'Rapping' Up the City Elections

Rockville’s elections board is calling on city residents to join them in a look back at the 2011 city election on Saturday to discuss what went well, what didn’t and what needs to change before the next election in 2013.

The will be held at 10:30 a.m. at .

Candidates from the 2011 election and their campaign staff have been invited to the meeting, which also is open to the public.

“The purpose of it is basically to solicit information from folks—anybody actually—in terms of the elections process, what problems they saw, what worked out well, where we need to make improvements, et cetera, et cetera,” David Celeste, chairman of the city’s Board of Supervisors of Elections said at a Jan. 5 meeting in which the board discussed the scope of the wrap-up’s agenda.

The agenda includes:

• A discussion of how to revamp campaign finance reports.
• A review of Chapter 8 of the city code, which spells out city election law.
• Voting methods for 2013, including whether to use voting machines or paper ballots.
• The city’s voter database.
• Voter turnout.

The agenda includes a list of issues compiled by the elections board, some of which would routinely be presented for the City Council to address, Celeste said. The meeting also is a chance to get feedback from people who have been involved in campaigns.

Campaign finance reports need an overhaul, acting city clerk Brenda Bean said.

Some of that needed reform stems from issues raised by candidates during the 2011 election cycle. The issues included , and the .

At Saturday’s meeting, the board will update where things stand regarding a shift to a voting system that produces paper records of ballots cast. Elections watchdog groups, such as SAVEOurVotes, say the shift will bring greater security and transparency to the elections process than the paperless electronic voting machines in use today.

The Maryland General Assembly passed a law in 2007 calling for elections by 2010 to use voting systems that include a “voter-verifiable paper record.” Counties, facing tight budgets, have not yet complied with the law.

Celeste said he is wary about framing the issue as machines vs. paper ballots and raising hopes that the changeover will happen before 2013.

“That’s a tough one because we tend to piggyback on what the county does, because otherwise it’s going to cost Rockville a bundle,” he said.

Candidates have complained that the database of registered city voters is outdated. The consequences of that can be costly as candidates mail campaign literature to addresses that appear on voter rolls, but that are no longer home to registered voters.

The database is provided by the state to the county elections board, which maintains the data. It has been several decades—perhaps as far back as the early 1980s—since the city has maintained its own database, board members said.

Getting registered voters to the polls remains a challenge.

In November, voter turnout was 16.94 percent, with 6,240 ballots cast out of 36,840 registered voters. Despite pleasant weather on Election Day, turnout was down slightly from 2009 when 6,406 of 36,840 (17.39 percent) registered voters cast ballots.

Celeste said he hopes Saturday's discussion will generate ideas for increasing participation, but doesn’t want the board “to get in the way."

“Instead of us talking about what we’d like to do, I’d like to hear what the people have to say, in terms of voter turnout,” he said.