Thank you to the Citizen Center of Aspen for this: Please ask citizens (particularly local government board members) to testify tomorrow (or write immediate emails) against what Im calling the Lawless Local Elections Act (HB1164 Representative Hullinghorsts Non-Partisan Local Elections bill). Without immediate testimony and pushback from citizens, lawmakers will rush this bill through passage, as they did its mother bill--HB1303--the much decried elections modernization bill. The Son-of-1303 (HB1164) is even more outrageous than the mother (HB1303). This bill should have never seen the light of day. -The bill is so bold that it decriminalizes registering under fictitious names or false addresses when registering to vote in many local elections. -The bill abolishes all residency requirements for voting in taxing districts such as fire districts, school districts, cities, towns, recreation districts, etc. It is just show up and say you live here and vote, -with impunity. Zero days residency requirement. -The bill exempts 2000 local taxing districts from Secretary of State election rules, and exempts their elections from any oversight by the Secretary of State. -The bill vests almost absolute power to control the election in the hands of one local official to appoint and fire election judges, and remove any press or watchers at their whim to avoid oversight. -No requirement to use any particular election code. Local officials could use any or all of various codes, or as a practical matter, they could use NO ELECTION LAW governing the local elections. -The bill attempts to cleanse the many problems of the November 2013 elections under HB1303 by declaring all November elections legal and valid. Never mind the ever-mounting problems in Broomfield, that have spawned three court cases. Those are just a few of the outrageous provisions. How can you object to this absurd public policy? Scroll down to that FAQ to make your voice heard. The bill is 133 pages of dense, cross-referenced technical provisions that will be almost impossible for lawmakers or the voters to absorb. But citizens must demand that the concepts in this bill be unquestionably rejected. It is hard to create a condensed summary of this multi-headed hydra. But Ive tried below. (To be followed soon with a technical analysis chart with citations). There is a common sense alternative that will be offered in a bill by Senators Grantham and Lundberg. Merely delay implementation of HB1303 for 22 months and take time to sort out the complexities, funding and technology required in a bipartisan, voter-friendly manner. Lawmakers should reject the Lawless Local Elections bill (HB1164) and opt for the solution that the vast majority of voters would demand---stop the chaos and conduct elections under the long-existing understandable law until we can sort out the pieces of the modernization bill of last year. If you plan to testify, come to Legislative Services Building, 200 E 14th Street, across from the Capitol. Room A, approximately 2:00. Bring a snack, water, a book, etc., as we may have to wait for quite a while to testify. If you have questions call Marilyn Marks (970 404 2225) or Mary Eberle (303 918-6555 - cell) More detailed information below. Marilyn Marks Citizen Center ===================================== Background and FAQs---(to be followed with chart of summary and citations.) Background (fix it for 1303)- Last years election bill HB1303 (mandatory mail ballots, and same day voter registration) was rushed through the legislature before common sense could prevail. Despite the many warnings that HB1303 would make local elections impossibly complex and expensive and sometimes legally impossible, Democratic lawmakers crammed it down the throats of voters, who waited hours to protest the bill in hearings. Local school boards, hospital boards, sanitation districts, fire districts, and cities and towns--though warned of the dangers to local elections--refused to challenge the catapulting bill and the power-wielding majority, and kowtowed at the expense of their constituents. Now they claim they have an emergency for 2014 elections, as their elections are now unworkable under the modernization act. Local government lobbyists have worked in the dark, outside of public oversight over the last 6 months, to draft a 133-page complex bill and schedule a vote 4 business days after it is introduced. A thorough analysis of the bills major impacts is at least a 40-hour task for an expert. At lobbyists urging, the bills sponsors (Senators Ulibarri and Roberts, Representatives Hullinghorst and Murray will likely try to push this bill through with claims of an emergency to deal with the local Spring election problems caused by 1303. But it is doubtful that the sponsors themselves understand the far-ranging impacts of the bill. Why does 1303 need fixing for local elections? Local elections (municipalities, school districts, fire districts, etc.) have logical residency requirements for eligibility to vote. Most have 30 days. HB 1303 (Hullinghorsts and Girons modernization bill) took the requirement to vote in your county on state and county issues from 30 days to -0- days if you moved within the state. (22 days if you moved from out of state.) The voter registration system is not programmed to manage multiple residency periods for each voter. Therefore the county clerk cannot accurately determine who has lived in their local districts or towns long enough to vote there. Therefore voters are issued ballots that are the wrong ballots for their residency status. If you dont think that matters, check out what happened in Broomfield. Why not just reprogram the voter registration system? Although that is in progress, it is many months and millions of dollars away. The original programming over 10 years ago never contemplated that the state and local registration requirements would be so mismatched. What is wrong with abolishing the residency requirements in local elections? When there is no requirement for residency, small elections of boards of local jurisdictions with taxing authority or healthy budgets become tempting for takeover for personal gain by merely manipulating the election through bringing in transient voters. Education policy can be manipulated in school boards with drive-by voters. As the Attorney General just concluded, the modernization law seems to allow that. And to make it worse, the Hullinghorst bill decriminalizes false registrations (fictitious names and addresses) for registering or manipulating the voter list for local district elections! No penalties for adding fictitious names to the voter rolls! Why is the Secretary of State oversight and enforcement being abolished? Complying with election integrity and security rules to ensure fairness and proper oversight is a lot of work. Essential, necessary work, in our view. And work that HB1303 made more complex and expensive. So the lobbyists and sponsors of HB1164 want local elections to be exempted from the duty to comply with long existing law and SOS rules and the additions that they added last year in HB1303. Representative Hullinghorst was the sponsor of HB1303 as well! Note that in the bill the Secretary may recommend some procedures, but has no enforcement authority. What do you mean that this bill allows there to be NO election laws governing local elections? The special districts have created an optional new election code Colorado Local Government Election Code, for use by local fire districts, library districts, ambulance districts, etc. It literally contains the provision to allow the Election Official to pick ANY (one) provision of the existing election code to use instead of the new code, or that they can mix and match, pick and choose the provisions they like!! In other words, they are permitted to run the election with NO law governing the process and no SOS oversight. Can one person really be given control over local elections? The new Local Election Code proposed allows one appointed person (the Designated Election Official) to fire election judges at his/her whim and remove any watchers at his/her whim with no recourse by the watcher. The DEO is allowed to conduct any recount without oversight. The DEO gets to pick and choose what provisions of the code they will follow! This law is begging for abuse and corruption. Since the days that Colorado was under Territorial law, one fundamental concept has been consistent in our election laws---elections are conducted by the citizens---NOT THE GOVERNMENT. We will conduct our elections and tell the government the results. Not the other way around. While in recent years County Clerk have been chopping away at this concept in their practices, there has never been an outright legalization of a government officials sole control of elections---not until the Hullinghorst bill HB1164! Is there really a crises concerning the Spring elections? Because of HB1303, Spring elections are going to be very difficult and expensive to run. The most practical choice is for special districts to use polling place elections as allowed in the existing code and not attempt to run all mail ballot elections. The municipal elections have to improvise on providing ballots to permanent mail ballot voters. But most troublesome is the fact that the residency requirements cannot be tracked by the statewide voter data base now, and distribution of proper ballots will be very difficult. All the more reason to have a polling place election where the judges can ask the voter how long they have lived in the jurisdiction. Going to -0- days residency requirement is a dangerous solution to this technical software problem. How can the lawmakers declare prior elections with major irregularities to be valid by their decree? It would likely not hold up in court, but the fact that lawmakers are trying to wipe away the HB1303 problems in the November elections says a lot about the unreported problems that are now the dirty little secrets of the insiders. Broomfield got the attention, but problems with residency determinations, mail ballot issuance and return, high costs, and voter registration rolls plagued the election in many major counties. Most candidates in close races never knew to challenge the problem results. What is the solution? It is relatively easy. Senators Grantham and Lundberg are proposing a common-sense solution this week--- a bill to merely delay the implementation of HB1303 and revert to our 2012 election code that everyone knows how to use, and that the voter registration system supports. Where can I read the bill for myself? leg.state.co.us/clics/clics2014a/csl.nsf/fsbillcont3/6125AA4642B2117C87257C300005FD7D?Open&file=1164_01.pdf How do I object to the passage of this bill? Write the House Committee on State Affairs hearing this bill tomorrow ( Monday) mid-afternoon. Their addresses below. Come to testify in Room LSB-A on Monday. [email protected], [email protected], [email protected], [email protected], [email protected], rephumphrey48@yahoo, [email protected], [email protected], [email protected], [email protected], [email protected] Write the sponsors with your objections--- [email protected]; [email protected]; [email protected]; murrayhouse45@gmail; Citizen Center is a non-profit, non-partisan organization focused on election transparency and open government issues.
Posted on: Tue, 28 Jan 2014 02:18:13 +0000
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