Election task force suggests reforms

OLYMPIA, Wash. – An election reform task force created by Gov. Christine Gregoire in the wake of her razor-thin victory last year found that the public’s trust in the state’s election system was damaged by imperfections and mistakes that “are clearly unacceptable.”

In a 23-page report the task force suggests 15 specific actions it wants to see the governor and Legislature take, including moving up the primary date and requiring voter identification at the polls.

The task force, co-chaired by Secretary of State Sam Reed and former state Sen. Betti Sheldon, held five public hearings around the state with a total of more than 455 people in attendance. The task force also received nearly 700 responses to questionnaires that were distributed at the public hearings and available on the secretary of state’s Web site.

The issue of reform jumped quickly to the forefront after Gregoire, a Democrat, won the governor’s race by 129 votes after a hand recount of nearly 2.9 million ballots after the Nov. 2 election.

Republican opponent Dino Rossi – who led after the first two tallies of the vote – and his supporters have gone to court seeking to void the results, alleging widespread problems and voting irregularities. Calls for a revote came after accusations were made of illegal votes by felons and dead people, and provisional ballots that were illegally tallied without being properly checked. A judge has ruled the case can move forward, but he would not order a revote.

Reed said Wednesday he wanted voters to know that “the state of Washington is seriously and thoughtfully dealing with those problems.”

“No way are we going to excuse them away or whitewash the situation,” he said. “There were very serious problems. Illegal votes are unacceptable.”

The report came as the Senate prepared to vote on several election reform bills and several bills awaited action in the House.

The flip-flopping results over a nearly eight-week period following the election “created the perception that something was amiss in the system, especially in King County,” the report found. “It also created individual and collective emotional swings as the leader changed from day to day, hour to hour.”

The task force suggested that all counties certify their results on the same day, which would require larger counties to start earlier, but would lessen the likelihood of a dramatic change in results that could take place if counties were late in counting and certifying their results.

King County, the largest county in the state – accounting for about a third of the voters – did not certify its results until Dec. 23, after counting newly discovered ballots. Reed certified the election on Dec. 30.

King County was singled out in the report as needing to improve its election system. The report said that residents across the state expressed concern about the county’s election system.

Shortly after taking office, Gregoire created the task force to try and address the deep division among voters in the state.

Of the suggestions that were presented in the report, Reed said bills have been introduced addressing all of them, either in the House or Senate.

A package of bills expected to go to the Senate floor as early as Friday would schedule the primary in August, a month earlier than currently, so counties would have more time to get out general election ballots. The proposed legislation would also impose statewide standards for handling ballots, require first-time voters to produce identification at the polls, require regular audits of county election departments and require a paper trail for touch-screen voting machines like those used in Snohomish and Yakima counties.

Another Senate bill would make it easier for counties to opt for conducting their elections entirely by mail, though the task force said that given public concern about potential abuse of absentee ballots, it thinks retaining the local option of voting by mail should remain, but with stronger warnings about voter fraud. About 70 percent of the state’s voters already vote by mail.

The task force also recommended color-coding provisional ballots, mandatory audits of local election systems by the secretary of state’s office and improving voter registration records.