BILL ANALYSIS Ó
SENATE COMMITTEE ON ELECTIONS
AND CONSTITUTIONAL AMENDMENTS
Senator Lou Correa, Chair
BILL NO: SB 397 HEARING DATE:
5/3/11
AUTHOR: YEE ANALYSIS BY:
Darren Chesin
AMENDED: 4/27/11
FISCAL: YES
SUBJECT
Online Voter Registration
DESCRIPTION
Existing state law requires licensed persons to provide to
the Department of Motor Vehicles a signature and the
Department of Motor Vehicles (DMV) is required to digitize
that signature and forward the digitized signature to the
Secretary of State (SOS) if a person wishes to register to
vote.
Existing law will permit a person who is qualified to
register to vote and who has a valid California driver's
license or state identification card to submit an affidavit
of voter registration electronically on the Internet
Website of the SOS. This provision will become operative
when the SOS certifies that the state has a statewide voter
registration database (VoteCal) that complies with the
requirements of the federal Help America Vote Act of 2002
(HAVA).
This bill would permit counties to develop and use an
electronic voter registration system for county residents
similar to the statewide system that will become available
when VoteCal is operative. Specifically, this bill would
provide for all of the following:
Authorize a person who is qualified to register to vote
and who has a valid California driver's license or state
identification card to submit an affidavit of voter
registration electronically on the Internet Website of
the county elections official of the county in which the
person resides if that county has opted to comply.
The affiant shall affirmatively attest to the truth of
the information provided in the electronic affidavit and
assent to the use of his or her signature from his or
her driver's license or state identification card.
For identification purposes, the electronic affiant
will be required to submit his or her California
driver's license or state identification card number,
date of birth, and the last four digits of his or her
social security number.
Upon submission of an electronic affidavit, the county
electronic voter registration system must provide for
immediate verification that the affiant's date of birth
and driver's license or identification card number
matches that information on file with the DMV.
This bill would require the SOS, upon receiving notice
from a county elections official that the official has
received an electronic affidavit, to obtain an
electronic copy of the applicant's signature from the
DMV and to provide the electronic copy of the
applicant's signature to the county, which shall serve
as the voter's official signature for elections
purposes.
The provisions of this bill would remain in effect only
until the SOS certifies that the state has a statewide
voter registration database that complies with the
requirements of HAVA.
BACKGROUND
VoteCal and Online Voter Registration . Among other things,
HAVA required every state to implement a single, uniform,
official, centralized, interactive computerized statewide
voter registration list defined, maintained, and
administered at the state level. This statewide voter
registration list will serve as the official list of
eligible voters for any federal election held within the
state. HAVA provided funds to states to develop voter
registration lists and required each state to develop such
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a list by January 1, 2004. HAVA also provided a procedure,
however, for states to request a waiver that extended the
deadline to January 1, 2006. The SOS applied for, and
received, such a waiver.
At the time HAVA was approved, California was already using
a statewide voter registration system known as Calvoter
that achieved some of the goals of the voter registration
list required by HAVA. However, Calvoter did not satisfy
many of the requirements in that law, including
requirements that the database be fully interactive and
have the capability of storing a complete voter
registration history for every voter.
In January 2005, the SOS sought guidance from the United
States Department of Justice (Justice Department) regarding
a plan for compliance with HAVA's statewide voter
registration list requirements. Under the initial plan,
the state would achieve interim short-term compliance with
HAVA by January 1, 2006, through upgrades to Calvoter, with
a plan for long-term compliance through the development and
implementation of a new voter registration system, to be
known as VoteCal. The Justice Department, however,
expressed concerns that this plan did not comply with the
requirements of HAVA. Subsequent discussions between the
SOS and the Justice Department led to the adoption of a
memorandum of agreement (MOA) between the two parties. In
that MOA, the SOS committed to further upgrades to the
Calvoter system to achieve short-term interim compliance
with the requirements of HAVA, and to complete development
and implementation of a longer-term solution for replacing
the Calvoter system with a new permanent statewide voter
registration system. In exchange, the Justice Department
agreed to refrain from initiating litigation in federal
court against the state to enforce the voter registration
list requirements of HAVA.
Since that MOA was signed on November 2, 2005, the state
has continued its efforts to develop the VoteCal system.
After completing a planning process that is required by
state law for all major technology projects, the
procurement process began, and a final deadline for bids to
be submitted for the VoteCal project was set for January
29, 2009. Of all the vendors who submitted bids for the
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VoteCal project, only one - Catalyst Consulting - met all
the requirements of the request for proposal (RFP). Upon
obtaining approvals for expenditure authority for the
VoteCal costs, a contract was executed with Catalyst
Consulting on September 8, 2009, and work on the VoteCal
project commenced.
However, on April 19, 2010, the SOS discovered that the
vendor hired to develop and deploy the VoteCal system had
not obtained a performance bond for the project, even
though the RFP required the vendor to obtain such a bond
within 21 days of the contract being executed.
Additionally, the SOS and the independent project oversight
consultant that was hired to oversee the VoteCal project
both expressed concerns about the ability of Catalyst
Consulting to meet the agreed-upon schedule for VoteCal to
be deployed. On May 21, 2010, the SOS and Catalyst
Consulting agreed to terminate the contract for the
development of VoteCal.
Since terminating the contract with Catalyst Consulting in
May, the SOS, in coordination with the Department of
General Services and the California Technology Agency, has
begun the process again of awarding a contract for the
development of VoteCal. A new RFP was issued on October
29, 2010 but a contract has yet to be awarded.
The delay in the implementation of a statewide voter
registration database that complies with HAVA has notable
impacts on election administration in the state. Among
other programs that have been signed into law and absent
new legislation to provide otherwise, online voter
registration will not go into effect until VoteCal is in
place.
COMMENTS
1. According to the sponsors , current law allows voters to
submit an affidavit of voter registration electronically
under Elections Code § 2196 once the statewide online
database known as VoteCal is implemented.
Unfortunately, VoteCal is delayed until at least 2015.
The voter registration process should be a catalyst, not a
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barrier to participation. It would be practical and
convenient to allow for online voter registration. In
fact, eleven states currently or soon will offer online
registration, including North Carolina, Washington,
Oregon, and Colorado. This change helped alleviate the
expenses of election cycles in many states. In Arizona,
one county went from paying 83¢ to 3¢ per registration.
SB 397 authorizes counties to develop and use an
electronic voter registration system for the electronic
submission of an affidavit of voter registration. Under
SB 397, only people who are qualified to register to
vote, who have a valid California driver's license or
state identification card, and who reside in a county
that chooses to participate in the online voter
registration, will be able to participate.
The provisions of this bill would remain in effect only
until the SOS certifies that the state has a statewide
voter registration database that complies with the
requirements of HAVA.
SB 397 would increase security, accuracy, and efficiency
in voter registrations by creating a new avenue for
voters to register online. Under SB 397, citizens would
input their voter information online and the county
elections office would use the voter's signature from
the DMV. Additionally, the registration information can
be automatically verified for authenticity, increasing
registration security and saving the state and counties
time and resources.
Voter registrations now are often handwritten and must be
keyed in by county workers, whereas under SB 397, many
voters would be able to enter their own information
directly - minimizing concerns about inaccuracies.
2. SOS Concerns . While not formally opposed to this bill,
the SOS stated in an April 29, 2011 letter to the chair
of the committee that she has a number of implementation
and fiscal concerns with it. Specifically, the SOS
states that her office would need time and funding to
modify or restructure its information technology systems
to be able to securely receive, store, and provide the
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signatures to county elections officials and that it is
not possible to have the system ready on January 1,
2012, as this bill requires.
POSITIONS
Sponsor: California Common Cause
Support: California Association of Clerks and Elections
Officials
CALPIRG
Los Angeles County Registrar-Recorder/County
Clerk
University of California Student Association
Rock the Vote
Oppose: None received.
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