While it may not be of much interest to many, there are a few people who have been reading my posts that might be interested to know how voting went for the people whose voter registrations I've been "tracking". I figure, to be fair, if I'm going to gripe about things that go wrong, I should give props when things go right. What's more, again to be fair, I need to drop a kudo on Reid Magney from the GAB.
In my post, "18? Check! State ID? Check! Vote? Check! Or, maybe not...", I expressed some concerns I had about a few election day registrants who weren't showing up as registered voters on the Voter Public Access (VPA) site. VPA is the public part of the Statewide Voter Registration System (SVRS), which is Wisconsin's federally-mandated database for keeping track of voter registrations.
Clerks have 30 days in which to enter voter participation and election-day registrations into the SVRS. After seeing several people's histories updated on the VPA site with their participation in the June recall, but not seeing any of the new (or updated) registrants I knew about, I started to worry their registrations did not go through and that their votes didn't count. It took over 2 months, but I now know that at least 2 more people whose registrations I've been following up on were, in fact, completed. This makes 5 out of 7 I've been watching.
My daughter's registration card was in yesterday's mail, which we discovered after we had a smooth-as-butter experience voting. Her boyfriend, who was also a new voter on June 5th, had the same experience. Both were on the poll lists, and both were able to vote without hassle (or delay, for that matter). And, though neither are showing up as registered voters in the SVRS, I feel fairly confident they will when the election data from yesterday is entered...and that their participation in the June recall election will be there. Fairly confident; one person I've been tracking has voted twice now - in the May primary and the June recall, but she's still not showing up. And the other person I'm keeping an eye on, despite a pretty solid voting history - including the June recall - is now listed as "ineligible". I will be following up on those, but for now, I'm pleased that most of the people I've been keeping tabs on seem to be on track.
Now, about that kudo...
Last weekend, I wrote about some pages on the GAB site that said "Access denied!" (See "WI Government Accountability Board says: Access Denied!" They were supposed to be responses to questions about voter ID's on their FAQ page, but when I clicked to read them I got that message. There was some debate as to whether or not this was intentional or an accident, whether or not it was a big or little deal, and there was even speculation about who was responsible. My position was that, regardless of whether or not it was intentional, it didn't look good and I expected better than that from the GAB. Other voter ID questions had updated responses that clearly stated there is no ID requirement to vote, but these said "Access denied!".
One person "called me out" for being unreasonable when I stated the GAB needed to fix these pages/question "immediately" - it was a beautiful Saturday, after all. And I acknowledged that much...I also said I was pretty certainly the GAB would become aware of this issue pretty quickly on Monday, and I was right. By noon-ish on Monday, Reid Magney personally addressed my concern in a comment on my post. He said:
"Hello from the G.A.B.
After the voter photo ID injunctions, we immediately worked to remove all incorrect information about the current status of photo ID requirements from the G.A.B. website. We also put up prominent notices saying photo ID had been enjoined, and is not required to vote.
We recently discovered we had missed some photo ID information contained in the FAQ section, so we "unpublished" those FAQs so they would not be visible on the website. That is why users saw an "Access Denied" message when they clicked on the links to those questions/answers from the FAQ page.
Unfortunately, the questions were still visible due to a website coding issue. Today we changed the website so unpublished FAQs don't show up on the FAQ page anymore.
What remains under the Voter Photo ID Law section of the FAQ page is other provisions of 2011 Wisconsin Act 23 that are still in effect, and not enjoined by the courts.
Nomi, I would be happy to meet with you in person, talk by phone, or converse by email anytime you have questions about the G.A.B. and its website. I think you'll find that most questions or issues can be resolved fairly quickly. My contact info is on the website.
I'd also invite you or anyone else interested in the G.A.B. to attend our next meeting.
Reid Magney
Public Information Officer / Webmaster
Government Accountability Board"
So, to Mr. Magney, I give a kudo - not only for taking care of the problem promptly, but for taking the time to respond directly within the post for the whole world to see. (Okay, maybe not the
whole world... ;) Well done, Reid; well done.