- We good? Yes. All right. And I will call the March 31st election board meeting to order. The first thing
- I will do is we have now are we doing all the minutes? We had something that said we were doing just
- the early ones because the second one hadn't been transcribed yet. Correct. So we are still finalizing
- the second set from March 20th and then we will approve those and the ones from today's meeting at the
- next meeting. Work for you guys. Yes, sir.
- So I will move that we approve the minutes for the first meeting of March. Second. Second. Any discussion?
- Those in favor, aye. Aye. Both same. All right. All right, Ms. Clerk, how about the lab test update?
- Mr. Chair, if I may read correspondence into the minutes. Sure, absolutely.
- On March 24th, Monroe County conducted a test of six scan devices and a high-speed scanner using a test
- deck of 3,988 ballots in preparation for the May 5th, 2026 primary election. Equipment used is from
- Highland Village Elementary, Soles Harbor Church, Fairview Elementary, Grandview Elementary, Emmanuel
- Baptist Church, and Eastview Church of the Nazarene, polling locations per state random
- selection method. All results were as expected from all scanners. Test results are certified, correct,
- and accurate, respectfully submitted. Robert A. White, who is the owner of BNL IT services. Both of
- you were present at the testing. I felt it was a good day and I want to thank, we had
- did I understand you to say, Kylie, we had more people show up than we ever have at the? Yeah, so from
- the 2024 test for the general election, we had a total of six people who attended that. And this year
- for the 2026 primary, we had 29 who checked in. And those people included representation from both parties,
- candidates, a gentleman who described himself as a data analyst, prospective
- And so I'm very grateful to him and his team. Everything was looking good at Election Central, and it's,
- you know, fingers crossed, going to get better with all of the renovations and updates and things like
- that. And so I'm very grateful to him and his team.
- Just thank you to everybody. We had a good day. Thank you. May I note for the record also that the League
- of Women Voters had a representation there and we've received a report from them on what was observed.
- So I wanna thank Ralph Shaw for that. Yes, thank you. The facility, I'm gonna jump ahead of you some.
- Your facility is just gonna be awesome to work in.
- That's just gonna be so much better than the outer parts building was, you know. Hey, election supervisor,
- I've made postcards and dates. So postcards first, we had our vendor come in who takes care of our election
- mail. They have set up and scheduled with us to have postcards going out and those will be going out.
- I believe at the end of this week, and they will start seeing people's mailboxes at the beginning of
- next week, which will be perfect timing since it has information about early voting, and that will give
- them the information for that, as well as having information about how to request an absentee ballot
- by mail and how to find their location for election day. It will have a QR code on there that takes
- them to the map that they can type in their address, and it will tell them which location they are to
- go to on election day.
- We also will have a second wave of postcards going out Those ones will be a bright yellow postcard and
- those will be sent to every registered voter in the county and it will tell them where their polling
- location is since we've had so many updates to the polling locations and with the new location of early
- voting and then for the
- important upcoming dates. The last day to register to vote is going to be April 6th. You have until 1259 p.m.
- to do that online. Come to our office to drop them off in person until 4 p.m. And then on April 7th,
- sorry, will be the first day of early voting. I think you said 1259. Did you mean 1159? 1259 p.m. That's
- 1259 p.m. is like 10 minutes ago.
- 1259 P, oh, sorry, A.M., yes, thank you. It's been a long day with training this morning. She's been
- rushed this morning. But I think it is 1159. So basically we're talking noon. It says 1259 in our books,
- 1259 A.M. Okay. But for- In your books, okay, but it would be- For online. For online. Okay, all right.
- And they have to have either Indiana driver's license or Indiana ID to apply online. Correct. They can't
- do it if they have, say,
- a passport that they're relying on or their last four digits of their social security. Correct. And
- for what it's worth, we're having again, as we do on our flight stuff, because of getting on an airplane,
- our guys have to have star IDs. And I'm pleased to say none of them are having any issues getting star
- IDs. We tell a guy on an interview, you need one. And a week later, he sends me a picture of it. Yeah.
- And that's another good
- point of information as well. If you are updating your ID and you are afraid that that paper ID isn't
- going to work at the polls, it will. As long as we have a barcode on there, it is counted as an ID.
- That way we can scan it in. And then also you can still use your passport or military ID to come to
- the polls to vote as well. All right. Mr. Kreider, we'll let you. Oh, I'm sorry. Go ahead. Yes, ma'am.
- I hope that you're already getting back some filled in ballots from people that you've sent the ballots
- out to. Are you going to pull those out of the batches of postcards that you're sending out? I mean,
- if they've already voted, do they need that information? So we're sending it as updated information
- due to us doing a lot of cleanup in 2025. We did a ton of cleanup in SVRS.
- Myself and Jessica have worked with GIS very close to make sure that all the address points are up to
- date and that everything is within the correct precincts. And so a lot of people have been updated and
- they might have thought that they were in one precinct and their precinct might have changed and they
- didn't notice that when they received their ballot. So we're still going to send out these
- voter acknowledgement cards so that they have an updated version of that. I'm sure there's some overlap
- time or just absolutely overlap time.
- Hopefully some of those ballots are coming back already. Yes, we started seeing some of them come back.
- I want to say that we maybe have 10 that have came back so far. And then yesterday was actually our
- largest day of sending out and we had 23 that went out. Thank you. Now, Mr. Crider. Good morning, Richard
- Crider, Monroe County Building and Fleet here to provide an update on the
- new space. Early voting area is operable. I'm pretty confident that if early voting started tomorrow,
- we'd be just fine. I have us down, I think it's five business days away. So that's coming up quick.
- We have a short punch list of items to complete that I think we're going to handle in house. So we are
- now kind of looking ahead and
- moving forward to moving staff down into the new space from Suite 203, and we're going to use Suite
- 203 for another training location. So that's what we're looking ahead to. Let's see. Yeah, that's where
- I'm at. Call Kylie about every day. What do we need to take care of today, tomorrow?
- So when do you guys move downstairs. So that's one thing that me and Richard are working on currently,
- we are going to use the space that's upstairs for election day training. So all of the training that
- will begin on April 13 will take place in that space.
- we need to be moved downstairs to that new space by the end of this week or very early next week in
- order to allow enough time for Bob White and his staffing to come in and get all of that equipment set
- up, have tables set up, get the iPads for the e-poll books programmed for training and to get a projector
- and screen in there for us to be able to do slideshows with them as well. Ms. Kylie,
- I know you and I have talked about the furniture. Are there any other outstanding? No, so right now
- we'll just use temporary furniture until the permanent furniture comes in. And I do believe early voting
- furniture will be arriving shortly, if I'm correct. Yeah, it's actually scheduled to arrive in Indianapolis
- on the 7th. So they're going to bring it down that week, set it up. So that's a plus.
- Go ahead. What's the status of repaving the parking lot? May 11th. And are we good on parking for early
- voting workers? I'm still working on that with the city. I was told that I would probably get a phone
- call back yesterday. I did not receive a phone call after this meeting. I have already set in my calendar
- to call them again to see if I can get an update.
- We have 83 parking passes that we have used in the past from the city, and I'm hopeful that we can at
- least get those activated for next week for our poll workers to be able to park in the parking garage
- that's directly behind showers. It's the trades district parking garage and I think that that would
- be a great location for that.
- We also are requesting parking on the street to be reserved as well And so then we've done that in the
- past for overflow of voter parking So that was one thing that we're looking at and then Richard Crider
- has already sent out an email about the parking lot so that County employees can move their vehicles
- from that lot and be used for election early voting parking only
- So just to clarify the parking garage, you're not talking about the one north of 11th Street, you're
- talking about one south back there. Yeah. So it's called the trades district parking garage. It honestly
- butts up to the showers building. So it'll be. I do want to clarify one thing. My email was that the lot
- is reserved for early voting, but I've also reserved a row for county fleet vehicles who have departments
- inside the showers building. I just wanted to add that in. Looks good to me. I mean, it just. All right,
- anything anything from the public on? Yep, the project update. We're good.
- Thank you, sir, very much. You're welcome. Go to a punch list item. Thank you, Richard. Thank you.
- All right. Now we need to approve the additional workers to seeming to be a bit of a challenge to get
- people. But we'll see here. So now correct me if I'm wrong, because some of this came quick. The resolution
- that we got from
- Molly is what we're voting on because we've already got the names, correct? Correct. And then Kylie
- provided me with the list of name, which I believe is also in the packet that was provided to you.
- So those, the two lists will be attached to the resolution as exhibits. Thank you.
- for this, I want to clarify so that it's also public that when we had a meeting last week on Tuesday
- before the test of the equipment, Democratic chair had if there was a way for her to add additional
- names to the list that did not make it to the first list. So we had discussed how we would do that and
- moving forward with that. And then the Republican Party also had asked to do the same. So that's why
- these are back for more approvals instead of it being
- the original lists that were approved last week. Molly, is there code that would preclude us if we got
- people that just for some reason didn't know and wanted to start working before it started that we could
- get them trained? Could we add people? I'm sorry, I hate to throw questions with that some lead, but
- I'm just as I look at this and I know that some of the issue we're running into with some with some people
- I'd rather say yes than, gee, too bad for you. Right. And so that's another thing for Election Day as
- well. In twenty twenty four, we were coming back almost weekly, updating the list of Election Day workers.
- And then on election morning we had updated the list again. And so the election board, I think it was
- about five or two in the morning, had approved a final list of Election Day workers.
- One of the reasons I bring that up is I'm meeting with someone this afternoon that says he has a group
- that would like to get involved with the elections in Monroe County. Well, if I can say to this person,
- hey, we need help still early voting in Election Day if we can still add them. I'm sure we could find
- a trainer. Hint, hint. Yes. OK. OK, I just I want to make sure that was that was OK before. Let me look
- at the statute. OK.
- We would probably have to meet again. Is that clear? My understanding of your question is can there
- be a blanket as long as we have it on the party letterhead that it's understood that we are comfortable
- with adding them to the list and I don't have an issue with that. If it's legal, I have no problem adding
- people from either party.
- You think to us we have trained. Because here to work this you know I'm good with that because the truth
- of the matter is is we we likely are going to have to come together again several times prior to the
- primary election day and we will have other more paramount issues to address at that time so. I'm happy
- to reach out to Matt coach of our or Valerie
- to see if we can do it that way as long as it is on party letterhead and let you know. Yeah, and I was
- going to also suggest during this meeting as well that we should probably go ahead and see about scheduling
- some meetings for the month of April, because as the list of Election Day workers come in, they will
- also have to be approved by the Election Board, so they be
- their work on Saturday the 28th and they're just now starting to get into really getting names and they'll
- start filling up the list here shortly and it's just we're gonna start having more things that need
- to be taken care of especially with those but then we also have some resolutions that do need to be
- approved prior to the primary and those are items that Molly has brought up which
- I have known a couple of them that we needed to take care of, but really knew that we needed to get
- this in here because we have training today, tomorrow, and Thursday. I'm happy to propose April 9th
- and April 23rd because we're having the meeting today that we would have had on this coming Thursday
- as long as the room, of course, is open for use.
- Are you proposing 130? Yes. I'm good with that. I do on the 9th, I have to get to Indianapolis by 430,
- but I would like to think we wouldn't be here late enough that I couldn't be in Indianapolis by 430.
- Is there a motion to add those dates? Yes, I am making a motion to add April 9th and April 23rd at 1.30 p.m.
- Are we allowed? Second. I'm sorry, thank you. I can ask a question, I guess. Are we allowed to hold
- meetings to a specific agenda and not have other things brought in from the public other than just comment
- on what we're doing? All I'm saying is,
- In the instance of time, are we allowed to say, this is the agenda, and at the end of the printed agenda,
- we're finished? I mean, you can adopt the agenda at the beginning of the meeting, and then that's the
- agenda for the meeting. OK. You guys follow where I'm going? I didn't. In the interest of time, you
- have to get to work. They have to get to work. OK. We'll deal with that when it comes time for that.
- How does that impact?
- worker training 130 on those two dates? I don't know yet. Me and Ashley are planning to set and finalize
- the schedule for Election Day training today and that way we can upload it to the spreadsheet for the
- recruiter so they can start filling in training dates. We'll make it work. Would an earlier morning
- meeting make what you need to do easier?
- not necessarily because our trainings could be any time of the day we have some that are after working
- hours some that are early in the morning it it's one of those where if ashley's not here it's fine um
- and i can probably bring jessica if we don't it would fit we'd have to fit for all of us but if maybe
- an earlier yeah yeah well here's here's the truth mr chair you know um there will be
- plenty of things to address if we are sticking to an agenda and we're meeting solely for the purpose
- of getting the agenda implemented you know if we're having four-hour meetings that's problematic the
- ninth won't be any issue because training will begin on the 13th so we're fine there yes ma'am and the
- room would not be available earlier in the day on a Thursday because the commissioners meetings that
- will go 130
- So then the motion and a second is to have meetings on 4-9 and 4-23 at 1-30. Am I correct with that?
- Correct. I have a motion and a second. Any discussion? No. Those in favour, aye. Aye. Opposed? Okay,
- so we have now set meetings on 4-9 and 4-23 at 1-30. I used to say write those in your calendar, but
- now everybody types those into their calendar, so.
- I don't think you voted on the resolution for appointment. No, we're setting an appointment. We're setting
- meeting first. Now I would entertain a motion to adopt the resolution that we were given about adding
- the additional board members. So moved. Second. Any discussion? Does this include accepting additional
- people if it's on the letterhead?
- I would have to check the statute. There's nothing in the statute about allowing that, so I can look
- at it and get you an email before the 9th. OK. And why don't you reach out to the state board and get
- their opinion as well. I will. And then we'll see where we are. I just, if people want to work, I hate
- to say no. You're absolutely right. End of story.
- And having those backups are very crucial just because if somebody calls in the morning of or if they're
- there and they have to leave due to an emergency, being able to have a list to go off of and say, hey,
- you said you're available this day. Can you please come in? Those are things that we run into all the
- time. And there's times that staff members from my office are covering those spots until somebody else
- can come in. And right now, with the shortage rate, it's going to be very hard to do those.
- All right. Did we vote on this yet? I'm sorry. We did not, did we? Okay, those in favor of adopting
- the resolution, aye. Aye. Opposed? Motion carries. All right. Any questions? Absolutely. On our agenda,
- it actually lists proposed meetings on Monday, May the 4th, May the 5th, and May the 7th. Do we need
- to vote on
- Those meetings are having it on the agenda is sufficient. Those meetings are already publicly noticed.
- They are included in the annual notice earlier this year. Thank you. And those meetings just
- for clarification are going to be at election central. Yes.
- And so I can clarify on those the May 4th is the election day set up all of the election board comes
- in and helps with calling the inspectors at those locations to ensure that they are set up and good
- to go. If they need something we make a list of items that need to go out first thing.
- Tuesday morning so that they're out to the polls before the polls open. Generally, we don't have very
- much. There might be one location that says, hey, we already used up the tape that we had. Can you please
- bring out extra tape? Or we had one that said, hey, my roll of stickers is a little bit smaller than
- what I think I'm going to need. Can you just go ahead and bring them out so we have them? And those
- are all things that we just go ahead and take care of Monday night. That way, Tuesday morning, as soon
- as our couriers get in, they can get out to those polls, get them the materials that they wanted.
- And then the fifth is election day and then the 15th is the provisional ballot hearing. That's 10 days
- after the election. That allows anybody who had a provisional ballot 10 days to cure their ballot before
- that. We do that one at 1201 because the deadline to turn in their information is at noon. Okay, I do
- like the time of the May 4th meeting much better than the time of the May 5th meeting. Yes, 430 p.m.
- and then 5 a.m. Much better.
- Welcome to my world. My dog's not even gonna be happy at 5 a.m. Yeah. All right, so we dealt with that.
- I think we're down to any public comment. Is that normal for us? We'll take it. Seeing none, I will
- entertain a motion to adjourn. So moved.
- Those in favor, aye. Aye. Opposed? Thank you.