ORDER-2023-93 : Requesting City Council approval of the Board of Registrars of Voters Recommendation relative to In-person Early Voting for the September 19, 2023 mayoral preliminary and November 7, 2023 municipal election

Transcript (~7 min @ 50:40)

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▶ 50:38 Maya Jamaleddine: And for now, since we have, um, I would like to, uh, make a motion to suspend the rules for me, members of the admin on the order before us.

▶ 50:51 Speaker 1: Second,

▶ 50:54 Maya Jamaleddine: We have a motion made by Councilor Stewart, do you have any second

▶ 51:01 Maya Jamaleddine: to suspend the rules?

▶ 51:03 Robb Stewart: Point of order. I thought you made the motion. I second it. You. I'm a second.

▶ 51:08 Maya Jamaleddine: Okay. Okay. We have a motion made by, um, councilor Stewart,

▶ 51:13 Maya Jamaleddine: seconded by Councilor Ec Eccles. All in favor? Aye. Aye. Any opposed? Okay. Um,

▶ 51:22 Speaker 8: I would like to call, uh, Albertson.

▶ 51:31 Maya Jamaleddine: Hello. So, hi. The order is 2023 dash 93, requesting city council approval of the Board of Registrars of Border's recommendation, um, relative to in-person early voting for the September 19th, 2023, mayoral primary, and November 7th, 2023 municipal election.

▶ 51:53 Speaker 5: Okay. I just would like to make one brief note on what you just said. Um, because the wording needs to be right about this. The September election is not a primary, it's a preliminary,

▶ 52:03 Maya Jamaleddine: I'm sorry, yeah,

▶ 52:04 Speaker 5: Preliminary because it's, it's not partisan. Yeah. So, um, briefly, uh, basically mostly the state tells us what to do with state and federal elections. Um, we can opt in or out of early voting, but for the state, for, for municipal elections, um, it is entirely up to the board of registrars. And if the Board of registrars decides by a majority to have early voting, then it goes to you for approval. The board did make that decision. Um, basically, uh, we're finding that early voting is not as important to people now that we have mail-in voting, but there are definitely people who still do it, and we wanna keep that option open for them, especially in a municipal election. Um, that I think is gonna be a busy one.

▶ 52:51 Maya Jamaleddine: Do we have any question? Uh, councilor Siwa.

▶ 52:55 Speaker 1: Thank you, Madam Chair. Uh, um,

▶ 52:59 Robb Stewart: thank you for being here this evening. Mm-hmm. Uh, what's the additional cost of having the early voting?

▶ 53:06 Speaker 5: Uh, you know, I'm not a hundred percent sure. It's fairly minimal though. It's basically the cost of having some, because we'll have it when City Hall is open. So it's basically the cost of having someone be here. I'm sorry. So, so I think we're looking at two days of early voting. So it's, I wanna say it's gonna be about $500. Please don't hold me to that. But, uh, really the only thing we need is, is to staff the room.

▶ 53:35 Robb Stewart: So, just, just to clarify, when I look at the memo that came out, there are three days of early voting for the preliminary. Mm-hmm. And then three days of early voting for, uh, the primary. Right. Okay. Yes. Is that correct? So six Six total six days altogether? Yes. Okay.

▶ 53:50 Speaker 5: So, all right. So I'll, I'll up my estimate. Uh, I would say probably less than a thousand dollars, unless there's a cost that I'm not aware of in there. Basically, we just have to have someone in here to take the votes. Okay. And it's done while City Hall is already open

▶ 54:03 Robb Stewart: And it's, it's done right down the hall here in City Hall, right?

▶ 54:06 Speaker 5: It's done here.

▶ 54:06 Robb Stewart: It's done here in the chamber? Yes. Okay. Okay. Okay. Thank you.

▶ 54:11 Speaker 1: Thank you. Madam Chair. No more.

▶ 54:13 Speaker 8: Councilor Eccles.

▶ 54:15 Jack Eccles: Thank you. Madam Chair. Do we set when, uh, mail-in ballots are available, or is that just statute?

▶ 54:24 Speaker 5: Uh, you know, I'm not, I'm, I apologize. This is my first municipal election as a registrar. Um, and, and so I'm so used to literally the state telling us everything. Mm-hmm. Uh, I, I don't know. I can get that information to you. Yeah. I don't remember ever doing it. It just, Well, the whole thing is new. Mm-hmm. And I wanna say we don't have to do mail-in, but obviously we're going to. Thanks. So we're gonna maximize voting.

▶ 54:56 Speaker 8: Um, councilor Stewart.

▶ 55:00 Robb Stewart: Thank, thank you, Madam Chair. How, so this, is this the, we have done early voting before Yes. And how many people vote? Uh, early, not by mail, but going in person, roughly.

▶ 55:14 Speaker 5: Coming in person. Um, last year we would typically have, uh, I wanna say 30 or 40 a day. That was in a, you know, a fairly well contested, um, election, federal and state election. Um, we had huge turnout in 2020, obviously. Yeah, sure. And we expect to have high turnout in 2024. We don't really know what's going to happen this year, but we wanna make, we just wanna make sure that the option is available. Okay. Thank you. The numbers were relatively small, I can tell you that compared to the number of people who voted by mail and in person.

▶ 55:55 Speaker 1: Thank you. Thank you, Madam Chair.

▶ 55:57 Speaker 8: You're anyone else? Okay.

▶ 56:01 Maya Jamaleddine: I do have a question. Yes. Ask. Right. Do, uh, what kind of outreach are we planning to do for early boarding?

▶ 56:09 Speaker 5: Uh, we will probably about what we do for everything, we will put it in the papers. We'll put an announcement in the papers, we'll put an announcement on the City website. Um, probably ask the mayor to promote it on Mm. Mmt v uh, put it on the Facebook page. Like I, I welcome any suggestions, but we're just gonna get the word out in the usual ways.

▶ 56:32 Maya Jamaleddine: Um, any, uh, plan for assistance, for instance, if, if coordinating, uh, with, um, counsel on Aging, uh, for, um, seniors, if they would, you know, take advantage of the early voting.

▶ 56:48 Speaker 5: Absolutely. I mean, I'm, I'm, and I'm happy to reach out to them. I, I suspect that seniors are the majority, although not by a huge amount of the people who vote early, and I wanna make sure that they're aware of it, honestly. Uh, I can tell you from processing ballots last year that most, most seniors say, let me put it this way, most of the people who live in our senior citizen buildings voted by mail.

▶ 57:13 Speaker 8: Okay. Um, okay. So, uh,

▶ 57:16 Maya Jamaleddine: statistically speaking, they voted by mail, the majority voted by mail rather than coming, rather, rather than coming in Yes. And doing early voting. Yes. Okay. So, um, my recommendation is for those that choose to come in person and vote early, I hope that we can, um, do any kind of a recommendation and coordinating with, uh, council on Aging for Transportation if they are able to provide that.

▶ 57:42 Speaker 5: Absolutely.

▶ 57:43 Maya Jamaleddine: Thank you. What is the will of the committee

▶ 57:47 Speaker 5: Motion to recommend? Second,

▶ 57:50 Maya Jamaleddine: We have a motion to recommend made by Councilor Eccles, seconded by Councilor Chetty. On, on discussion.

▶ 58:01 Speaker 8: All in favor?

▶ 58:04 Speaker 8: Aye. Aye.