From Lesley Mara, Deputy Secretary of the State

______

Office of the Secretary of the State: Information Bulletin

Issue 58, August 4, 2010

From Lesley Mara, Deputy Secretary of the State

Dear Colleagues:

First, let me acknowledge all of your hard work in the past several weeks in attending to the final details for the Primary next week. We know from your calls and emails that you have been working hard to get ready for the big day. Thank you for all of your effort. Feel free to call or email if you need help any time.

I have been asked by a number of registrars to clarify our office’s directive related to duplication of memory cards by registrars or staff at the local level. While so many areas of our election law and process can be vague, in this area, the directive is clear: Registrars and local election officials are prohibited from duplicating memory cards. In addition, LHS has been directed not to assist with any such duplication.

We have shared the rationale behind this ruling before, but perhaps, it bears repeating. In our opinion, such duplication violates Section 9-244 and undermines the transparency of the pre-election testing process, as candidates and observers have no way of verifying or checking the activities involved with duplication.

Additionally, and more important, duplication disrupts the chain of custody and security procedures we have put in place with UCONN to ensure the integrity of programming of memory cards. UCONN cannot vouch for such cards during their post-election auditing work.

If time lines cannot be met for replacement of cards, we have directed that our office be contacted so that necessary provision can be made.

I hope that this clarification is helpful. Good luck on Tuesday!

REMINDER: NOTICES OF PRIMARY Please remember that each municipal clerk should be forwarding to our office a copy of the notice of primary that is prepared and noticed locally. It is vitally important that we are aware of all candidates and all primaries that will be held on August 10, 2010.

USE OF “NEXT LOCAL ELECTION” ON CVRS

We have been asked why CVRS does not print the August 10, 2010 primary on the letter of acceptance sent to each voter. Currently, CVRS only allows our office to update the November election date. It was programmed like this for several reasons. For instance, in any other year but 2010, if we entered a statewide primary date, instead of a statewide election date, all voters in the state would have a primary date listed on their letters of acceptance even when your town does not have a primary. To remedy this situation, we added the ability for each Registrar of Voters to enter in a “local election” date. This date could be a local referenda, special election or PRIMARY. To access this option, you should go to: Activities, Elections, Maintain Elections. Once there you can use this option to enter the primary date.

REMINDER: USE OF IVS REQUIRED IN 2010

Please see a timeline of events for the IVS System below.

1. Preview and Practice will be available Tuesday, August 3rd. This allows you to call in and listen to your ballots as they will be presented on Primary Day. The number for Preview and Practice is 866-494-8683.

2. Ballot access and ID codes will be the same as they have been in the past.

3. You will need to perform Field Equipment Registration ONLY IF your polling place has changed from the last election OR your phone number at the polling place has changed since the last election. The Field Equipment Registration number is 866-486-3841.

4. According to IVS, if you are uncertain about the status of your equipment you can still take your equipment to the polling location prior to Primary Day and perform field equipment registration even if your are not required to do so pursuant to (3) above. This will ensure that your equipment is set up properly and there are no issues with any of the equipment or connections. If the equipment is set up properly and working you will receive a fax confirmation of your registration. IVS will also send a fax blast to all equipment starting at 6AM on Primary Day morning to ensure that the equipment is set up and working correctly. IVS will provide our office with a report detailing which polling locations were unsuccessful in receiving the fax blast.

5. On Primary Day, when your poll worker calls into the system, they will be asked to enter their Poll Worker ID and their Ballot Access ID. They will then hear a prompt to select a party.

The Primary Day phone number is 866-486-3843.

REMINDER: PLEASE SEND A MEMORY CARD TO UCONN.

As we have in the past, please submit a memory card to the University of Connecticut for pre-primary testing so that we may ensure a complete and accurate primary result. The memory card(s) should be sent to:

Dr. Alexander Shvartsman

Voting TechnologyResearchCenter

371 Fairfield Way, Unit 2155

University of Connecticut

Storrs, CT06268

860-486-3719

Page 1 of 3