Archive for the 'HAVA' Category

Oregon Secretary of State Kate Brown unveils online Civics Toolkit

Published on January 9, 2012 in Elections, HAVA, Press Releases, Secretary Brown and Uncategorized. 1 Comment Tags: , , , , , , , , .

Press Release

SALEM – Oregon Secretary of State Kate Brown recently unveiled a new online Civics Tool Kit. The civic education curriculum was developed through a collaboration of efforts by local professors, teachers and Oregon elections staff. The goal is to provide a beginners guide to civics with an Oregon centric view that anyone can access and use.

Oregon Secretary of State Kate Brown Tells McNary High School Students About New Civics Toolkit

Secretary Brown talks civics with McNary High School students

According to the most recent national civics examination, fewer than half of American eighth graders know the purpose of the Bill of Rights. In addition, only one in 10 demonstrated acceptable knowledge of the checks and balances among the legislative, executive and judicial branches.

“Democracies can only be sustained by citizens who have the basic knowledge, skills and dispositions – I think our online Civic Toolkit can help,” said Secretary of State Kate Brown. “As your Secretary of State and Oregon’s chief elections officer, it is my duty to engage Oregonians in the political process.”

The toolkit is made up of 10 lessons that cover everything from your rights and responsibilities as a good citizen, the history of voting in Oregon and what you need to know before you register to vote in our great state.

You can find the online Civics Toolkit by logging onto Oregon’s Secretary of State website (Elections Division), clicking on Voter Resources then Civics Toolkit or go directly to: http://www.sos.state.or.us/elections/pages/voterresources/civics-toolkit/index.html.

Secretary Brown unveils Civics Toolkit at local high schools

Published on January 6, 2012 in Elections, HAVA, Headlines, Press Releases, Secretary Brown and Uncategorized. 0 Comments Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , .
Oregon Secretary of State Kate Brown Talks Civics at West Salem High School

Secretary Brown rolls out the new online Civics Toolkit

After more than two weeks off for the holidays, students welcomed Secretary Brown to their Government classes to talk civics. The secretary unveiled the online Civics Toolkit developed by her staff, local teachers and professors. Students got a first look at the 10 online lessons which cover everything from how to be a good citizen to how to register to vote. Secretary Brown encouraged students to get involved in the political process and reminded the teens that here in Oregon you can register to vote when you are 17 years old.

Reflecting on the day, Brown observed: “These students were sharp. Many had a great knowledge of Oregon and its government. We hope they find the Civics Toolkit online, learn it and share it. Special thanks to teachers Jason Whiteley and Doug Parker for opening up their classroom. These guys do an excellent job!”

You don’t need to be a teacher or student to take advantage of it. The Civics Toolkit is on the Secretary of State website at http://www.sos.state.or.us/elections/pages/voterresources/civics-toolkit/index.html. Everyone is welcome to download these free resources and bone up on elections civics.

Oregon Secretary of State Kate Brown Tells McNary High School Students About New Civics Toolkit

Secretary Brown visits McNary High School to talk civics

Oregonvotes.org – Frequently Asked Questions

Published on May 6, 2010 in Elections and HAVA. 0 Comments

Do you have more detailed questions about your ballot ahead of the May primary election? Oregonvotes.org can help! Here is the final TV spot being shown throughout the State.

Oregonvotes.org Spot – Ballot Help

Published on May 6, 2010 in Elections and HAVA. 0 Comments

Another helpful TV Spot, currently playing throughout the State of Oregon. If you are having any issues or need to know what to do with your ballot, please give our Elections Division a call at 503-986-1518 or head over to http://www.oregonvotes.org. There you can find information on where to drop off your ballot and what to do if your ballot is lost or damaged.

Online Voter Registration is LIVE!

Published on March 8, 2010 in Elections and HAVA. 0 Comments Tags: , .

As many of you are aware, Online Voter Registration has been LIVE for one week now!

In just one week of service, over 1049 Oregonians have registered to vote using the new system.

Remember, Online Voter Registration is NOT replacing paper registration, it is simply offering up an alternative to the paper system for those who would use it. As Secretary of State Brown stated in a recent Oregonian Op-Ed:

It will help people who find traditional procedures out of reach, including the housebound and the disabled community. With the right equipment, for example, sightless people can register without the assistance of another person to fill out a card. Our military servicemen and women will find far less delay in registration, eliminating worries about whether the snail mail will deliver their paperwork in time.

We are extremely happy to have the system up and running and hope that Oregonians continue to get registered to vote in the upcoming May Primary Election.

We’ll leave you today with a table with of some more detailed information on registrations done with the Online system:

Online Voter Registration Statistics as of 11:30am, 3/8/2010
Total Registrations 1049
Registration Type
Type # of Registrations
Electronic (DMV signature exists) 829
Paper (no DMV signature) 220
Total 1049
Registrations by Party
Party # of Registrations
Constitution Party 0
Democratic Party 346
Independent Party 140
Libertarian Party 13
Not a member of a party 198
Other 11
Pacific Green Party 17
Progressive Party 6
Republican Party 275
Working Families Party 5
No Party Selected 38
Total 1049
Registrations by County
County # of Registrations
Baker 1
Benton 9
Clackamas 96
Clatsop 9
Columbia 9
Coos 12
Crook 13
Deschutes 97
Douglas 28
Harney 2
Hood River 4
Jackson 62
Jefferson 9
Josephine 22
Klamath 23
Lake 3
Lane 117
Lincoln 7
Linn 29
Malheur 3
Marion 72
Morrow 1
Multnomah 219
Polk 20
Tillamook 2
Umatilla 3
Union 6
Washington 139
Wheeler 2
Yamhill 30
Total 1049
Registrations by Age
Age Group # of Registrations
17-19 49
20-29 246
30-39 240
40-49 167
50-59 152
60-69 124
70-79 55
80-89 16
Total 1049

Online Voter Registration Demo

Published on February 23, 2010 in Elections, HAVA, Secretary Brown and Social Media. 0 Comments Tags: , .

We are very excited to announce that our Online Voter Registration system going live on March 1st, and very busy getting ready for this monumental project to launch.

We wanted to invite everyone to take part in a webinar demo of the most user-friendly, convenient and secure way of registering to vote in the State of Oregon. This informational demo will take participants through the online registration process, from beginning to end, followed by a short question and answer session with Elections Director Steve Trout.

Our online participants will join members of the Legislature, advocacy groups and state wide media, who will be viewing the presentation from inside the Capitol Building in Salem.

The webinar will take place on February 25, 2010 at 9:00am. Registration information for the webinar can be found at this link:

https://www2.gotomeeting.com/register/790747411

We hope to see you there!

Ballot Drop Locator

Published on January 14, 2010 in Elections and HAVA. 0 Comments Tags: , , , .

Most every registered voter in the State of Oregon has received his/her ballot by now. So what are your options to make sure that your ballot gets in on time?

1. Mail your ballot in before Friday, January 22nd – After this date, the Postal Service cannot guarantee that it will deliver your ballot on time.

2. Drop your ballot off at an official ballot drop-off site before 8pm on January 26th - If you’re unable to send your ballot in before January 22nd, you can still drop your ballot off at one of many ballot drop-off sites.

To help with the process of finding the closest drop-off site, our Elections Division has created a Ballot Drop Locator, which plots the locations of drop-off sites on an online mapping application. If you’re still having trouble finding a drop-off site, take a look at our County Elections Office guide and give your county’s elections officials a call.

The Cost of Voter Registration

Published on January 5, 2010 in Elections and HAVA. 0 Comments Tags: , , .

This month, the Pew Center on the States in Cooperation with the Oregon Secretary of State’s office, released an Oregon Case study on the The Real Cost of Voter Registration. The study looks at the costs incurred at the State, county, city, and township levels of government in Oregon during the 2008 election. The study found that Oregon spent $9.7 million dollars in state, local and federal dollars on voter registration during that election year.

Here are some highlights of where that money was spent:

  • The single biggest expense was $1 million to operate and maintain OCVR, the Oregon Central Voter Registration database, required by federal law and paid for in part with federal money.
  • The state spent $200,000 to print voter registration forms,
  • State agencies spent $2.8 million on voter registration activities
  • Counties spent $6.9 million, most of it in payroll costs.

Being the first state to undertake an honest analysis of these costs is a tremendous learning opportunity for the State of Oregon. As Secretary Brown put it, “It’s important to understand that this is the first statewide registration cost survey. So we have no way of knowing whether our costs are high, low or average compared to other states. We’ll learn more as other states take this on.”

And what did we get in terms of measurable gains in registration with this $9.7 million dollars?

Well, we can start with 76,337 (2.8% of those eligible) new registrants from January 1 to the primary election deadline of April 29 of 2008. Add another 144,957 (5.4% of those eligible) registrants from the primary until the general election deadline for an 8.2% total voter registration jump in just one election cycle. But winning registering new voters is only part of the story, a great deal of resources are dedicated to updating voter registration information to insure their accuracy. This includes any address and phone number changes, party registration, etc. for the 2,153,914 registered voters in the State of Oregon, no small task!

Secretary of State Brown was excited about the results of the study and the opportunity to help streamline the voter registration system in Oregon, starting with the opening of the online voter registration in March of 2010. When asked, she said, “Pew has done a terrific job of analyzing costs from all levels of government. This is the first statewide study of its kind in the country and will be a great help to the other states. Knowing the real costs can help us develop a system that spends less on bureaucracy and registers more eligible voters.”

Oregon Secretary of State Brown – 20 Push-ups

Published on November 4, 2009 in Audits, Ballot Initiatives, HAVA and Secretary Brown. 0 Comments Tags: , , .

Source: a href=A few years back, when I was still a State Senator, I attended a workshop, which was put on by the Council of State Governments regional arm, CSG-West, an organization I also chaired for a year.

This particular workshop was focused on how legislators can build  credibility –through improved accountability– with their constituents. At the outset of the workshop, the keynote speaker asked who in this room of legislators could do 20 push-ups. Thinking nothing of it and being the eager beaver that I am, I quickly raised my hand as did a few others.

The speaker then spent the next 15 minutes talking about some key functions of building and maintaining accountability with constituents,  delivering on campaign promises and engaging groups back inside the district.

With that lesson delivered, the speaker conducted a little real-world experiment, recalling the claim I and a few others had made regarding these 20 push-ups. She invited me and one other legislator, a gentleman from New Mexico, up to do the 20 push-ups we had promised her we could do. This was a moment of truth.

The good news for Oregon; I did them pretty easily. The bad news for New Mexico; their legislator couldn’t do his.

This drove the message home for me: If you’re going to commit to something during the campaign, you need to make absolutely sure that you can deliver on them once you’ve been elected.

When I was running for this office, I made three major promises to the voters of this state:

  1. That I was going to restore integrity to the initiative process
  2. That I was going to undertake a comprehensive civic engagement program
  3. That I was going to focus our work in the Audits division on performance auditing

When I took office, I remembered that day when I was called up to do 20 push-ups. Taking a high profile position in State government, I knew that I was going to be held to my word on the campaign trail, so I started right in, working on fulfilling those promises.

Continue reading ‘Oregon Secretary of State Brown – 20 Push-ups’

Taking Care of the Voter Registration Rolls

Published on September 25, 2009 in Elections and HAVA. 0 Comments Tags: , , .

Keeping track of voter registration information is serious business as it is vital to insuring that our elections run as smoothly and securely as possible. Until recently each of Oregon’s 36 county elections offices had their own voter registration list. However, the Help America Vote Act, which was passed by the United States Congress in 2002, required that all states develop “a single, uniform, official, centralized, interactive computerized statewide voter registration list defined, maintained, and administered at the State level that contains the name and registration information of every legally registered voter in the State.” In 2006 our elections division did just that, putting together the Oregon Central Voter Registration (OCVR) database; and the system has born tremendous fruit. Where counties previously had problems with tasks like tracking down duplicate registrations, they can now access voter registration information across county lines through the OCVR database instantaneously in order to perform a variety of cross checking tasks.

In August of 2008 the State of Oregon and State of Washington undertook a pilot project, which sought to build on the success of OCVR implementation by comparing voter registration databases across state lines to check for potential duplicates. A fantastic overview of this Oregon-Washington pilot project written by the National Academies of Science can be found here.

On September 4th of this year, both Oregon and Washington sent out a letter (pictured below) informing voters that they may be registered to vote in both states. Attached to the letter is a short form that allows voters to indicate whether they were indeed registered in a second state and to cancel that invalid registration.

Dual Reg (OR)

Dual Reg Letters (WA)

So far, about 7,000 letters – 4,500 in Washington and 2,500 in Oregon – have been sent to the matches who came up during the check, but if you have just registered in Oregon after being registered in Washington, or vice-versa, you may want to print a copy of the letter, fill it out and send it in to your respective elections division for them to insure you aren’t registered to vote in both states on accident.

This project will help us perform a key function; tightening up our voter rolls to make sure that they are as accurate as possible. It is just another way that Oregon elections is staying ahead of the curve nationally with innovative projects.