Voter Amendment Costs
Voter Amendment Will Be Costly
Kathy Bonnifield, Executive Director of Citizens for Election Integrity, emphasizes that the debate on the seriously flawed "Photo ID" Amendment ignores the high costs to both the state of Minnesota's budget and to that of counties. Minnesota Management and Budget estimates that first year local costs will be between $8.3 million and $23.3 million.
Bonnifield notes that provisional "ballots will need to be stored in a secure location after Election Day and those handling the provisional ballots after Election Day will be required to have a complete understanding of how to respond to a provisional voter coming to the facility. We also know that two election judges of two different parties would need to handle the provisional ballots."
Smaller townships would face the cost of opening their offices to create business hours for people to bring proof of their identity. Kent Sulum of the Minnesota Association of townships estimates that staffing the business hours could cost as much as $3.1 million a year statewide.
In June 2012, Think Again MN launched a history series that examines politics and policy-making in Minnesota during the last century from the immediate post World War II years up through the 1990s. That era witnessed fierce legislative battles at the State Capitol but it was also a time of shared values that cut across partisan lines.
MN's Leading Election System
MN's Leading Election System
With Secretary of State Steve Simon
Listen to Secretary of State Steve Simon's excellent presentation on MN's outstanding election system emulated by many other states at the Think Again Brooklyns forum January 19, 2016. Secretary Simon includes ways in which it can be improved, and he explains why it is important to vote. He concludes with a quote from a tee shirt: "Failure to vote is not an act of rebellion. It is an act of surrender."
Get details on how to vote at http://mnvotes.org
Oregon's Automatic Voter Registration
How Oregon Became the Easiest Place to Vote in the US
By Lornet Turnbull
YES! Magazine
October 8, 2016
In January, Oregon became the first state in the country to begin automatically registering eligible citizens to vote when they obtain or renew their driver's licenses or state IDs, completely shifting the burden of voter registration from the individual to the government.