BILL ANALYSIS
SENATE COMMITTEE ON ELECTIONS, REAPPORTIONMENT AND
CONSTITUTIONAL AMENDMENTS
Senator Loni Hancock, Chair
BILL NO: AB 1228 HEARING DATE:
7/7/09
AUTHOR: YAMADA ANALYSIS BY:
Darren Chesin
AMENDED: 6/23/09
FISCAL: NO
SUBJECT
All-mailed Ballot Elections: Yolo County Pilot Project
DESCRIPTION
Existing law permits an election to be conducted wholly by
mail if the governing body authorizes the use of mailed
ballots for the election, the election occurs on an
established mailed ballot election date, and the election
is one of the following:
An election in which no more than 1,000 registered voters
are eligible to participate;
An election in a city, county, or district with 5,000 or
fewer registered voters that is restricted to the
imposition of special taxes, expenditure limitation
overrides, or both;
An election on the issuance of a general obligation water
bond;
An election in one of four specifically enumerated water
districts; or,
An election or assessment ballot proceeding required or
authorized by the state constitution under Proposition
218.
Existing law authorizes a school district or city with a
population of 100,000 or less to conduct an all-mail ballot
election to fill a vacancy in a special election.
Existing law authorizes a district to conduct any election
as an all-mailed ballot election on any date other than an
established election date.
This bill creates a pilot program allowing Yolo County to
conduct not more than three local elections as all-mail
ballot elections subject to the following conditions:
a.The governing body of the city, county, or district, by
resolution, authorizes the all-mailed ballot election and
notifies the Secretary of State (SOS) of its intent to
conduct an all-mailed ballot election at least 88 days
prior to the date of the election.
b.The election does not occur on the same date as a
statewide primary or general election.
c.The election is not a special election to fill a vacancy
in a state office, the State Legislature, or Congress.
d.At least one polling place is provided in each city
within the jurisdiction and is open to receive voted
ballots for at least two weeks before the date of the
election and until 8 p.m. on the day of the election.
These polling places must be at an accessible location
and equipped with voting units or systems that are
accessible to individuals with disabilities.
e.The elections official delivers to each voter all
supplies necessary for the use and return of the mail
ballot, including an envelope for the return of the voted
mail ballot, postage prepaid.
f.The elections official delivers to each voter, with
either the sample ballot or with the voter's ballot, a
list of the polling places required under this bill. The
list of polling places must also be posted on the
Internet web site of the Yolo County Elections Office.
g.The return of voted mail ballots is subject to the same
procedures for the return of vote by mail (VBM) ballots
at a regular election.
This bill also requires that Yolo County report to the
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Legislature and to the SOS regarding the success of the
election. The report must include, but not be limited to,
any statistics on the cost to conduct the election; the
turnout of different populations, including whenever
possible, but not limited to, the population categories of
race, ethnicity, age, gender, disability, permanent VBM
status, and political party affiliation; the number of
ballots that were not counted and the reasons why they were
rejected; voter fraud; and any other problems that became
known to the county during the election or canvass. It
further requires the report, whenever possible, to compare
the success of the all-mailed ballot election to similar
elections not conducted as all-mailed ballot elections in
the same jurisdiction.
BACKGROUND
A Little All-Mail History . Several California counties
have conducted all-mail ballot elections. Monterey
conducted one of the first vote-by-mail elections ever held
in the United States in 1977 on a flood control measure.
Alpine County conducted its first all-mail election in
November, 1993 for a countywide special election. San
Diego used all-mail balloting in May 1981 for a measure
proposing to build a $224 million convention center.
Stanislaus County conducted its first all-mail ballot
election in 1987 for the Modesto City Charter.
In 1992, the Legislature approved a pilot project in
Stanislaus and Placer counties. The counties were allowed
to conduct all-mail ballot elections. Placer County did
not utilize this pilot project but Stanislaus County
conducted the 1993 Statewide Special Election as an
all-mail ballot election.
All-mail ballot elections conducted in California as well
as other states have generally shown increases in voter
turnout and significant decreases in the cost of conducting
elections. During Stanislaus County's all-mail ballot
pilot project, the County saved almost half of its usual
election expenditures. Stanislaus County generally
reported turnout levels at six to eight percentage points
below the state's average. During the 1993 Statewide
Special Election, the County's turnout was 6.8 percent
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higher than the statewide average during that election.
Oregon has been conducting all-mail ballot elections for
non-partisan and ballot measure elections for 20 years. In
1998 the voters passed an initiative expanding vote-by-mail
to primary and general elections.
COMMENTS
1.According to the author , vote by mail has steadily
increased in California since the state began allowing
voters to register as permanent mail ballot voters
without having to provide a reason for doing so, which
has led some local election officials to promote all
vote-by-mail elections. These legislative efforts have
failed primarily out of concern for those who prefer to
vote at the polls - mostly poor non-white voters.
Increasingly, poor non-white voters are disproportionately
represented due to higher voting rates among permanent
(formerly known as absentee) mail ballot voters, who tend
to be older, wealthier, and white. While vote by mail
voting affects all elections, it is particularly acute in
traditionally low-turnout elections, such as local
elections without a state or federal contest.
It is unclear in these low-turnout elections whether the
potential increase in turnout from all vote-by-mail
elections will offset the potential decrease in turnout
caused by eliminating a preferred voting method (poll
voting) for some voters. Previously authorized pilot all
vote-by-mail elections did not provide detailed reports
that would allow such an analysis.
AB 1228 establishes pilot elections allowing Yolo County to
conduct up to 3 local all vote-by-mail elections. These
elections will be subject to prescribed conditions to
minimize their impact on voters who traditionally vote at
the polls, including, but not limited to, requiring all
return postage to be pre-paid, a required two week early
voting period, one polling place per city, and a process
to ensure the timely mailing of ballots and sample
ballots.
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Legislation is needed for Yolo County to conduct a pilot
All-Postal election for the purpose of reporting the
demographic outcomes and the fiscal impacts compared to a
non-vote-by-mail election.
2.Vote By Mail and Permanent Vote By Mail Voting . Under
state law, any voter can request a VBM ballot for any
election, and any voter can become a permanent VBM voter.
Permanent VBM voters automatically receive a ballot in
the mail for every election, without the need to re-apply
for a VBM ballot. As such, any voter who prefers to vote
by mail has the ability to do so under existing law.
Among the arguments that supporters of all-mailed ballot
elections frequently make in support of such elections is
that all-mailed ballot elections are more convenient for
voters. However, it is not clear whether this is the
case. Any voter who finds it more convenient to vote by
mail has the option to do so under existing law, and
voters who want to vote by mail at every election can
sign up for permanent VBM status.
Unlike many of the previous bills that would have
authorized all-mailed ballot elections, whether on a
permanent or on a pilot project basis, this bill
explicitly requires Yolo County to report back to the
Legislature on the impact that the all-mailed ballot
election had on turnout of voters by permanent VBM
status. As a result, this pilot project may provide the
Legislature with more information about whether
all-mailed ballot elections may, in some circumstances,
be more convenient for voters than traditional elections,
in which voters may request to vote by mail, but are not
compelled to do so.
3.Monterey County Pilot Project . AB 319 (Salinas), Chapter
385 of 2001, allowed Monterey County to conduct any
election within the county wholly by mail, provided that
the election did not contain a state or federal office.
AB 319 specified that it was to serve as a pilot project
for mailed ballot elections, and required Monterey County
to report to the Legislature and the SOS regarding the
success of the election, including, but not limited to,
any statistics on the increase of voter fraud. The pilot
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project ended on December 31, 2005. AB 591 (Salinas) of
2005 sought to extend the pilot project until December
31, 2008, but that bill failed after never being heard in
the Senate Elections Committee.
Unfortunately, the report filed by Monterey County as part
of the pilot project lacked much of the information that
is necessary to evaluate the impacts of the pilot
project. Although the report indicated that mailed
ballot elections increased turnout, decreased costs, and
did not result in voter fraud, the report lacked the
detail necessary to evaluate these claims.
4.Other Previous Legislation . AB 1654 (Huffman) of 2007
would have allowed jurisdictions in Calaveras, Marin,
Mariposa, Nevada, Plumas, Santa Barbara, Siskiyou, and
Sonoma counties to conduct any local, special, primary,
or general election as an all-mail ballot election until
December 31, 2013. AB 1654 was approved by the Assembly
Elections and Redistricting Committee but subsequently
was amended to deal with an unrelated issue.
AB 867 (Liu) of 2005 would have authorized Calaveras,
Mendocino, San Benito, San Mateo, Santa Cruz, Sierra, and
Ventura Counties to conduct all elections as all-mail
ballot elections until January 1, 2011. AB 867 was held
on the Assembly Appropriations Committee's suspense file.
PRIOR ACTION
Assembly Elections and Redistricting Committee:5-0
Assembly Floor: 48-27
POSITIONS
Sponsor: Yolo County Clerk-Recorder
Support: Disability Rights California
Yolo County
Oppose: None received
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