Bill would give felons voting rights on release

OLYMPIA – Saying that it’s a mistake to deny ex-criminals the right to vote – often for years – some state lawmakers want to automatically restore felons’ right to vote once they’re released from prison.

Dozens of advocates, family members and felons turned out Monday for a hearing on controversial Senate Bill 5530.

As things stand now in Washington, a person loses the right to vote when convicted of a felony.

Felons can petition to vote again only after they’ve served any prison time, gotten off probation, and paid all their fines, fees and other court-imposed costs.

“I don’t think having the right to vote should be based upon one’s financial status,” said Sen. Jeanne Kohl-Welles, D-Seattle, the prime sponsor of Senate Bill 5530.

“It smacks too much of class and other forms of bias.”

Washington bars more than 167,000 felons from voting, according to New York University’s Brennan Center for Justice.

That’s nearly 4 percent of the state’s voting-age population.

That’s twice the rate in Idaho; seven times the rate in Oregon.

Current law is “casting people off to the side and basically telling them that you don’t deserve to participate,” said Lea Zengage, a Lake Stevens advocate for prisoners and their families.

Kohl-Wells and other lawmakers clearly have an eye on a March 2006 court ruling in King County in which a judge ruled that three felons who cannot pay off their court costs should nonetheless be allowed to vote.

Superior Court Judge Michael Spearman said there is “no rational relationship between the ability to pay and the exercise of constitutional rights.”

The case is on appeal to the state Supreme Court.

One of the plaintiffs was Beverly DuBois, a former park ranger sentenced in 2002 to nine months in jail for growing marijuana.

She was released from prison owing $1,610, but despite monthly payments, the indigent Chattaroy resident’s debt had by last summer grown to about $1,900.

“At that rate, I’ll never get to vote,” she said in an interview at the time.

DuBois has since registered to vote, her attorney said.

Also still fresh in most lawmakers’ memories is the months-long battle after the 2004 razor-thin gubernatorial election, with right-wing researchers combing voter lists and checking backgrounds for signs of any illegal felon votes they could get disqualified.

To avoid similar messes, the state needs a simple, bright line to know when felons can vote again, said Betty Sullivan, with the League of Women Voters. The group supports Kohl-Welles’ bill.

Fourteen states, including Oregon, have automatic restoration of voting rights after prison, Kohl-Welles said. So does Washington, D.C.

And Maine and Vermont allow voting by people in prison – a step that Kohl-Welles said she thinks goes too far.

Some Republican lawmakers, however, are clearly unhappy at the prospect of large numbers of felons voting.

Sen. Pam Roach, R-Auburn, bristled at Zengage’s statement that almost everyone violates some law from time to time.

“Are you suggesting that everyone’s a felon?” said Roach.

“We’re talking felons. There’s a difference between breaking the speed limit and committing a felony.”

“I didn’t say everyone in society. I said when I speak to audiences, how many people do you know that have never smoked something that they shouldn’t have,” responded Zengage.

“Well, you’re looking at one,” retorted Roach.

Also opposed is William Hoffecker, a Pierce County resident who showed up for Tuesday’s hearing.

“I’d like to remind everyone that this bill is talking about felons,” he told lawmakers. “These are not nice people. They have been murderers, rapists, child abusers, methamphetamine manufacturers, robbers, thieves. … If we feel sorry for anyone, let us focus on the victims of these nasty felons.”

Excluding felons from the political process leaves them alienated from the community, said Jessy Miller, a Pierce County woman who owns a hip-hop record label.

Miller pleaded guilty 15 years ago to a drug-dealing charge and spent 22 months in prison. She paid off her fines and got off probation but waited years to vote.

In 2004, she finally registered but worried that she’d done something wrong and would get in trouble.

Standing in line to vote that year, registration card in hand, she left without voting. She was too nervous.

Only after reviewing her court records did she discover that her voting rights had been restored in 1996.

“I should have been doing it a long time ago,” she said.