Elections Additional Data Could Help State And Local Elections Officials Maintain Accurate Voter Registration Lists Report To Congressional Requesters

Reports of ineligible persons registering to vote raised concerns about state processes for verifying voter reg. lists. Although states run elections, Congress has authority to affect the admin. of elections. The Help Amer. Vote Act of 2002 (HAVA) sets a deadline for states to have a statewide voter reg. list & list verification procedures. This report selected 7 states (AZ, CA, MI, NY, TX, VA, & WI) to represent a range of characteristics relevant to voter reg., such as whether a statewide voter list existed prior to HAVA. Discusses how these states verify voter reg. eligibility; the challenges they face in maintaining accurate voter lists; & progress toward implementing HAVA reg. require. Identifies fed. data sources to help verify voter reg. eligibility. Ill.

GAO-05-478 Elections: Additional Data Could Help State and Local Elections Officials Maintain Accurate Voter Registration Lists

The Help America Vote Act of 2002 requires the states to develop a single, computerized voter registration data base (VRD) that is defined, maintained, and administered at the state level. To help the states with this task, the U.S. Election Assistance Commission asked the NRC to organize a series of workshops and prepare an interim report addressing the challenges in implementing and maintaining state VRDs. The EAC also asked the NRC to advise the states on how to evolve and maintain the databases so that they can share information with each other. This report provides an examination of various challenges to the deployment of state VRDs and describes potential solutions to these challenges. This interim report's primary focus is on shorter-term recommendations although a number of long-range recommendations are presented. The final report will elaborate on the long-range questions and address considerations about interstate interoperability of the VRDs.

"Elections: Perspectives on Activities and Challenges Across the Nation" is an October 2001 report of the U.S. General Accounting Office. The report describes the operations associated with each stage of the U.S. presidential election process and includes information about voter registration, absentee and early voting, election day administration, vote counts, certification, and recounts. The U.S. General Accounting Office presents a downloadable version of the report online in PDF format.