The law also responds to problems with the motor voter law by allowing towns to divide the voter checklist into an active and an inactive list. The law also directs the Department of Motor Vehicles to provide registration applications with an extra copy for the voter, with language directing the voter to keep their copy to bring to the polls as proof of registration. Local boards of civil authority were also granted authority to add people to the checklist on the day of the election if they swear/affirm that they registered within the required time frame.

"While the legislature made a great first step with election reform this year there are a few important issues it must still grapple with next year," Markowitz said. According to Secretary Markowitz the two most important issues remaining for legislative consideration are:

1. Increasing the time between the primary and general election so that ballots can be printed on time. Currently, ballots must be delivered to the town clerks 35 days prior to the general election in order to make it possible for overseas and absentee voters to participate. Vermont law provides only 8 days between the time all information for the ballots has to be certified to the Secretary of State and the time ballots must be in the hands of the town clerks. For this reason it has become impossible to find printers willing or able to print Vermont’s general election ballots. To solve this pressing problem the legislature must look at whether to move the primary back to some earlier date in the fall or spring, or to change some of the other filing deadlines to allow more time for ballot preparation and printing.
2. Creating a statewide voter file. One of the principal concerns about the security of Vermont’s elections is that we have no way of knowing whether a person is voting in more than one jurisdiction. That is because each town currently maintains its own checklist. Without a statewide voter file there is no way to check for voters who might vote in more than one jurisdiction.

Markowitz said, "the debate nationally is whether we can best prevent a recurrence of the problems we saw during last year’s presidential election by granting more federal control over our election administration. Vermont’s experience proves that this is not necessary. As we identify ways our election systems could use improvement, our legislature has shown that it can work closely with our office to respond quickly and effectively."

 

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