I'm, this is the calling order, the October meeting of the Monroe County Election Board. I will start
with approval of the September minutes. I will make a motion to approve the September minutes as originally
prepared. I will second that. Can't hear. Can you hear me? Okay. I will make a motion to approve the
minutes that were prepared by my office. I'll second that motion.
Ms. Ashley, would you call the roll? Nicole Brown? Yes. Danny Shields? Yes. Motion carries. I'm going
to make a small adjustment so we can get some CFA questions, comments dealt with. So go ahead.
My name is Liz Fiddle. I appreciate you working me into this agenda at this point. I received a letter
most recently on September 15th, excuse me, saying that this was the notice of my first offense for
what I thought was taken care of when I filled out a form, the CFA-1 form on September 8th, after I
had received a letter on August 25th.
which is election board findings. So I'm just here to hopefully get the approval that the form I filled
out on the CFA form, CFA-1 form I filled on September 8th meets the, and will mitigate the notice of
first offense that I received the letter about. So that's really why I'm here.
Okay, so on that the first letter that she received was the notice of findings and that was that the
filing was not yet turned in by the July 11th deadline. We had sent out the second letter after we had
received it stating that we have received the letter and that it was the first late filing and then
that would just go on the record. It was approved at the last election board meeting to send out those letters.
So I guess my question is, what do I need to do now to remedy this situation, right? So now we just
make a note in our office that it was the first late filing that await in the future. We have a record,
and then it would then be just kept on file in our office. I'm sorry, there would be no more succeeding
letters of infractions or whatever at this point now? No. OK, great.
Does that meet with your approval? As long as I don't have to do anything else and I'm not supposed
to do anything else, I'm good. I am happy to make a motion that because this is the first offense that
we just keep the record on file, initiate that record on file with Election Central. I have a hand up.
Ms. Givens has joined us. Go ahead, ma'am.
Your sound is not up. Hold still, your sound is, we're getting up. We've got to cross through
your microphone. Sound, can we fix that? Is it okay now? There it is, go ahead. Okay, it was very difficult
to join the meeting today for something. I'm sorry. It was difficult. Go ahead.
We're good. Thank you. OK. So I made a motion. So far, we have approved the minutes, and we've let Ms.
Seidel deal with her CFA one. And I think we're finished with that part. Am I correct? Yeah, we just
need to make a motion that it's going to be kept in file in our office. I will make the motion that
we keep that on file. Then I will second that motion.
Ms. Ashley? Nicole Brown? Yes. Danny Shields? Yes. Penny Gibbons? Yes. So thank you, ma'am. I think
we've got that fixed. I think we're done for now, right? I think we've got that fixed. Thank you so
much. Has my camera been enabled because you have to be able to see me and hear me for me to vote? Yes,
ma'am. We can see you. Yes, we can see you. OK. Because at my end, it says my camera has been disabled.
We're looking right at you on the screen in front of us. We're good. We're good. Thank you. We are flowing.
Clerk's update is next, ma'am. Very quickly, as I mentioned last month, my office hosted a roundtable
on citizenship and elections. It was a very productive discussion with several panelists, bipartisan
members of the panel group and the feedback that I have received is that it went well. I did not receive
any negative feedback regarding the discussion and where I had intended to have questions be anonymous
and just allow panelists to respond, it was a very open and honest discussion where
people raised their hands in the round table and just spoke very freely. So I appreciate my staff, especially
Kylie and Sarah and Jessica, Angie and Kelsey for setting everything up. I thought it went very, very
well and I appreciate your hard work on that. Thank you, Ms. Brown. I will add that I had some individuals
after the round table come up to me and say that they were very thankful for the
opportunity to come in and just get a better understanding of the new legislation and that they hope
to be able to see this in the future as well with more just to continue to keep it transparent. And
that's one of the main goals of our office is just to make sure everything is as transparent as possible.
Thank you. Okay. I believe that Ms. Giddens, I don't want to put words in your mouth, but I believe
you were in favor of having public comment after each thing rather than have a general am I
Did I read you correctly on that? If I did? I thought we were supposed to have a resolution today about
how we would continue. Yeah, but that doesn't mean we can't go ahead right now and have public comment
as we go by anything. So we have a resolution on that, I think, later. But I'll go ahead right now.
And is there any public comment about the roundtable?
I see none, so we will move on to Ms. Ferris's election central update. Hey, guys. I'm just going to
go ahead and start with the citizen update, and then I'm going to go into the voter list maintenance
update as well. So for citizenship, since July 1st, we have sent out a total of 41 requests of citizenship
letters. And that is as of today, October 2nd.
Six letters have returned to us, USPS, as undeliverable. And one has returned as not a US citizen and
was registered through the BMV by error. And then an additional three have provided their proof
of citizenship to make sure that their records stay active. And then voter list maintenance, since July
1st, we have processed 7,558 voting records.
Through the voting list maintenance hoppers in SVRS, 6,523 of those voters have been made inactive,
814 have stayed active, 189 have been canceled, and 32 have been rejected.
And then I'm going to just bring up some concerns that we're having with the 2026 early voting location
right now. We were informed that our look at date for moving in will be February, and we're just starting
to get to that point of we're trying to prepare things for next year and make sure that we're gonna
have enough time to get everything turned around, set up, and be organized enough to
I'm not sure that we can push through with that, but we're also wondering if there is going to be a
discussion among us, the election board and election office staff, if there should be an additional
place as a backup in case if construction is not completed in time. I also think that it would be a
great idea if we could probably get Richard Kreider in on some of these conversations so that we can
get a better understanding of where we're at in general
And with apologies, Ms. Kiley, I was preparing to go out of town at the time we were having this discussion,
but I feel as though we were given, well, first for clarification, we are talking about moving Election
Central from where it is now at the old Johnson Hardware to the north end of the showers in the space
on the first floor that had been taken up by Parks and Rec and some other offices, that whole hallway
set of offices but he's the mr. Crider's correspondence said the correspondence is that we're looking
at a potential move-in date being in February they believe the construction will be completed in January
when we first started the conversation of the construction it was suggested by our office and clerk
Brown that
Hopefully the construction would be completed and be ready to be moved in in January since filing begins
in January. And then filing will close in February. What is the date of that filing begins? Is that
like first day or? I want roughly January 6. OK, I believe. And then closing is February 3rd, I believe.
So currently you would we would start
candidate filing in one location and then finish candidate filing in another location. Right now, it's
being relayed that it's only going to be the early voting location that's going to be moving at this
time. But the way that it's looking is that you would file for the primary in one location and file
for the general in another location.
That doesn't sound awesome, but I think it sounds like it could be accomplished. Yes. Oh, excuse me.
I just would be uncomfortable if candidate A went to file and it was at one location and candidate B
running against candidate A found that it was somewhere else. Correct. Gee, what could go wrong? Mm-hmm.
Okay. Just to circle back to what Kylie first suggested, because
moving dates change, construction deadlines change, and so if it were not to be ready by that February
date, we're talking about needing a backup location so that we can oversee early voting in Monroe County.
Sorry, I don't know what happened. It's not an option to use the old Napa building anymore if anybody's
driven by there in the recent past. But what we've had, and this is my suggestion, I'm just throwing
it out right now, you may have had other thoughts, because today is the first time we're seeing each
other in a couple of weeks, that the convention center rooms that we have used for poll worker training
Um, but I feel like I kind of threw that out there. Um, I had agreed with the convention center as a
location. Um, but there was some question with the budget for next year because our budget currently
where the polling location money was for if we needed to rent a space that, um, money's not there anymore.
So we're trying to find something that'll be within the county that we won't have to
rent that we'll be able to use for the duration of the 28 days of early voting that will be able to
be locked up and the equipment will not be disturbed in that time frame. So could we invite Mr. Kreider
to next month's meeting? Yeah. Certainly let's reach out to him early.
Yeah, I wanted to kind of get a conversation starting between us that a way we can get some ideas written
down and then be able to have him here and be prepared. Hey, then. Hey, everything has just worked out.
I understand that. And then one last thing underneath the election central update.
We have a list that I created last year after the presidential election completed that is of all of
the elected officials who represent Monroe County. And I am wanting to look at getting this posted to
the website for the election board and the voter registration website that a way that it's available
to the public. I've had some individuals come into the office and really enjoy being able to see that
document and had
if it could be posted on the website. But I wanted to bring it to the election board first for approval
to get that posted on the election board page. And having just returned from the annual conference for
the Association of Indiana Counties, the Indiana Election Division was there. They came to the clerk's
breakout session. And specifically, one of the co-directors requested that we send them the offices
that are up for 2026. And so I'm happy to make a motion to approve that. And then with the first order
of business, if we should get that approval today, that you send that information to that co-director,
or both co-directors, at your earliest opportunity. Yeah, I can do that. So that was a motion to put
up? Well, unless there's some further discussion.
I'm shocked that it's not already online somewhere, to be honest with you.
So when I was working with another county on some information in SVRS, they stated to me that they thought
we should have a list of all the elected officials. And so I created one earlier this year. I want to
say it was about January, February is when I very first started working on it. And then we got busy
with voter list maintenance. So it kind of got pushed back a little bit more. But now we're getting
to that point of where individuals are coming in wanting to know who's going to be up and what offices
will be opening up next year.
I think this will be a great addition to the website. So individuals have that access directly on the
website. When you put that out, I mean, as I look through, you can tell it's not hard to read next election
year 2026. That's not hard to read. But it would be kind of nice if we had a list of these offices are
up this year, possibly in a, I hate to say an addendum, but here are the offices, here are the ones
up this year, because that would be easier for the general public rather than go, oh, wait a minute,
back and forth.
Yeah, it's because it doesn't add that much. And I can do that. I can have this one uploaded if it's
approved today and then I can also create one that's just the 2026 elected officials and take that data
straight out of there and have that is uploaded as well. Might I also suggest and I'm happy to discuss
that we take the names off of the people who are currently in in the office because I could see someone
feeling like that's electioneering ahead of
the ones that are coming up in 2026, if there's a name already on there, does that make, did I make
sense? Okay, so I think if I hear you correctly, we're going to have a list of all the elected officials.
And then we're going to have a second list that doesn't have names, but just the offices. Super Spencer
precinct board number one is up for election just to throw something out. Is that correct? Yeah, and
I would just title it as like 2026 open offices or offices to be elected. Because it should be hard
to go from the list these are up for election this year to go back a couple little bit to see who that
person is if you want to know that. That would be correct. We could do it year to year. Yeah, of course.
Yeah. You know, certainly you want to know who the judges are.
And then we might also consider the fact that the courts have a website, right, with judges and court
staff. Yeah. OK. That's all I have for that part of the discussion. So we need a motion to have her
do that. I think so. Oh, I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I didn't see your hand up. Yeah. OK. Thank you. Do you
already have all the district maps showing at the election website?
because if not, I would like to see that also for people. The map is on the website currently is just
a. It has all the districts on it as well as all the precincts, but it's also used for finding where
your polling location is going to be for Election Day, and it's all combined into one by the GIS Department.
So I mean,
If someone wanted to run for county council, could they quickly look at where those divisions are or
do they have to dig through multiple layers to get to that? Is what I'm asking a sort of thing to make
it easier for the general public to find things.
I'm sorry, John has it set up where on the side there is just like a bar that has County Council, County
Commissioners, Senate, and a couple other districts on there as well. And it's just a simple click to
show each of those district lines. Ms. Givens, if I'm misquoting you, correct me. I think what she's
saying, and I agree with this fully, that if I decide I want to run for
Pick an office. It's very simple for me on that website to say, here's my address. I want to run for
whatever. Dog catcher. Yeah, dog catcher. Yeah. Which district am I running? Would I run in? Is that
what you were saying? Well, I mean, if that fits, I just wanted to make sure that it's easy for people.
Because occasionally, sometimes the GIS
is a little dense, even though John does a fabulous job with it. He's an award winner with it. Just
if people want to go to the election, that shows the different precincts. So I have pulled up the map
on the teams for you guys. And it's a simple, there's a task bar up here that's a search bar. If you
type in your address, so I'm going to use the,
current voter registration office as an example. I understand what you're saying. And then over here,
you can just put which you're looking at. So for instance, county commissioner, then it will pull up
and show you which district that is in as well. That's what I wanted to make sure we could do. Because
as I look even at my precinct,
as a committee person where, you know, it's kind of difficult to figure exactly where it is,
looking at maps. Yes. You know, so I'm totally with her on making this as easy for people to figure
out as possible. And I join you in wanting to make it as easy as possible for prospective candidates,
but I would also be remiss if I did not let you know that
clerks have been made aware that the governor is calling for redistricting ahead of 2026. I don't know
what that picture looks like. In fact, none of the clerks know what that picture looks like at this
time. We have expressed concern that if that redistricting occurs right up to, you know, butting up to
the first day of candidate filing that that is going to cause a significant amount of confusion. We
believe our lobbyist for the clerks association is articulating that to the people who have the most
contact with the governor. But we are awaiting that and so it does not make sense to me to put that
map up when it could change depending upon the governor's
decision, and we are still waiting. I have no further information on that. I will also note on that.
It's not only just the confusion it can cause, but also the amount of work that it's going to be to
get that redistricting done in time in SVRS to ensure that each individual is in the correct district
that they're running for. And the clerks break out at that session, we talked about
I don't know him personally, but my understanding is the governor's willing to consider moving the first
day of candidate filing back. I don't know. There is a lot in discussion because we've not received
definitive answers from the state, so this is just a preview. Stay tuned. Nobody's talking, obviously,
but they're all talking.
My understanding is what they're talking about is congressional districts, but I guess if they have
a special session, they could do other things as well if they chose to do so. Yeah, so, okay. Special
sessions can, yeah, okay. All right. Anything else from members here? Anything from the general public,
public comment on this?
I see none, so let's move on to old business. Clerk Brown has the accessible polling presentation discussion
from our last meeting. Just really quickly, I don't know that we had a full-on discussion about it last
month, but I, of course, was very impressed with
Michael Sherman's presentation. And as I look out into the audience, he generously came here in person
because I know he's very busy. And so I'm going to presume you're here for any questions that the board
might have as far as clarification. And so did you want to come up to the podium in case there's questions?
Okay. Otherwise, you know, my,
I've had an opportunity to see a demo on more than one occasion. It is phenomenal. I think it keeps
us out of litigation if we know what the issues are and do our very best to mitigate them. We can't
necessarily fix everything, but if we can make it mitigating
to make it more accessible. I've told Mr. Shermans I would love to have something where Monroe County
is in partnership with the city so that if you go to a polling site, and I saw this at the library so
this is not my original idea, that there's this emblem where they're kind of shaking hands and it is
a accessible site at the Monroe County Library because the city has worked with ADA to get that
the library in compliance. And I'd love to see that at our polling sites, even if it's only temporary,
a sign up that kind of says. Actually, in your guys's packet, there's already one drafted up for you
guys. Look at you. Look at you. And me and Sharmas have already had a little bit of a discussion about
an edit on that. So I think me and him will continue to work on that and make some edits.
you give me an idea where it's the last page of the packet for the ADA that is what I am talking about.
Did I receive that packet? Penny, I believe so. I should be able to also pull it up for you as well.
OK, I don't recall seeing it and I thought I was current on all the emails, but I missed it.
I love this. It's credit.
where credit is due with respect to ADA, Blue Dag, who is being very generous to us in terms of making
a deal. Certainly we would not even know about this were it not for the city of Bloomington and Mr.
Shermas and I think any amazing opportunity for the city and county to partner that I don't see how
we could turn it down. That's my two cents.
I'm not sure this actually came in our packet yesterday, did it? I don't believe it was in the packet
from yesterday. Yeah, I've seen that. Okay. Can you email the packet to the board? Yeah, of course.
Okay. Yeah, I'll make a copy of the
information that you guys had today, and most of it was in that that was sent yesterday. The only thing
that was added was this information, which the information that was added was what you received at the
last election board meeting and then this additional piece of paper. So then is it fair just to take
advantage of the opportunity that Mr. Shermans is here to answer any questions and then revisit it?
It's fine with me.
The only question I have is, who pays for this? We do. Out of the election budget that we just had cut,
not officially cut, but cut, we have to pay for all these. Right. We would have to pay. The city's part
in it would be helping us with the inspection of polling sites, which is what they've done for us in
the past. But as far as the opportunity to use this software, that would be on
on the county, Mr. Shermas negotiated as low a deal as he could on our behalf as far as expressing our
interest and I believe got the company to agree to one year at a time where they normally might do multiple
years and then we would not be beholden in a year that we were not holding elections. Is that correct,
Mr. Shermas? He is nodding his head. I'm not sure we're totally following each other.
comment was, who pays to fix the building? The things that you've shown us that are not appropriate.
Yeah, we have a contract with them for doing this. Not yet. The mitigation would be done by the police.
I assume it would be done by the? And or Bob. He has helped us before. So if a ramp was too steep, we
might have the extended, I don't know what to call it,
We have ramps that we have a couple of locations that we already set them up at those locations, but
then we have additional ramps as well in case if we need them anywhere. But they're already purchased
and they're already in our storage. But most of the situations are if the bathroom is not handicap
accessible, then we
provide a sign for the locations that that is the case and allow individuals who need a handicap restroom
to go ahead and vote that a way they can get to a location that does have a bathroom for them. So the
city slash county is not required by law to have these places accessible. And that's with a question
mark and raised eyebrows.
If that has to be done, why is the county, and I'm going to say maintenance for lack of a better term
here, not taking care of fixing that? Is that outrageous to think that it's their stuff? I don't expect
my neighbor to come fix the crack in my sidewalk. But a lot of these polling places are not owned by
the county. They're at a church or they're at schools. And I understand that.
I understand about what I'm talking about early voting in the showers building is where is where I'm
talking about. And the mitigation efforts that you found that you presented to us. Yeah. Michael from
the City of Bloomington Council for Community Accessibility just to identify and.
I would say that when we do surveys, we identify all of the barriers, and then we suggest the software
will suggest mitigations. Many of these mitigations potentially won't cost anything. They just require
different signage or placing a stack of paper towels that are reachable or a soap squeeze. There's just
lots of different kind of mitigations that can take place that don't cost money. And for ones that do
cost money, sometimes they can be very low cost to whatever the facility that is doing it. So if it's
a church and they know, oh, this would make it more accessible by doing this, it doesn't cost much.
but we identify all barriers, and yes, some potentially could be more costly, then that's for you all
to determine with that facility what you want to do to address it. Again, we're there for consulting
in case it does, because sometimes we can say, well, you could do this instead of that kind of solution.
So it's somewhat dependent on what the survey finds for what barriers are there. I would expect the
church would want to fix something of that nature.
you know, whatever locations we use would want to fix that. But if it's government property, I just
don't want that to have to come out of the election budget. I want to make sure that doesn't come out
of the election budget. That's why I'm clarifying here. I misunderstood you. You want to say something,
then I'll tell you. I was going to say, for instance, we had a church not
in the 2023 election that was as a polling location, and it was stated that their paper tile dispenser
was too high. And so we had let them know that, hey, this is showing that it's an ADA violation, like
there could be an issue for anybody that's handicapped that's not able to reach it from a wheelchair.
And they went ahead and lowered it for us so that we didn't have to worry about it. So most of our locations
are very understanding, and we'll go ahead and make the changes on their own. And some of them we do
just have to find
and solutions to fix it for the day of. And I was just going to say, and like for example, if you're
speaking about election central, my assumption is that that's in the county budget to deal and fix with
and what's not you have to determine, but that wouldn't be anything for you guys to fix. I agree. The
way it was coming out, I want to make sure who was paying for that. That's fine. That's fine. And to
dovetail what Ms. Kiley said,
We, I don't think we're talking about the same church, but we also had a church near the Metalwood retirement
community where the slope was too steep for someone with mobility issues. And I remember this pastor
because he was just the loveliest man, new pastor, new to the area. The church did not have the money
to, they would have had to redo
whatever you do to concrete to make a ramp and they could not afford to do that. And then of course,
Bob was not able to help us mitigate that with a ramp or anything. So I believe what we ended up doing
that year was rerouting the people who would have voted at that church to the UU church.
And I'll just throw in a little side note. They consulted with us. We went up there. We looked at it.
We reviewed. We helped them determine a solution for their problem. And at last, I understand that they're
going to implement and redo all that. So just wanted to throw that in there. It made them actually say,
we need to be more accessible after they got that survey. It would just shock me that they wouldn't
want to do that. They did want to do it. They didn't have the funds. And I don't know.
how you get church building funds, he genuinely wanted to do. They genuinely wanted to serve as a polling
site for us, just the loveliest people. But they just did not have in their building fund to do so.
So we had to make different arrangements. Yeah, so some barriers sometimes are
really challenging and that was one that was like there's not much way to get around this and that was
a way to do it. But most of the places you can address them and certainly as Kylie said on the day of
that they can be addressed because they can make temporary arrangements. So that's what this helps figure
out for everybody. All right. Thank you sir. Any other any other public comment. I will say one of the large
things that we see is handicapped parking. And so we have signage that we have for handicapped parking
to make additional spaces at the locations on Election Day. All right. Thank you, sir. I'm going to
interject here. We have a county attorney here who may want to talk about our lawsuit. Or is that why
you're visiting us? Please feel free.
We have received some discovery requests in the federal lawsuit that we need to respond to shortly.
I'm just wanting to know if I can get together and talk with you about some of these items. I'm not
sure whether these are records that are readily available in your office or that will require
someone from the voting machine company to... So prior to leaving town, I printed off what I had from
your correspondence requesting, and I thought I had sent someone from my office to deliver those to
you in an envelope, but I remember you and I were trying to connect and you were in talks. Yes.
This is a different request. This is a different request. OK, then I'm not aware of the different request.
Yeah, it's a little bit more extensive and may involve some technical programming to get information
out if that can be done. So I think we probably have to respond by the middle of this month or seek
an extension, which we can easily do.
provide the information they requested, but six requests for production of documents, one interrogatory,
but they are pretty comprehensive, so it may take some time. So I just wanted to put that on your radar,
and I'll probably be calling you, Clerk Brown, in the near future to set up a meeting, if that's possible.
Absolutely. Have you already sent the discovery paperwork to me?
I think I did. Okay. So I've been out for nearly two weeks. Yeah. Literally came from the AIC conference
into the office and then here. So, um, if, um, Ms. Kylie, if we can look at his correspondence, like
early next week and see who, you know, what stakeholders we need to help us with this. We, I believe
we could probably meet your mid month deadline.
I have printed out copies of this. Should I give those to Kylie? That would be great. Depending on those
records, we might be able to extract them ourselves, depending on which department and what equipment
it's going to be from. That's what I'm hopeful for, so that we can get them to you quickly. Thank you
very much. Thank you. Thank you. I did reach out to Molly Turner King.
She does not have the resolution that was on the agenda for today. So we will have to postpone that
for the next election board meeting. All right. Then do we have any, we have new business. Ms. Givens,
you're listed here on 2024 provisional discussion. Yes. There are several issues I want to raise. And
then following that, I have five motions I want to make.
that follow up on on those different items. One of the things I learned. Sorry, the echo is terrible.
One of the things I learned when at the recent roundtable discussion that the clerk held was that there
were almost 400 provisional ballots cast in the November 2024 election general election. I'm concerned
about those, so I reached out to Kylie and obtained a list of the reasons that
these ballots were declared provisional. So I wanna like to ask questions about some of the categories
and begin a discussion about what we could do better in 2026. I say this because almost 85% of those
ballots were rejected. These are people, over 300 of them who made an effort to vote. And I think it's
unfortunate that their votes didn't count. And I'm not pointing a finger at anyone here. I wanna make
that very, very clear.
I just would like for us to develop ways to better educate the voters on how to register, how to change
their registration if they need to, how to file for a mail-in ballot if that's what is best, or where
to vote in person. I'd like to start that. First, there were seven voters whose provisional ballots
were approved because their registration was incorrectly canceled. Kyle talked about canceling.
registrations earlier in the meeting. So who incorrectly canceled those ballots and how might we avoid
this going forward? I know that people can check their voter registration online at indiana.in.gov,
but people like my 96 year old mother have neither the skills nor the equipment to check. Second, there
were nine voters who were incorrectly given a provisional ballot.
That seemed something easy to correct going forward with training, and six of those nine occurred at
one location, which was at the Indiana Memorial Union. Um, third 210 of the provisional ballots were
cast at a single location, the Indiana Memorial Union. While eight of these ballots were accepted, most,
meaning almost 200, were rejected because the voter was not registered in Monroe County.
This is where I think voter education would make a very, very big difference. 23 of the people or 5.9%
of the people who cast a ballot in Monroe County in November 2024 had their ballots rejected because
they voted at the wrong polling location. 13 of these individuals voted at the wrong location. And as
I'm sure anybody could guess, it was at the Indiana Memorial Union again.
So I hope that we can devise programs for outreach to reduce this number or even bring it down to zero.
And at this point, too, we don't know how many additional voters were turned away from the first polling
place they attempted to go to and then didn't try to go onto their own polling place. I've worked as
a clerk on at least five different occasions. And I know I personally had to help people.
They weren't eligible to vote at that location. So then there was another issue that isn't part of what
I heard from Nicole, but plays into the 2026 election. Neither the two ballot scanners that were at
the Sherwood Oaks polling location functioned properly in 2024.
So apparently state code only calls for a very limited number of machines to be tested prior to an election.
And I hope we can go beyond the state minimum next year. There was an additional problem when I voted
at that location, because I personally saw this, only one person was staffing the box where completed
ballots were deposited. Given the normal checks and balances we have in our system, I felt that there
should be someone from
each political party to oversee that box. They should have been clearly identified. I think this is
another instance where additional education and additional efforts might make a difference to what happens
in 2026. Like I said, I have five items I'd like for us to consider today and put in
to motions. And when before I begin that too, when I talk about public comment, generally there would
be public comment for items that are not on the agenda and public items or public comment on things
where there are motions. Generally, there wouldn't be a comment period, for example, on the citizenship
update that Ms. Ferris gave us earlier and those kinds of things. But that's why I was hoping that we
would have that resolution today.
So the first item that I have for motion relates to voter outreach. So I want to say with so many people
accessing television through streaming services and more competition locally for internet providers,
I feel that advertising on Comcast is no longer effective in reaching voters, especially new voters.
So I would like to ask about this.
don't exactly know who it should be, who it should fall to, but I would like to ask Clerk Brown and
the election staff to begin to explore other avenues advertising and to bring a report to the election
board at our December 20, 25th meeting. This timeline would give the clerk and her staff time to develop
new material and to get any necessary contracts signed before early voting begins in 2026.
So with that, I move that Clerk Brown and her election staff explore other avenues for advertising and
bring it to the board at our December 25 meeting. Are we making motions with no discussion among the
board? No, usually you have discussion after a motion is made. So I'm making a motion and then
If there's a second, then we would have discussion about it. So what I'm hearing is that she's making,
again, you've got a problem with the speaker. Actually, so do we. I'm just reading the bottom of the
screen to see what you're saying. And I'm hoping they're getting it's coming through correctly. The
motion is that we ask the clerk and the election
office to look for other ways to advertise rather than the Comcast method that is currently being used.
Is that what I'm hearing? Correct. And to bring it back to the board at our December meeting or by our
December meeting. If they can do it earlier, that would be excellent, but I don't want to put that pressure
on them. What do we need? Do we need a motion or can we just say
highly with your office, please look for other methods that we can get information out, as opposed to
paying, particularly if we're paying Comcast for this, and I'm sure we are, is it easier just to, I'm
not sure what a resolution, I'm not knocking, please don't misunderstand me, I'm not sure a resolution
is really necessary when we can just say, hey, we don't think we're getting a good return on our investment
with Comcast, can you look for other methods?
Does that does that make sense? Yeah, Clark Brown. Can you clarify when we took the contract to the
commissioners last year for Comcast? I believe there was questions about the streaming at that time
as well, and you had contacted your connection with them and they had stated that.
With us going through them, they were also getting it onto the streaming services as well by the same
channels that are through Comcast. If those are also aired on a streaming service, they're also being
aired on that streaming service. Only if they have Comcast for their internet provider.
I'll say I don't have Comcast for my internet provider and I have my streaming set up for Bloomington,
Indiana instead of Greene County, Indiana. And I was seeing the same advertisements on YouTube TV as
individuals who do have Comcast were seeing. And so, yes, Ms. Kiley, you're correct. Our vendor at the time
And I mean, obviously we didn't have to reach out to her this year with no elections. More than 55%
of all Monroe County households have something connected to Comcast, either the streaming or the cable
or the internet. And so all of those ways, as you said, they have access to, so that's more than half
of all Monroe County households. But,
we do use more than one method. We also had a radio commercial. Um, we also worked with candidates,
legal women, voters, um, college and Republicans and Democrats. Um, so we do use more than one method.
Um, I wanna, I wanna circle back to the presumption that
It comes back to us, all of the provisionals that were at the Indiana Memorial Union. And Ms. Kiley,
please help me where I leave off. At the beginning of every academic year, we do send someone, and in
this case, more than one person to the university in connection with PACE, in connection with college
gems and college Republicans to get the word out about
hey, you're here in Monroe County, we want to encourage you to vote where you sleep. And so we had,
on National Voter Registration Day, we actually went out to a building very near campus, and there were
several, if I remember correctly, several places on the campus.
Last year there was, I believe it was a total of 10 tables for the presidential year. Last year there
was one table. And actually, Ralph from the League of Women Voters, myself, Jessica, and Sarah from
the voter registration office were all there to help with education and getting students registered.
And if memory serves, you even arranged for free pizza for anybody who came to register. The problem
that I understood is that students
don't want to cancel their home registration. Those are the names that they're familiar with. Those
are the names that they want to vote for those people. And so it then becomes their responsibility to
request a ballot from their home community. We can't make them register here in Monroe County. The problem
that we had, and I believe it was twofold, was that then, of course, on election day,
They realized they had not requested an absentee ballot so that they could vote and then mail it back.
They also realized, you know, I had someone come in, I remember from St. Joseph County, they didn't
come in until noon. Well, by the time you would drive a minimum, and that's in good traffic, of four
hours to St. Joseph County, you may or may not
get to vote if that person had an opportunity to do that. I remember one young lady from Marion County,
another from Hamilton, and another from Vandenberg that I pretty much said, you better get in that car
and start heading there right now because here's where you vote and your polls close at this time, depending
on the time thing. Also, my recollection is that there was a group, nobody affiliated with us,
who was at the union giving out some poor information that was then attributed to Monroe County Election
Central. We did not give out misinformation. And so it is the case that we do not refuse voters. We
offer you a provisional ballot. We knew, you know, that if the records indicated that they were not
registered in Monroe County, despite having that huge
voter outreach effort that those would not be able to be considered by the Monroe County Election Board.
It just happens in a presidential year that there are way more provisionals issued than there would
be in a municipal or in an off presidential election. So this is not something where
I think Monroe County Election Board should be upbraided for not getting the word out. In fact, I think
that we did get the word out. It was heart wrenching when we saw people come in with their ballot that
they never mailed. And the reason that I recognize them is because they look nothing like what we had
sent out when we sent out mail ballots. And so, you know, what can I do with one that is for Allen County?
I can't process that and by election day, it is too late unless that person wants to get in the car
and drive up to Allen County. There was nothing that we could do with that. I'm hopeful that addressed
a couple of things that I saw as far as university students. Well, one of the, and this was another
motion I wanted to make was that,
I really feel like we should come up with additional ways, and I applaud what's been done in the past.
This isn't any, again, I'm not pointing a finger at anybody here, but I was recently talking with the
current president for the IU College Dems, who said that a lot of IU students don't watch traditional
television, and they're not listening to radio at all. They're on different kinds of streaming, even
for their music.
I don't know that we have currently an effective way to reach IU students. And especially we have an
indication that they want to vote with all the provisionals that were given is why I'm raising this.
And so again, and I'm glad that you brought in the IU political and civic engagement program, but I
would like for us to figure out new ways
to reach the IU College students specifically, but also other new potential voters. Kylie, is it correct
that they use social media? Yes. So early last year, I had brought up the conversation of wanting to get a
social media page for the voter registration office slash election central office and my original idea
was I wanted to start with Instagram and Facebook since they're connected you can post on Instagram
I'll automatically post to Facebook so it takes away some of the stress in my office of making sure
these postings are getting posted and that they're getting posted everywhere instead of just one place
and not the other. In addition to that I also want to say that at the last election board meeting I
mentioned a program that
I created while doing the SEATS program through Ball State University called the Civic Student Network.
I am still currently working with Ball State and a few individuals from VSTOP to finalize some information
in that. And I do plan on having that to the election board towards the end of December, hopefully for
the December election board meeting, if not the January meeting.
And that is going onto the campus directly and getting a day set up of just working with these students
and showing them how to register to vote, where to go to get all of their information about elections,
and hosting a mock election for the students so that they can physically see what it's like to fill
out a ballot for the first time and vote with the actual machines that they'll be voting with on election day.
I did this beginning last year at Bloomington High School North and it was a huge success. The students
absolutely enjoyed us being there, have already been asked to come back again next year for the seniors
there again and the hope is to get that spread across the whole county to get in communications with
MCCSC and get this countywide and then also reach out to Easton Green, not Easton Green, sorry, Edgewood
and get them involved in that
as well. And I am working with a few other individuals from other counties who are wanting to push it
in their counties as well. So that's one way that I'm really trying to push the involvement between
Monroe County Election Central and the student body on both IU's campus but also our hometown high schools.
Don't forget Seven Oaks and Lighthouse if you do that. They are on my list. And we had several of them
serve as poll workers. Yes.
We go to Seven Oaks, we go to Lighthouse Christian Academy, Bloomington North. We've not been able to
get into Bloomington South yet, but we've had multiple students who are part of the 4-H junior leaders
program who we have reached out to as well and gotten students signed up to work on election day so
that they get to see what it's like actually to serve as a poll worker. And the only other thing I'll
say is the traditional
I'll use traditional methods, are not the ones that we gear toward the IU students, the social media
and reaching out to college Dems and college Republicans. It's other households in Monroe County or
streamers or whatever, the people who listen to B97 on their way to work. So it's a wide net. I think
that there's some kind of,
there appears to be some kind of effort to say just shut all of that down when we're not, if IU students
were the only people we were talking about, I would agree that they probably don't get what they,
you know, their information from that. But I'm saying there are other places that do. And we've had
people wonder why they didn't see the commercial or hear the radio. So it is something that's taken hold in,
Monroe County. So I know you probably want to move on to other things, Mr. Chair. Well, I struggle to
feel sorry for people on campus who don't know it's an election year. I mean, you're that old and you're
in college. It's kind of hard to miss. And they carry around these little things in their pockets all
the time that would make it really easy to say, where do I vote?
and you put your address in and there it is. So I struggle to feel sorry for the ones that wait till
the last minute and don't get stuff done. And we did have people post on their own social media so that,
you know, and young people are friends with young people and please pass it on and things like that.
So we did, you know, I feel that, thank you, Kylie, we did an amazing job for outreach ahead of the 2020,
for presidential election. And we will continue to build on that. But our voters are not all IU students.
Thank you. Okay, so moving on. I also want to point out, well, I've got a couple more items too. I want
to point out that social media only works if you've got followers. And so just to say that we created
this, we have to figure out a way to expand who follows those things.
With that we are in constant communication with the Indiana University Pace, College Dems and College
Republicans and I've reached out to them and well they have their followers but I reach out to them
personally all the time and have them post on their social medias for our office because I also reached
out last year to the commissioners and had some items posted on their Facebook as well but it's just
you got to start somewhere.
you absolutely have to start somewhere and you have to have more than one tentacle. Is there a Democrat
version of Turning Point on campus? I'm not for sure. I would have to... If there is, those then I would
suggest you add the local Turning Point chapters. Yes. If you want younger people. Yep. You know,
now that... Good to do both. I have no problem with that. Now that IU is back in session, would you
be able to reach out to both
college chairs and invite them to our next meeting to enlist their assistance in, you know, what we
can do to have more tentacles on campus. I feel like you, again, I feel like you did an amazing job,
but certainly we're open to feedback. We appreciate the feedback we've received and we can reach out
to other clerks where they're university based.
and see what they do as far as, please excuse me, outreach. And you had other things, Ms. Giddens, you
had a couple other things you would add? Yeah. Yeah, and I do want to thank the board for listening
to me about these issues again. Last fall, I was watching some of the election board meetings, and I
know there was some confusion with providing the election board with a complete training packet in a
timely manner.
And I know that Ms. Ferris stepped into this role and has really taken it on full-fledged. But I also
know that Ms. Ferris keeps a really tight, concise calendar. And I'd like to propose that she bring
to the election board a training calendar so that we will be advised in advance when things are going
to be coming to us.
when we can expect to see things related to the training material.
So the training material was brought to the election board last year after it was brought to our attention
that it needed to be reviewed and approved by the election board beforehand, which had never been done
in the past. So we made sure that that happened last year, and the plan is to continue to do that. Actually,
Ashley and Jessica both are getting ready to begin working on updating that information once we get
some clarification on the legislation that's currently in the lawsuit. And once we're done,
with getting that clarified, then it will be to you guys as soon as possible. Thank you. So I want to
now talk about something that probably will be a bit contentious. But I think I heard at an earlier
election board meeting this year and even today that Mr. Shields indicated, and I'm paraphrasing here,
please, that he thinks people should have to put forth some effort to vote.
I feel like in 2024, we had hundreds of people who put forth that effort who actually tried to vote,
but their balance didn't count. And some of that again is because they weren't registered here in Monroe
County. But I hope that with expanded and redirected education, we can overcome some of those problems.
But I think one of the ways that we as a board can make a difference is to allow vote centers in Monroe County.
And even at last month's election board meeting, when vote centers were not on the agenda, we had two
residents speak out in favor of them. It's my understanding that now all of the counties surrounding
Monroe County, including Brown County now, all of them who have Republican majorities on their election
boards, they all have vote centers in place.
it. But there is eliminate turning away voters because they're at the wrong polling location or offering.
Eliminating or offering provisional ballots which are later rejected. When the board considered the
vote centers a few months ago, clerk Brian supported this effort and I would now like to move that. We.
that we reopen a discussion of vote centers and that we have two public meetings that are required before
a vote center for the election board can take a vote center. And I move that those two meetings be held
at least 28 days from now, but prior to November 14th, 2025, so that we can discuss this at the election
board's December 4th, 2024 meeting.
If I may, Mr. Chair, board member Githans, are you aware that the secretary of state is holding public
hearings throughout the state on this very topic? And so Kylie and I have both attended some of those
meetings. And in fact, this week I believe they were in Evansville. Correct. And then I think that they're
doing one in Lake County. And so they're going through, we have
I don't believe that information is due prior to Org Day at the State House. And so we won't know what
comes out of that. But he had, at the presentation that you and I went to together in Indianapolis,
V-Stop made a presentation. The Secretary of State's office made a presentation. There was public comment,
and everybody was given an opportunity. I don't think civics was there.
And so we are the clerks who are not yet vote center counties, and some have adopted vote center counties.
They've become vote center counties since we had our public hearing. I apologize. I got ahead of myself.
But we are waiting to hear back.
from the secretary of state as to whether or not he's going to mandate vote centers throughout the state.
And what I asked Kylie to ask in the meeting she attended in Delaware County was whether or not if the
secretary does mandate, if we can use the program, I'm sorry, the plan that the vote center committee
came up with so that we don't have to reinvent the wheel because we had an amazing plan. It just, you know,
It just didn't rise to the level of the unanimous vote that we currently need to have. Well, it's my
understanding, and please correct me if I'm wrong, that this has to go before the legislature in terms
of whether or not there are vote centers, which means that they would not be in place in 2026, at least
not for the primary. That I am not aware of, and I just saw the secretary
at the AIC conference that was not said by his office or his delegates. But that does not prevent us
from again holding public to public hearings. And I do have a motion on the floor to hold two public
hearings prior to November 14th, 2025 to reconsider having vote centers
in Monroe County in 2026. Ms. Githans, are you wanting to hold the two public hearings without a plan
or are you wanting to open up another vote center committee to create a plan to then propose to the
election board? I would like for us to use the existing plan because it was created earlier this year.
I don't feel that it's necessary.
But to create a new plan, I think it's completely valid. And like I said, since it was created this
year, there may be other members of the public who, after hearing that this was projected, who might
want to come and speak. It feels to me, in terms of the motion, that we should have a better understanding
of whether the secretary is going to
mandate vote centers. I'm happy to reach out to my contacts at the secretary's office to see when we
might get that information. If it's sooner rather than later, it seems like the motion would be moved
if it is later rather than sooner. We can have a motion, but I'll be quite honest, nothing that I have
heard would change my mind on vote centers.
So we can have a motion, you can have hearings, but nothing has happened that would change my vote.
If the Secretary of State and the legislature mandate vote centers, then we'll put a plan together if
it's mandated, unless somebody sues, just like we're under a lawsuit right now because of legislation.
If that happens, then we can talk about it. But at this point in time, nothing has happened that would
change my vote, so I see no reason to bring people in here.
So are you saying that there is nothing that anyone could say, no data that anyone could present to
you that would ever change your mind? I did not say that. I said there's nothing I've heard to this
moment that would change my vote. Well, then what I'm asking is for other people to come forward and
ask people to state their reasons for things. I'm asking for people to give you that chance to listen to them.
out to my contact at the Secretary of State's office just to see where we are. That would inform whether
I would... The Secretary of State is real easy to get a hold of. Yes, he is. And I can text him this
evening and say, I have a question for you, sir, and I'll get an answer. But at this point in time,
I think this is premature, depending upon what laws that may be changed and decisions that may be changed
by that Secretary of State's office.
If the purpose of this is to get people in here and try to intimidate me into changing votes, I've got
a life history of people have been mad at me about things, and I didn't change my mind. And at this
point in time, I don't see things that are changed my mind. And the more you push me, the less likely
you are to get the vote that you want. I was talking about persuasion. Mr. Chair, I kind of want to
meet in the middle here
in terms of the secretary himself has not announced. And so it does seem, and I have reached out, I'm
hoping I get a quick answer, but I don't know if I will while we have this meeting. If he is leaning
toward that and we can get that kind of indication, then there wouldn't be any point in a public hearing
because he's leaning toward that and could do that, and the only thing
I do agree with board member Githans that if he mandates it, I'd like to use the existing plan that
we have because the vote center committee worked for a year and a half on that plan. It was a solid
plan. And I think that that would take some of the sting out of all the work that would be required
to implement vote centers in Monroe County. If it is not, and
I'm sorry, I'm getting a response, but I can't read it yet. If it is not mandated, then it's local control
and you've made your perspective very clear. And so I would make a motion to table this motion until
we have a little bit more information. I would second that motion.
And then it sounds like you have connections, direct connections, as do I, but I'll let you as the chair.
I'll be happy to reach out. I'll let you as the chair reach out directly and report back. I will reach
out to his office and say, OK, where is this going? We've had, he and I have had slight conversations
about this already. And I'll reach out to him again and see what he says. And this is, for me,
this isn't something that would have to wait until the next meeting if we wanted to call a special meeting
as long as it is not the last week of October. I'm open to meeting again in the next couple weeks if
you could. I have to look at the calendar. I will not be here the first week of November. In fact, I have a
proxy already in place for that meeting. That's right. So the 9th, the 16th, or the 23rd, after you
talk to your... Are you talking about November? October. I'm talking about calling a special meeting
so that we don't have to go to the November meeting
I would suggest a special because generally the two hearings need to be spaced apart 30 days to allow
public comment from the first to the second. Okay. But I'm not talking about a special. I'm not talking
about a public hearing. I'm talking about saying a special meeting to motion until we have more information
from the secretary. And by that, by that time, I'm not sure when that Lake County public hearing was.
It's, it's gotta be soon. Or day is, or day is in November.
I don't remember exactly which day it is, but I will say that to have these public hearings and if there
was a chance of the vote centers being approved, there's not enough time now to get the equipment turned
around because it's a six to eight month production time to get the equipment to us. So. So we would
have to make decisions quickly. Yeah.
based on what the secretary reveals to the chair. Correct. I understand, too, that Clerk Brown and your
staff was able to get a HAVA grant last year through the state for, I think it was five additional printers.
Correct. Are those printers in Monroe County? And also, I know that you had the opportunity to apply
for an additional grant this year. Could you fill us in on the status of that?
Five predators are here in Monroe County, and that brings us up to a total of 12, I believe. To answer
the second question, first, we have not been made aware of additional grant opportunities through the
Secretary of State's office. Again, we just saw him on Tuesday.
And he did not mention addition. And that is something that he likes to deliver a check. So that is
something that he very much would do if there is an opportunity to apply for a grant at this time. And
he did not mention that. So the printers that we got, Kylie, I may mess it up. Help me. But the printers
that we got were the current model ahead of the upgrade. And what I understood from our vendor is that
They wanted us to have something because we got that grant money and we paid them, but they are getting
the certification for the newer models of the printers and it is their intention to swap the new printers
out for the ones that they sent us for the current model as soon as they get that certification from
VSTOP and the state. Yes, we have printers. Are they the ones that we'll likely use? Probably not.
of the certification efforts, but I've not been made aware of any updates on the recertification, I
keep saying recertification, certification efforts on the new model printers. So the new model will
be the 2.0, and that will transfer our printers from the Okee printers to Brothers, and we have been
informed that once that has been approved, they will send us five new printers, and then the five that
they sent us
in the event of if we had a special election we had them and we're able to use them then we'll send
those back once we receive the new ones. I would like to say in closing today too that I want the general
public to understand that I am not allowed to discuss these kinds of things behind closed doors with
either Mr. Shields or with Clerk Brown it would be a violation of the open door law so the things I
brought forth today
are things that they did not know I was going to be talking about except for having it on the agenda.
No issue with me. I just want the public to be clear on that as well. These are not things I was trying
to play gotcha or surprise people. We just have to follow the law in all situations. I'm not interested
in violating open door law. That's why I stayed away from the thing in Kylie's office a couple weeks ago.
All right, I'm going to move on to public comment on just general public comment. Anyone? Not on the
agenda. My name is Cheryl Langdon. Most people are familiar with me by now. Today I want to speak. Our
constitutional right of free speech is our most sacred right.
When non-agenda public comments were brought up last month, I think confusion occurred when there was
a last minute shift in the agenda's order of business. Thankfully, free speech will be upheld in this
forum. A very young, good man died using his right to free speech, which occurred a couple of weeks
after the subject of non-agenda comments in this very room. Unexpected shifts.
on the agenda caused the confusion, and I'm glad clarification was brought up. Charlie Kirk once said,
when people stop talking, really bad stuff starts. When marriages stop talking, divorce happens. When
civilizations stop talking, civil war ensues. When you stop having a human connection with someone you
disagree with, it becomes a lot easier to want to commit violence against that group. What we as a culture
have to get back to is being able to have reasonable disagreement where violence is not an option. These
words were the essence of Charlie Kirk. I feel humanity has lost the most amazing human being to ever
walk the earth in the 21st century. I'm not a conservative. I'm not religious. But I would have followed
Charlie Kirk to the ends of the earth if he would have asked me. Why? Because Charlie was courageous.
truthful, and willing to learn. He was humble, grateful, kind, and most of all, authentic. Anyone who
thinks otherwise are lost to themselves, the heavens, and civilization. I have always been activated
and energized long before knowing Charlie.
But with Charlie's assassination, I'm not only showing up for myself and my country, but I'm showing
up for the good of mankind and standing firm in my convictions against the evil. And evil is real. I
am ashamed that I have ever voted Democrat. Charlie was right. Our nation was created under a Christian
ideology. Our very Constitution's laws are based upon Christian principles. Again, I'm not a religious person.
But Charlie Kirk was absolutely correct about that fact. I am here to honor Charlie with something he
stood by. I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which
it stands, one nation, under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. Charlie Kirk was an
American son. Anyone who doesn't see that should reflect on their own loyalty to our sovereign nation.
We are Charlie Kirk. Thank you. And my flag that matches your shirt was delivered today in the mail.
It hasn't gone up yet because I had to come to the meeting. Anything else? Any other public comment?
Then I will entertain a motion to adjourn. So moved. Seconded. Would you call the roll, please? Second.
Nicole Brown? Yes. Danny Shields? Yes. Penny Givens?
Yes. Thank you. Our next meeting is in November. And I'm sorry I'm going to be in Fort Myers. I hope
you forgive me. I certainly forgive you. Unless is that unless we call a special meeting. If we have
a special meeting. Yeah. Now the 16th of of October is the Monroe County Lincoln Day dinner. So I'm
probably going to be at that if it's at night. If I want to stay married I'm going to be at that at night.
I will say generally the special meetings we try to hold at the same time as election board meeting,
so it'll be 130. So we're looking at either the 9th or the 23rd if we're going to hold a special meeting.
Thank you. All right, we are adjourned.