Future of California Elections’ Fall Forum 2015
Presentation by Kim Alexander, President & Founder
California Voter Foundation

Three big areas of change:
New laws that will help ensure more vote-by-mail ballots are successfully cast and counted
New disclosure resources that will help voters follow the money, especially on ballot propositions
New online tools that will help voters discover what’s on the ballot, find a polling place and check mail ballot and registration status
Vote-by-mail changes were needed to reduce ballot rejection
According to Pew’s Election Performance Index, California has one of the highest mail ballot rejection rates of any state in the nation:

Top Three Reasons why some mail ballots don’t get counted:
Late arrival
No signature on ballot envelope
Signature on the ballot envelope does not sufficiently compare to the signature on file

Mail ballot law changes in effect for 2016:
SB 29 of 2014:  requires counties to count mail ballots if they are postmarked by Election Day and received within three days of the election
AB 477 of 2015:  if a voter forgets to sign a mail ballot envelope, counties are now allowed to accept the voter’s signature separately from the envelope (but not required to outreach in first place)
SB 365 of 2015:  establishes the right of counties to accept ballots at drop off locations and directs SoS to create best practices guidelines in regulations
For more about the vote-by-mail process:
See the California Voter Foundation’s 2014 report, 
http://www.calvoter.org/votebymail

New disclosure resources will help voters follow the money, especially on ballot propositions SB 27 of 2014:requires proposition campaigns raising $1 million or more to identify and report their top ten donors to the Fair Political Practices Commission; requires FPPC to publish Top Ten Donors list combining top donors for and against each proposition across all committees
SB 844 of 2014:  requires the Secretary of State to track and publish data showing the total amounts raised for and against each proposition on the ballot
What’s available from the FPPC:
http://www.fppc.ca.gov/TopContributors/

From the Secretary of State:
Coming in 2016: New Online Voter Tools
California is one of only a handful of states that does not currently offer a statewide voter registration status lookup tool
In 2014, the Secretary of State teamed up with Pew and Google to offer a “Find my Polling Place” lookup tool
In 2016, the SoS is working with counties to also offer a tool that voters can use to obtain a list of all the contests on their ballot

Many new tools will be available once VoteCal is operating
Delays in implementing a new statewide database are the reason California is far behind other states in offering lookup tools
CVF’s recently published policy brief, “VoteCal and the Struggle to Modernize California’s Voter Registration Data” was published in July and features a list of the laws and tools that are contingent on VoteCal becoming operational
http://www.calvoter.org/issues/voterreg/votecalpolicybrief.html

Laws that take effect once VoteCal is fully deployed:
SB 113 of 2014 - allows 16 year olds to pre-register to vote
AB 1436 of 2012 (and SB 439/Allen of 2015) allows voters to register and vote provisionally at county election offices or satellite offices on Election Day
AB 306 of 2009 - allows voters to receive their state Voter Information Guide electronically and opt out of paper 
AB 1020 of 2015 - numerous changes including the ability of counties to automatically update a voter's address when they move between counties within California
Other potential changes contingent on VoteCal:
SB 450/vote centers and Colorado-style ballot delivery option for counties
Some provisions of AB 1461, the new Motor Voter law

VoteCal’s Voter Lookup Tools
Voter Registration Status: Once logged in, a voter will be able to see at which address she is registered, party affiliation, and whether she is signed up as a permanent vote-by-mail voter. If a voter wants to change any information on her record, she will need to complete a new voter registration form, either on paper or online.
Vote-by-Mail Ballot Status: A voter will be able to find out if his vote-by-mail ballot was counted, and if not, why not. However, it is unknown how quickly this information will be added to voters’ records and whether it will be feasible for a voter to use the lookup tool to determine whether there is a problem with his ballot in time to be able to correct such problems, such as a missing or bad signature, so that such ballots can be counted. 
Provisional Ballot Status: A voter who casts a provisional ballot will be able to find out if his ballot was counted and if not, why not. 
In the meantime, many counties offer similar tools
CVF web site provides a comprehensive directory of these tools where available: 

Ex: Shasta County’s mail ballot status tool:
Another great tool for 2016: Voters Edge
Challenges/Questions:
Will VoteCal be completed on schedule? (current deployment date is June 30, 2016)
Can we create a platform to deliver unified, official state and local voting information online?
Is there funding to support government outreach/voter education work?
Are there other cost barriers that are keeping candidate info from voters and can they be overcome?

Kim Alexander, President & Founder
California Voter Foundation
kimalex@calvoter.org
Twitter:  kimalex3