Provides additional opportunity for new registrant by mail to indicate choice of party enrollment where original choice was omitted or void, by requiring board of elections to notify registrant of ineffective enrollment and ineligibility to vote in a party primary and providing a place for the registrant to enroll or decline to enroll in a party by mail.
STATE OF NEW YORK
________________________________________________________________________
5901
2011-2012 Regular Sessions
IN ASSEMBLY
March 2, 2011
___________
Introduced by M. of A. KAVANAGH, COLTON, GALEF, PHEFFER, STEVENSON --
Multi-Sponsored by -- M. of A. CAHILL, GABRYSZAK, GOTTFRIED, HOOPER,
MAGEE, PERRY, P. RIVERA, WEISENBERG -- read once and referred to the
Committee on Election Law
AN ACT to amend the election law, in relation to failure of new regis-
trants to enroll
The People of the State of New York, represented in Senate and Assem-bly, do enact as follows:
1 Section 1. Subdivision 9 of section 5-210 of the election law, as
2 amended by chapter 179 of the laws of 2005, is amended to read as
3 follows:
4 9. The county board of elections shall, promptly and in any event, not
5 later than twenty-one days after receipt by it of the application, veri-
6 fy the identity of the applicant. In order to do so, the county board of
7 elections shall utilize the information provided in the application and
8 shall attempt to verify such information with the information provided
9 by the department of motor vehicles, social security administration and
10 any other lawful available information source. If the county board of
11 elections is unable to verify the identity of the applicant within twen-
12 ty-one days of the receipt of the application, it shall immediately take
13 steps to confirm that the information provided by the applicant was
14 accurately utilized by such county board of elections, was accurately
15 verified with other information sources and that no data entry error, or
16 other similar type of error, occurred. Following completion of the
17 preceding steps, the county board of elections shall mail (a) a notice
18 of its approval, (b) a notice of its approval which includes an indi-
19 cation that such board has not yet been able to verify the identity of
20 the applicant and a request for more information so that such verifica-
21 tion may be completed, or (c) a notice of its rejection of the applica-
22 tion to the applicant in a form approved by the state board of
23 elections. Notices of approval, notices of approval with requests for
EXPLANATION--Matter in italics (underscored) is new; matter in brackets
[] is old law to be omitted.
LBD00806-01-1
A. 5901 2
1 more information or notices of rejection shall be sent by nonforwardable
2 first class [or] return postage guaranteed mail on which is endorsed
3 "ADDRESS CORRECTION REQUESTED" and which contains a request that any
4 such mail received for persons not residing at the address be dropped
5 back in the mail. The voter's registration and enrollment shall be
6 complete upon receipt of the application by the appropriate county board
7 of elections. The failure of a county board of elections to verify an
8 applicant's identity shall not be the basis for the rejection of a
9 voter's application, provided, however, that such verification failure
10 shall be the basis for requiring county board of elections to take the
11 additional verification steps provided by this chapter. The notice shall
12 also advise the registrant of the date when his registration and enroll-
13 ment is effective, of the date and the hours of the next regularly sche-
14 duled primary or general election in which he will be eligible to vote,
15 of the location of the polling place of the election district in which
16 he is or will be a qualified voter, whether such polling place is acces-
17 sible to physically handicapped voters, an indication that physically
18 handicapped voters or voters who are ill or voters who will be out of
19 the city or county on the day of the primary or general election, may
20 obtain an absentee ballot and the phone number to call for absentee
21 ballot applications, the phone numbers to call for location of polling
22 places, to obtain registration forms and the phone number to call to
23 indicate that the voter is willing to serve on election day as an
24 inspector, poll clerk or interpreter. The notice of approval, notice of
25 approval with request for more information or notice of rejection shall
26 also advise the applicant to notify the board of elections if there is
27 any inaccuracy. Such notice shall include a statement of the party
28 enrollment of the registrant, or, if no party was selected by the regis-
29 trant, a statement that the registrant did not enroll in a party and is
30 not eligible to vote in a party primary election, and, instructions on
31 how to enroll in a party. The form of such mail notification shall be
32 prescribed by the state board of elections and shall contain such other
33 information and instructions as it may reasonably require to carry out
34 the purposes of this section. The request for more information shall
35 inform the voter that "THE FAILURE TO CONTACT THE BOARD OF ELECTIONS AND
36 CORRECT ANY INACCURACIES IN THE APPLICATION OR PROVIDE REQUESTED ADDI-
37 TIONAL INFORMATION MAY RESULT IN A REQUEST FOR IDENTIFICATION AT THE
38 POLLS IN ORDER TO CAST A VOTE ON A VOTING MACHINE." If such notice is
39 returned undelivered without a new address, the board shall forthwith
40 send such applicant a confirmation notice pursuant to the provisions of
41 section 5-712 of this article and place such applicant in inactive
42 status. The state board of elections shall prepare uniform notices by
43 this section as provided for in subdivision eight of section 3-102 of
44 this chapter.
45 § 2. Subdivision 3 of section 5-302 of the election law, as amended by
46 chapter 659 of the laws of 1994, is amended to read as follows:
47 3. If marks are found in more than one of the boxes or circles or if
48 no marks are found in any of the boxes or circles of any application
49 form, the voter who used the application form shall be deemed not to be
50 enrolled, and the words blank or void shall be entered in the space
51 reserved on his registration poll record for the name of a political
52 party or in the computer files from which the computer generated regis-
53 tration lists are prepared. However if such application form sets forth
54 the address of prior registration and such prior registration had not
55 been previously cancelled, the party enrollment, if any, which is part
56 of such prior registration shall be entered in such space on such regis-
A. 5901 3
1 tration poll record or in such computer files. If a new application
2 form does not contain a mark for a party enrollment, but, no later than
3 thirty days after the registrant was sent notice of the lack of party
4 enrollment as required by subdivision nine of section 5-210 of this
5 title and at least twenty-five days before a primary election, the
6 registrant makes a party enrollment choice on the card provided with the
7 notice, signs the affirmation contained therein and mails it to the
8 board of elections, then the registrant's party enrollment shall not be
9 deemed to be a change of enrollment and shall be effective on the date
10 it is received by the county board of elections. A party enrollment
11 mailed more than thirty days after mailing of the notice of the lack of
12 enrollment shall be deemed to be a change of enrollment.
13 § 3. This act shall take effect on the sixtieth day after it shall
14 have become a law.
