Petition Management. The Software Revolution. Election officials are ditching traditional processing methods for modern technology.

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1 Petition Management The Software Revolution A White Paper Election officials are ditching traditional processing methods for modern technology. Initiative and referendum processes were established to allow citizens the capability to be directly involved in the political process. While the process has been improved throughout modern society; the essential practice of signature and address verification is still a very manual process. However, with today s technology jurisdictions are now modernizing the stressful validation practice, enabling them to increase efficiency and save money. Runbeck Election Services, Inc. Address: 2404 W. 14th St., Suite 110 Tempe, AZ Phone:

2 2 Petition Management The Software Revolution You see them when you make a trip to the grocery store, in front of the Post Office, or even in front of your local hardware depot. Although they are not selling delicious cookies or popcorn, circulators are soliciting your attention to collect petition signatures. In most states, petitioners have a limited amount of time during which they are allowed to gather necessary signatures. Although some states have a year or more to collect signatures for initiative purposes; in others, time is of the essence ranging from 60 days in Massachusetts to four years in Florida 1. And that is just a sample. Depending on your state and its constitution it is interesting the number of various petitions allowed within your state s jurisdiction or even compared to others. Twenty-six states (28 counting the District of Columbia and the insular U.S. Virgin Islands) are Petition states; meaning they may allow a variety of Initiative, Referendum or Constitution Amendments with the use of petitions 2. The remaining 24 have none outside of the use of petitions to establish political parties, candidate petitions, and the power to impanel grand juries via petition; and even those methods also vary from state to state. Although most states have both statutory and constitutional initiative processes, there is sometimes a higher signature threshold to qualify constitutional initiatives, except in Colorado, Massachusetts and Nevada. There are other provisions such as geographical distribution requirements requiring signatures to be gathered from multiple parts of a state, thus preventing petitioners from only collecting in denser populated areas 3. Previous Practices During the Progressive era in American history ( ), initiative and referendum processes were developed and aimed to allow citizens the capability to become directly involved in the political process. By doing so, this restored equilibrium as a precautionary measure against monopolistic powers of corporations and various forms of trusts. This antiquated process, although deep-rooted as an American tradition has not seen much change in the essential practice of signature and address verification, which for the most part is still a very manual process. Even in this modern day and age, one of the more tedious, time-consuming and costly tasks that election officials must perform is the petition verification of names and signatures. Resources and time interchangeably pull on budgets, leaving no room for subpar efficiency with the scrutiny of the media in today s click bait society. Although lawful modifications have been made over time regarding the signature gathering process, not much has changed concerning the validation of signatures collected, that is UNTIL NOW. Address: 2404 W. 14th St. Suite, 110 Phone:

3 3 A New Era With the development of a revolutionizing petition management software jurisdictions can now comb through hundreds of thousands of names and signatures, in a matter of days; a process that would have formally took weeks to accomplish. ARIZONA The Arizona Secretary of State s Office is now utilizing this technology; formally the state elections department would rally an army of up to 75 temporary employees, and utilize 20 days to unstaple packets, count pages, and draw red-lines crossing out any blank rows 4. Utilizing new technology, the process now allows the department to process all submitted petitions in under six days, with petitions available for citizen review within 48 hours. Additionally, what used to cost Arizona citizens thousands of dollars in public-records requests for copies of statewide initiatives, now cost nothing 5. COLORADO Arizona is not the only state to utilize such technology; in 2017 Colorado s statutory petition process changed, in response to signature forgery. Under the new law the State is now validating each petition signature against the voter s official record 6 utilizing the newly developed petition management software and a scanner to automate the validation process once done by hand. Once petition sheets are scanned, election officials review and compare a voter s signature with their official signature record, also known as a side-by-side comparison. If an initial review can t authenticate a match, the signature is queued to a pair of bipartisan supervisors for further deliberation 7. MISSOURI 2018 marks the first year the State of Missouri capitalized on utilizing this new petition management software. Over 200,000 pages were submitted for scanning and signature verification. The State scanned submitted pages and distributed them to local election authorities for verification. However, the software will count the number of signatures per page and allow election officials to automate the verification of each signature 8. This new process is a remarkable step in the right direction, mostly due to the massive increase in Missouri petition circulation in the last 20 years, where the State has seen almost a 50 percent increase since

4 4 Modern Petition Technology How does it work? Election officials are utilizing petition software to automate the time consuming verification for petitions in three simple stages. STAGE-1 Counts the number of pages. Counts possible records per page. Identifies completed and missing fields. Detects crossed out fields. Formulates raw count of signatures. STAGE-2 Through integration with the voter registration database, the software will retrieve voter information, including names, addresses, and signatures initiating the matching sequence. STAGE-3 Performs random sampling and displays selected petition records with county-eligible records for side-by-side verification, as well as sending validated information back to the voter registration database for updating. Address: 2404 W. 14th St. Suite, 110 Phone:

5 5 Petition Management software is capable of integrating with any voter registration system; quickly and accurately handling every facet of the validation process. It is important to note; an essential requirement of the application requires integration with any VR database for comparison of all signatures and addresses aimed for successful verification. Additionally, placing petition information into the VR database for updating and random selection is a must. With today s technology, this new advancement has enhanced the verification process and improved procedures with accuracy and ease, ultimately shortening the number of resources and time utilized, saving jurisdictions money. If all jurisdictions capitalized on this advanced technology, election officials could break away from the tedious manual processes, all together. The biggest benefit in this technological advancement of automation is strengthening America s democratic practices and contributing to the improvement of transparency and auditability.

6 6 Works Cited 1 Petition Circulation Periods. National Conference of State Legislatures June States with initiative or referendum Ballotpedia, the Encyclopedia of American Politics June Petition Circulation Periods. National Conference of State Legislatures June Secretary of State:It s 2017, and my office finally takes credit cards Michelle Reagan, AZ I See It. AZCentral. 2017, 12 September Reagan, Michelle. Secretary of State:It s 2017, and my office finally takes credit cards. AZCentral. 2017, 12 September Frank, John. Colorado s 2016 election was stained by forged signatures. Here s what the state is doing to prevent it in The Denver Post. 2018,19 March Frank, John. Colorado s 2016 election was stained by forged signatures. Here s what the state is doing to prevent it in The Denver Post. 2018,19 March Schmitt, Will. In Missouri petition season, Jay Ashcroft focuses on his job while avoiding Eric Greitens. Springfield News-Leader. 2018, 6 May Watson, Bob. Missouri sets initiative records - again. News Tribune. 2018, 4 February Address: 2404 W. 14th St. Suite, 110 Phone: