BILL ANALYSIS Ó
AB 786
Page 1
Date of Hearing: April 27, 2015
ASSEMBLY COMMITTEE ON TRANSPORTATION
Jim Frazier, Chair
AB 786
(Levine) - As Amended April 21, 2015
SUBJECT: National Voter Registration Act of 1993
SUMMARY: Makes changes to current law to ensure compliance
with the federal National Voter Registration Act of 1993 (Motor
Voter Act), as specified. Specifically, this bill:
1)Requires the Department of Motor Vehicles (DMV), in
coordination with the Secretary of State (SOS), to make the
state's Implementation Plan of the Motor Voter Act consistent
with Motor Voter Act requirements related to simultaneous
applications for a voter registration and a motor vehicle
license.
2)Requires DMV, if requested to do so by a registered voter, to
notify county elections officials of both counties when a
voter moves from one county to another.
EXISTING LAW:
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1)Requires each state to offer voter registration services at
motor vehicle agency offices as well as provide public
assistance offices, offices that provide state-funded programs
primarily engaged in providing services to persons with
disabilities, Armed Forces recruitment offices, and other
state and local offices within the designated as Motor Voter
Act voter registration agencies.
2)Requires the DMV to provide the opportunity to register to
vote to individuals who apply for, renew, or change an address
for a driver's license or personal identification card issued
by the DMV.
3)Requires a driver's license or identification application to
be used as an application for voter registration, unless the
applicant fails to sign the application.
4)Requires change of address information received by the DMV to
be used for the purpose of updating voter registration
records, unless the registrant chooses otherwise.
5)Provides that a person may not be registered to vote except by
affidavit of registration.
FISCAL EFFECT: AB 786 is similar to AB 1122 (Levine) of 2013.
The Assembly Appropriations Committee analysis indicated that AB
1122 would result in one-time costs to DMV in the range of
$500,000 to redesign forms and that costs to design an
alternative process to electronically transfer information would
be substantially higher.
COMMENTS: The federal Motor Voter Act, signed into law in 1993,
was intended to make it easier for Americans to register to vote
when they apply for a driver's license. According to the
author, however, California has yet to come into compliance with
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this federal law. Specifically, the author points out that the
Motor Voter Act requires that DMV offices to allow motorists to
register to vote when they apply for a driver's license and
requires DMV to update voting records when motorists change
addresses. The author points out that currently DMV implements
only part of the Motor Voter requirement, by requiring the
motorist to completely fill out the entire voter registration
form. This is contrary to the Motor Voter Act that requires
applicant's registration form to be automatically filled in
except for the signature. Once voter registration is completed,
the author contends that DMV fails to adequately update voter
registration records, as required by the Motor Voter Act, when a
motorist makes a change of address. The author points to very
low voter registration rates in California as evidence that DMV
should come into compliance with federal Motor Voter Act
requirements.
To address this issue, the author has introduced AB 786 which
requires DMV to come into compliance with the Motor Voter Act
requirements in general and specifically with provision of
federal law that require: 1) that a completed driver's license
application shall also serve as a voter registration, unless the
applicant fails to sign the voter registration application; 2)
that any change of address submitted to the DMV for the purposes
of a driver's license must also serve as notification of change
of address for voter registration; and 3) that the completed
forms for voter registration that are turned into the DMV be
transmitted to the state elections official not later than 10
days after acceptance. Additionally, the bill also specifies
that when a registered voter requests that DMV make a voter
registration change of address from one county to another, the
DMV must notify the county elections officer in both counties.
When the Motor Voter Act took effect in 1995, California, along
with other states challenged the constitutionality of the
federal mandate and three separate lawsuits concerning
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California's implementation of the Motor Voter Act were filed in
federal court. The court found that the Motor Voter Act was
constitutional, despite the lack of federal funding provided to
states, and ruled that California was obligated to implement the
Motor Voter Act. California submitted to the court an
implementation plan to ensure conformity with Motor Voter Act
requirements.
Despite the Motor Voter Act's clear requirements, the state's
court-approved implementation plan instead called for a two-page
application - one page for the driver's license application and
one page for the voter registration form. The rationale for
this two-page plan was cost, as the Motor Voter Act did not
provide states with any direct funding or any mechanism for
reimbursement of the costs associated with its implementation.
According to DMV, the cost to create a single, computer
generated form to serve as both a driver's license and voter
registration application would have been significant. On August
12, 1994, then Governor Pete Wilson signed Executive Order
W-98-94 directing state and local agencies to implement the
Motor Voter Act only to the extent that federal funding was
provided.
According to the SOS's 2011 Motor Voter Act handbook, every
person who visits a DMV office to apply for or renew a driver's
license or identification card or to change an address receives
a voter registration card (VRC). Every person who receives a
driver's license or identification renewal form by mail also
receives a VRC. The VRC can be used to register to vote or to
re-register after a change in name, address, or party
preference. When voters update their address with a DMV office,
the new address is sent electronically to the SOS's statewide
voter registration database, which then shares the information
with county elections officials who update local voter
registration records. When voters move to a new county, DMV
instructs them to complete a new VRC to initiate the change of
address process. To expedite this, DMV accepts completed VRCs
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and forwards them to the SOS or the county election officials.
The Motor Voter Act permits a county elections official to
cancel the prior registration of a voter who has moved to a
different county after it attempts to confirm the voter's change
of address. In addition, existing law permits cancellation if
the change-of-address notice comes from the DMV or another
designated agency (typically SOC) or if the voter initiates the
request. Moreover, state law permits a county elections
official to cancel the prior voter registration of a voter who
verifies in writing that he or she has moved to a different
county.
According to SOS's Motor Voter Handbook, the DMV is required to
collect and transmit electronic change-of-address data to
elections officials on a daily basis, which allows for automatic
change-of-address updates for many voters. The SOS then
transmits the information to local county elections officials.
The county elections official, however, may not automatically
update the addresses of voters who move from one county to
another because current law requires voters who move to a new
county to re-register to vote by completing and signing a new
VRC. AB 786 requires DMV to notify elections officials of both
counties (the county the applicant moved from and the county the
applicant is moving to) when the voter requests the DMV to make
a voter registration change of address.
According to the SOS, VoteCal, the federally required statewide
voter database, should resolve this process because under
VoteCal a voter will have a single voter file that will follow
them when they move, between and within counties. When a voter
moves from one county to another, the voter record will be
maintained at the original address (in the originating county)
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until the record is updated. If there is a match between a
change of address transaction and an existing voter record,
VoteCal will automatically update the existing voter
registration record with the new data. VoteCal is currently
scheduled to be fully operational in June 2016.
Double referral: This bill passed out of the Assembly Elections
and Redistricting Committee on April 15, 2015 with a 5-1 vote.
Related legislation: AB 1461 (Gonzalez), requires the SOS to
use records from the DMV to automatically register to vote those
individuals who are eligible, as specified. AB 1461 is
scheduled to be heard in this committee on April 27, 2015.
Previous legislation: AB 1122 (Levine) of 2013, which was
substantially similar to this bill, was held in the Assembly
Appropriations Committee on the suspense file.
REGISTERED SUPPORT / OPPOSITION:
Support
None on file
Opposition
None on file
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Analysis Prepared by:Victoria Alvarez / TRANS. / (916) 319-2093