 I think the way, the best way to do this and committee, correct me here if you think there might be a different way of doing this is to first here. So we're talking about kind of this huge issue of mail out ballots and how that worked and should we continue to do it. So what I think makes sense is to hear first from the what I call the good government groups. V per the campaign for Vermont the League of Cities League of women voters, they're kind of a good, what I consider good government groups. Then here from the parties that would be Bruce and Martha, then the from the LCT and the clerks, and then get into the kind of the details of what it would be but here first kind of the, the general concept and should we go forward with it shouldn't we go forward with it that kind of thing and then get into more of the details and will can then start will and the clerks can start listing the details to us that we may need to pay attention to and then people can comment on those. Does that make sense to anybody. Okay, well hearing no objections then we'll start with Paul so kind of general concepts and and we will get more into details and specific things that we have to pay attention to. If we do this or don't do it. Okay. Thanks. So Paul. Thanks. Well, thanks so much, matter chair again members of the community, Paul burns a beeper and I would should say that my organization joined with a number of others in submitting some testimony and comments, specifically with respect to this question of universally male ballots and whether that should become a permanent of Vermont's general elections moving forward. These organizations are all strongly in favor of making that policy permanent and what we're talking about in broad strokes is, is what, what was put together in rapid fashion, we must say for the county election credit to, to the parties who we've talked about before but this committee being one of them and then obviously those who implemented the policy at the local level with the Secretary of State's office. These organizations again that that joined together in offering the comments in addition to v per was a ARP Vermont ACLU of Vermont Conservation Law Foundation disability rights Vermont League of Women voters Vermont and democracy from our conservation voters Vermont NEA. And then there were two organizations that came on after we submitted which is justice for all and Main Street Alliance of Vermont. And over the course of the summer to we also had other organizations and businesses who were strongly in favor of implementing vote by mail and that included Vermont businesses for social responsibility, Ben and Jerry's Burton seven generation among others. So I just wanted to mention that there are many organizations and diverse organizations with with an interest here. The idea of course for 2020 was that we wanted to have an election in the midst of a pandemic that was safe, safe for voters and safe for poll workers and other local officials. And, and it made sense to implement this, this policy and approach that it already been used effectively and a handful of other states around the country. And it was important to us. I should say that we preserved, even while implementing mailed out ballots to all active registered voters that we preserve the opportunity and choice for people to be able to vote in person as well and that is particularly important for some communities. Some folks with certain disabilities find it particularly important for instance to for them to be able to vote independently that they have this opportunity to vote in person at a polling place. New Americans expressed a strong interest in being able to preserve that, in part because of the translation services that are made available in person. And so, so even as we press to make permanent the idea that people should receive at their home, these mailed ballots, having the opportunity to vote in person is at least for the foreseeable future an important element that we think should be preserved as well. But let's remember and you've heard some of these numbers before but Vermont broke all participation records in the midst of this pandemic, some 45,000 more Vermont Vermonters voted in 2020 than it ever voted before. Nearly 73% of potential voters actually took advantage of their right to vote. Some of the quarters of them voted early. Most of them, taking that ballot that they received at home and putting it in the mail, but a number of folks, obviously you taking advantage of the drop boxes that were available we think that was important as well or in some bringing it to their clerks or voting in person even a small number of them. And so, this is a policy I mean if it can work. Those states that had implemented prior to the pandemic, this voting by mail policy. A lot of them took years to implement it they maybe started with pilot projects and lots of public education over a long period of time. And while we didn't have that exactly Vermont was building on a, an important history of many advantages that we had some 30% of Vermont voters had typically voted early in and in more normal times and past general elections and so it wasn't a foreign concept. And so, so we were kind of building on that, plus the idea that we allowed people we've always were for some time now allowed people to participate by voting early in the process of that wasn't a new feature for folks. We've obviously had other advantages automatic registration and election day or same day registration to so these are all things that were in place. And I think helped make it possible to implement a policy like this, without that longer lead time. And, and I think the fact that we had relatively few as a percentage of the overall voters, relatively few ballots that were defective is something to celebrate. Instead, I think we can do more to try to address that through curing and other things but I think it really was impressive that we had a relatively small percentage of defective balance, lots of public education. And, and while we don't know exactly how many may have come in after the election, we, we know that, gosh, it was great work done by the Secretary of State's office the local officials and many organizations to encourage people to get those ballots sent in early. And I have to, you know, we just have to recognize that that was an important success as well. And so, and, and few if any, you know, we haven't seen evidence of fraud we haven't seen evidence of many of the things that folks were concerned about or some people at were concerned about or raising objections about early on. And so, I think almost an unmitigated success is what we see to move forward on a faster than normal timeline, you know, let's remember one year ago this was not being talked about in your committee, this idea that we were going to get a mail for 2020. What many people considered you know the most important election of our lifetime. So, to be able to adopt that as rapidly as, as the state did great great credit. So now comes the question, should we keep that or not, and from our perspective it would, it would essentially represent a retreat from a policy that we know works well to engage more voters in the process. It would, it would make it more difficult, in other words, for people to vote and participate as they choose by removing this, this approach to voting by, by not sending every active registered voter a ballot to their home and we see no, no reason to retreat from a policy like this that worked and worked really well. And so, you know, at a time when in some places, you know, it's, it is still challenging to get people to vote we're always looking for ways to, to engage more people. Fundamentally, we believe that democracy works best when more people participate. This policy is one of those tools to help make it easier for people to participate, help to get more people involved in the process there's always more education work that we can do. We're committed to continuing that effort. But I think as a fundamental policy, making sure that those ballots are, are automatically sent out to registered voters, making sure that there are multiple options for returning those ballots including the dropboxes and the postage, prepaid postage on the envelopes and making sure again that once they're received there's pre canvas and so forth we've talked about that in other places but I think those are the fundamental elements that we would like to see preserved and continue to move forward because they work. And finally, Madam Chair, I would just say we've, we've done, as I think I mentioned in earlier testimony we reached out to some of our members we received lots of good responses, well over 100 people responded to say how much they appreciated having this opportunity to receive their ballots at home. And obviously tens of thousands of Vermonters filled out their ballots at home and returned them that way when they had never done so before. And lots of folks felt that, you know, in addition to being safer in a pandemic that it gave them an opportunity to be thoughtful about their ballots as they're if they're sitting at their kitchen table and really considering their choices and they aren't rushed and you know nobody's obviously nobody's looking over their shoulder when they're voting but it's just it's a different process you can really take the time you can do the research that you want to and I just think it's worth mentioning that many of our members raised that as a particular issue of of interest for them, something that they felt more comfortable about and felt like a better informed voter, and they felt really good about that so so ease of voting greater participation and more thoughtful informed voters seems like a winning policy to us and one we would like to preserve. Thank you, and I will first of before we move on to Pat, I will apologize because I left Audrey out when I talked about the good government groups. So, I apologize for that and just so that you know that we have. I made sure that the administration is aware that these conversations are going on and they have open invitation to join us and weigh in whenever they want. Mainly I think probably just to listen to the conversations but I just wanted you to, to be aware of that. So, Pat. Thank you, Chair. I am President of the campaign for Vermont Board of Directors. We did submit a letter supporting certainly the voter checklist and sending a balance to registered voters we also talked about the importance of making sure that voter checklist is being dubbed, and is is accurate as far as who's who is registered to vote. But I think what Paul said was right on the money I think the more people that want to get involved and vote, and feel confident about voting I think that's an important I don't know what can be done whether it's education or more transparency whatever that means but people need to feel confident that that the that the vote is their vote and it's being received and recorded and I think maybe if we can the Secretary of State's office can talk about I think it's called my voter. Maybe Chris Winters can have my voter where where that shows that your ballots been received and it's not. It's been accepted and I think that's important for people to know that that exists and to check how their vote is being received and counted so we're very supportive of mailing ballots to Vermonters. Thank you. Thank you, Pat, I thought we had lost you there for a little while because I saw that your symbol came up and it said Ben Kingsley. Oh, he's he maybe want to speak as well he's here. Oh, there you are. Okay. I know exactly what Pat said, you know, this is everything Paul said is right on the money this is a clearly successful policy. In terms of getting folks engaged there's obviously things that we need to take into consideration, you know, for doing this again things like how to help town clerks process these ballots when they come in better voter education around. So the question is like what ballot am I sending back particularly in primaries and things like that so things we can do to change the design of the ballot to make it more clear, you know what I'm supposed to be doing all of those are positive things and can help on the fringes of this this problem but I think this is a clearly, you know successful program that you know we we should support. And Pat, did you I'm sorry thank you man chair can't tell us apart we work too closely together me and Ben. One thing we had on our letter which we didn't discuss last time and no one's brought it up but I'm assuming this comes out of the Secretary of State's office is enforcement of known voter fraud. I would actually pursue some voter fraud that we know might exist I think that would clearly deter others from messing around with the system and making it as a fraud free as possible so that voters really feel confident in in what's being done and what the process is. So thank you. Just to add to that real quick. You know and this is not because we think that there's widespread voter fraud. There's obviously no evidence of that but the problem is when you have people out there that's like I know of this instance, and you know see them complaining about it. You know how in public. It erodes the integrity of the election, right so so dealing with those problems that we might actually know about and pursuing them. And if people see us doing that. That helps to protect the integrity of our election. And that's just one other commentary on, you know, elections in general and whatnot but I think that that helps to protect the integrity of the election, as if we do pursue those rare instances we do know of. Right greed. Thank you I added that to the list. Thank you madam chair. Yeah, I'm sorry I didn't have that on there before I don't know why. No problem. Thank you. Thank you. Is that comes out of the Secretary of State's office does it not for force of seeking out and and identifying people who might be handling. I think it's the Attorney General's office. Oh it is. Okay. But we get there. We can talk about how that, how that might just think once or twice people might pay attention and quit fooling around. Even shaming. I think that'd be good. So with a billboard. Yeah. Madam chair whenever, whenever the committee wants to hear about it. Yeah, I don't I want to just kind of talk about the general concept first of of it and I noted that as one of the issues that we should address. So, I'll go to Lila. Thank you. Lila Richardson with the League of Women Voters. Paul Burns described the fact that the league was one of the signatories to the list of recommendations that he submitted at the beginning of the process and he's really got over the major point that we're concerned about. We're very, very supportive of any system that helps more voters participate in the process which we think is absolutely. One of the most important things that for monitors can do is to is to participate in the elections and make their voices known the question about how this relates to education is really important to the league. I think is very involved with voter education on in a nonpartisan way with trying to support people by getting information about the various candidates candidate forums, widely available. But having this system where people are bill their ballots helps to have an important education function because it makes people aware sometimes of issues or candidates they haven't thought about that much. It gives them time to research of what their options are in races that they might not have, you know, focused on before. There's a lot of information out there. It's a good timeframe for people to get the ballots at the beginning of the period and to have time to do that. And we think it worked very well under as Paul said very very difficult circumstances of the pandemic we'd like to see the system be made permanent. Great. Thank you. Audrey, would you like to weigh in. Thank you so much, Madam Chair committee members thank you for your time and attention this is such a near and dear to my heart, but also to the work that I do. The National Voting Home Institute is a is a nonprofit nonpartisan entity that works on this exact issue. And it's not often that I actually get to come to a state and say you should make the jump and you should mail ballots to everyone. Everyone has the really spectacular foundation security processes dedicated clerks. And, you know, all of that that that ecosystem that serves as the foundation for elections system that that can work in this way so hats off to the Secretary of State and the clerks and, and you all for for making that happen. So that is my recommendation I think you should should keep the policy it works. It is secure it is more accessible. It is safer from a health perspective, and you're over a year long term you actually start seeing large cost benefits, as you don't have to place, replace as much equipment, things like that. And the security aspects are just currently under the technology that we have are just unbeatable paper ballots are great. And they make sure that that our most important institutions are secure so. And to touch on something that you mentioned earlier, Senator white to talk about people participating civically is so important. And in these sorts of policies they actually pull people farther down the ballot. They start seeing higher rates of voting, all the way at it, whatever the sort of last question on your ballot might be. And so you're seeing that people are spending more time thinking about issues being critical of what is their government look like how do they want to express their, their voice in that government, and we're just so thrilled to see the things that Vermont has done to make this successful, but we want to stress that some of the other issues that we've been that this committee has been discussing are important to not only just to secure the process but make it more accessible, just mailing someone a ballot is not always enough. Things like the cure processes and ballot tracking, all of those pieces will fit together to make the gears of this machine work in a way that is most effective and we're just so happy to lend our support and be here to take any questions or be supportive in any way that might cross your mind so thank you so much for your time I really appreciate it. Thank you. So, we'll jump to the parties Martha. Are you here. There you are. Thank you all for inviting me and for taking up these issues. I don't think I have very much to add that hasn't already been said I completely agree with all burns remarks and the other remarks that have been made I think it was highly successful. I think people like it when something works in government and works for them and makes it gives them more options and I think the only reason to change it would be if there had been a bad experience and we needed to fix it in some way but I think people like the continuity and they don't like it when government keeps changing the procedures and rules all the time. I'm a tax preparer so I notice it a lot in that field. But no I would say that it worked very well we should we should keep it. Great. Thank you. Bruce. Thank you Madam Chair Bruce Olson from non Democratic Party. We certainly and strongly support vote by mail, primarily because it increases voter participation and as a consequence makes our democracy stronger. But we at the same point we want to maintain the ability of voters to vote in person we know that for many people that's a time honored tradition that they want to maintain. And if we can do it safely hopefully after this pandemic is behind us, we want to continue that but vote by mail certainly gives working families, because the elderly gives people that live far away from polling places a greater opportunity to participate in the process. I think that's a good thing. Our only criticism really of the vote by mail that we saw in this last election was that was there was no curing process. And you know that's a real frustration for a voter when they're legally registered to vote and then they make one mistake and then their ballot doesn't count and we think that that can be corrected fairly easily. As opposed as this question about fraud we did not see anything that indicated there was any fraud in the vote by mail election that we just had. That was free of fraud and increased participation, and with a curing process to make it work a lot better. We do want to send a thank you to the town clerks and to the secretary states office who implemented this, almost on the fly. You know this is, as people pointed out something that a year ago we weren't even thinking about, and we're able to very successfully implemented because of the clerks in the secretary states office. One of the other things that the only, I would just echo what Paul Byrne said, we really, I think hit the nail on the head is all the reasons why we should do this and we'd be happy to work with this committee in the legislature to make sure that we can implement vote by mail going forward. Thank you. Great. Thank you. So clerks, or let's go to BLCT first, you're going to you might be more specific BLCT. Um, yeah we were here to back up the clerks to be honest with you and we're not talking about local elections so I think that we don't have a necessarily a position on on this, more so that if this were to become common practice that the clerks have just as much help and and resources that were given this go around because I think that's where the rubber meets the road and that's why it was so successful so you know the, if everyone works as a team as it has been the last year. The clerks work out well so I thought we're here to support what the clerks say and anything that they need. We'll stand behind, but we don't actually have a position to hold on this but because it doesn't impact local elections as you're referring to but it's been a success and from all we've heard from the clerks the secretary states office was excellent the public education was excellent and that's, that's what we need to continue to do moving forward. Thank you. Clerks, which Carol. So, um, I, we haven't pulled the membership of the association but but looking at the what the responses were like pre and post November. The majority of clerks really supported it. There were some clerks who were concerned about the loss of local control and local involvement with regards to mailing out ballots but personally I don't want to mail 6000 ballots out myself. I do know that that is a concern that some of the clerks have most of my concerns are process related, which means they're fixable. So, or, or can be can be addressed. It's been mentioned before talking about, you know, cleaning up the checklist consistent information on the checklist, particularly with regards to how voters can access my voter page, the need for to be consistent so they can get on to their possibly tying into the national change of address system so that we can keep our mailing addresses as up to date as possible. I'm codifying the process is associated with voters who choose to vote their ballot but then bring their voted ballot to the polls, making sure that we're, we're using the right process for that. How to handle ballots that are returned is undeliverable what's the best way to deal with that is there a way to reprocess them, you know what, how should we handle those. We talked about just earlier this afternoon we talked about ways to mesh together local and general elections, and yet what would the impact be if we were trying to hold a local election at the same time as a general election would our local ballots have to be mailed by us, they would clearly have to be mailed to everybody. And how would that work out what what would that kind of a process look like. It's more, there's a pretty significant culture shift with regards to clerks in that we'd be seeing a lot more pre election work, and hopefully less work on election day with less people coming through the door and and culture shifts can always be a little problematic. Okay, but as I said, 99% of that is is process related and those things can be addressed. Great. Thank you Carol, john. Well, first of all, I want to thank you all for, you know, already had a bit of a conversation about, you know, considering this issue without, you know, with, you know, in as far as the concerns about the structure of the schools to that include a greater conversation about about cooperating I'm glad there's some, some daylight there I'm also glad there's some daylight in terms of maybe moving back some of those filing deadlines a little bit to give us more room again for local for town meetings and those were my two personal biggest concerns about this entire question because having gone through it it went really well. November was a lot easier for us than August, which was the postcard driven one. Now, you know with us. The big change was workflow, obviously, and those are two different and this one we're coming up now I've got. You know we're doing mail and voting for town meeting they all my ballots just hit today. That's two and a half weeks out as opposed to you know the previous election so I think the full piece of information. You know that would be available would you know come after crossover when it's too late to get that you know by having said that people seem to like it I would just say, you know the different clerks have can have even dramatically more work flows so I think it would be very important to keep the issue, somewhat fluid or dynamic or at least you know stay in touch. As this as this develops as this go on, I think it will create some real change if this really gets set in in a long term way to some of the way the clerks operate and so I think that'll be an ongoing discussion that comes right back around to what I was just saying, and that's resources. I think resources resources resources. That's a big part of how this worked was that we had the resources to support us and without those resources. It gets to be a much more challenging conversation. Good. Okay, thank you. Now, what I think we'll do is go to the Secretary of State's office and I'm going to ask this question, kind of two questions. First of all, a very simple question that just requires a yes or no answer. Do you support continuing to do mail out balloting for the general election. The second part then is assuming that you do which of the issues that have been brought up and that need to be statutorily defined, and which of them are just in that group of things that say that you'll work with the town clerks I'm not sure how to how to put that but there are some things that we need to do and then some things that we need to give you and the town clerks authority to do. And what we need to know is what we need to do. Did that make any sense to anybody. A little bit. Thank you, Madam Chair. As far as the first question goes, the answer is a very clear yes, and it's really gratifying to hear all the support. So much harmony on on a committee discussion about a bill is really great to see. I don't go into much more you asked for a yes or no question the question the answer yes or no answer the answer is a definite yes. I have a little bit more to say if the chair would allow it. Yeah, I suppose. Hi, and I thank you for that. Just because you know we said all through the 2020 elections vote by mail was going to be safe, simple and secure we tried to get it make it catchy and have people remember that voter education piece was so safe, simple, secure, sign, seal and send your ballot. Well I'm going to add a fourth S to that. It was safe, simple, secure and a success. And that's why I think we're talking about it the way that we are today people had a really powerful and positive experience with that. And as was said by multiple others, just before me, we achieved a record shattering voter participation in the midst of a pandemic, and we accomplished all the goals that we set out for. We set sent about every active red voter. It wasn't an easy process and we couldn't do it the same way. Again, it's actually close to a miracle that we were able to pull it off with the resources that we had, and that was thanks to the really hard work of our elections division, our smallest in the nation elections division, the really hard work and wonderful partnership that we developed with the town clerks, we were constantly on the line with a group of clerks to figure out the best way to do this. And, and that goes to the second part of your question I think is, there are a lot of things that I think we can work through administratively just with the clerks continuing that that partnership we've grown together over the last year and kind of been through battle together and I think are working together more effectively than than I can ever remember us doing so in the past so that's a really good sign for what's to come. I'll point it out and some others pointed out Vermonters overwhelmingly embraced voting by mail over 75% of Vermonters voted early those are just plain amazing numbers. And this election was one of the smoothest elections that we've ever seen it really came off without a hitch was amazing for how worried we were how many things we thought could go wrong, pulling off vote by mail and less than a year. So post post November, we've received a lot of shifts in opinion accolades for the management and oversight of a really safe, secure and accessible election. We had a number of folks in the legislature who are opposed and now have kind of come around to see the benefits of vote by mail. The governor kind of wanting us to wait and see and wasn't sure about vote by mail and now he's fully on board and recommending it for March town meetings. There were some clerks who had had questions and some that still do but I think we're seeing more support there than we did. And a lot of that thanks should also go to all those partners who are on the call who did that voter education and really got the word out and made sure people knew how to return their ballots knew where to return their ballots and had a successful election experience. So, bottom line is people liked it. People liked it a lot. And we know that this experience shows that voting by mail has a future here in Vermont we think it ought to be a permanent fixture after crushing those participation records, and the Secretary of State has always been of the view that our democracy is stronger and more representative when more people vote. It worked well for decades in other states it can work really well here we saw it work well in 2020 so now to the things that I think we've already talked about putting in a bill. I think go with this vote by mail discussion and as you've worked through that list we've already checked off a bunch of those. I think that 30 day early processing is important and we have brought agreement on that and because we had that early processing available. That's what made it so smooth. That's what made us be able to report all of our results are 95% 97% of our results on election night and didn't become an issue like it did in other states. So that 30 day early processing is a really big piece of this that we want to see codified drop boxes the use of drop boxes and I think I would add to that outdoor polling places. That's in there. That's in there we've covered that and I think that you've authorized us to start talking to amour and about that. That's another one that we really wanted to, to make sure was in there. Sorry, there's just a couple more. I think I have I think brought agreement on central mail and coming out of the Secretary of State's office which is a real key piece of this and the ballot curing is the other piece that we've had some conversation around I think is really important to make vote by mail as successful as possible. But not those pieces that the one piece that I would add is an additional position for the Secretary of State's office you've heard a lot of people talk about having the appropriate resources to pull this off. And again it was, we're very fortunate that we have such dedicated elections team because we asked things of them that we never should have asked of any, any state employee, the hours they put in the weekends that they put in the family time that they gave up the vacations that they gave up for for nearly nine or nine or 10 months straight was just more than we ever should have asked of anyone and so we can't go through it that way again. We have to have another position for the Secretary of State's office in order to move to vote by mail successfully and still keep will sending from turning in his resignation letter. The last piece for us all I think to really think hard about is that vote by mail is wonderful. It gets more people involved in the process but it does come at a cost those mailings come at a cost. So that's one of the things that we really need to think about is what what that will cost and what that future funding source for the mailing of all those ballots and the processing of all those ballots includes and that also includes some resources for the clerks themselves who with those resources can run a more successful election. So I guess in closing, you know, one of the thing I did want to mention is that we need to be laser focused on the accuracy of the checklist and people have brought that up as well, that we're going to have to take more time and more to make that checklist and those mailings as accurate as they possibly can be. We learned a lot. And I think we cleaned up those checklists a lot in 2020, but there's always more work to be done. We want to make sure that those things are accurate and that those ballots are going to the right place. So I guess to round it out, voting by mail is safe, simple secure and was a success and voting as the foundation of our democracy, we need to be do everything that we can to ensure that every eligible voter who wishes to cast about and can so, giving that option of voting by mail of dropping off at a drop box of coming in and voting early or still being able to come and vote at a polling place is just something that we really should do and we should give that option to our voters so we fully support moving forward to make it a permanent fixture in Vermont and I want to say thank you to this committee for all the work that you've done to support us in this we couldn't have done it without that. Thank you to all the folks on the line, the clerks especially all of the stakeholders who did a great job of working with us and getting the word out to Vermonters. So I'm going to be come out on the other end of this and have it have been such a success and see the groundswell of support for making this a permanent thing. So thank you Madam chair. Thank you. Will. Want to add some stuff. Yeah, if you don't mind. No, please do. Thank you to Chris that deputy secretary Winters just a really nice job summarizing some of this stuff that's why he gets paid the big bucks more eloquent than I will be I'll try to be close and I'll try to be brief too because I think we've covered a lot of this ground I want to first just say thanks to everybody for your kind words again I really do appreciate it for myself and the rest of my staff who dug in as much as I did and I just wanted to say in that regard that you know there's been a lot of praise on myself my team and the clerks all rightfully so I want to give a little praise to secretary condos who showed decisive leadership at the beginning. I don't do anything without his approval and authority and decisions had to be made and made quickly and then advocate for and I thought he really stepped up. So I wanted to note and remind it so one thing that Paul mentioned, I wanted to go back to, which is that other states who have stood up vote by mail systems and how long they have spent doing so five, six, three, four years, perfecting it and getting all the processes and pieces put in place together. And the fact that we didn't have that luxury last year. But I think that, and that that was one of the reasons why we advocated for the approach that you guys have taken, which is not to bite off more than we can chew at this time, but to do what we think is doable right now to move us to continue that policy, expand it better over time. And I think the committee with what we've talked about just today and kind of landed on as a universe moving forward has really threaded that needle appropriately at this point. I think what you're suggesting we can do and we can do before 2022. And then we should and can have discussions about further ways to improve the system going forward right it's like anything else. Over time will make it better and serve our Vermont voters better all the time as we do so. So, to more specifically answer your second question send the right which is which is what Chris did a good job of already I think, at least from my mind we have good consensus on the general concept of sending out the vote for the general election to all active voters to remind the committee you're talking about about 440 450,000 voters that those ballots will be returned directly to the clerk's offices. That's a that's a big decision that you guys made that I think is the right one. Again, in terms of taking just the steps that we that are appropriate right now. I think a lot of the states that do vote by mail do some form of central processing where they're brought back to more central locations and counted in in more volume and I have never advocated for that and don't now so I think having these set up to be returned to the clerks is what makes sense for Vermont right now. So we have the postage paid in both directions. So obviously we pay the postage going out, but we want those return envelopes to be pre postage paid and address back to the clerks, make it as easy as possible for people to return the ballots, and drop boxes. And I think the message that I have previously gotten from the committee is, we're going to do some basic requirements around drop boxes and leave a lot of the security and accessibility standards to either guidance or rulemaking done by the Secretary of State. I've already reached out to my colleagues and a lot of the states that have drop boxes and have gotten a flood of useful information about policies in place in those states. And then, excuse me, the early processing is the big one. And that is intimately tied with the opportunity to cure and the basic parameters I have in my head so far coming out of the committee is that the clerks to do the early processing for 30 days. And when we talk about that the step that's not allowed now that would be during that time is actually opening the certificate envelope and feeding the ballot into the tabulator ballot box. That is what Carol was talking about that is, it's the front end work, but then the ends up not being the back end work on Election Day where that otherwise would be taking place. It also enables us to get down to a greater level of ability to address almost all the reasons that a ballot can be defective by enabling the clerks to open up, take the ballots out and process them in the tabulator ballot box. So I think expanding the that is optional right, keeping that as a choice the clerk can make about what to what degree they want to process balance. I made this point in our last session and I'll make it again that if you pair that of course with the requirement that I would suggest at this point that the clerk needs to within 72 hours make a determination of whether the ballot is defective or not. That's where you're putting the new burden on the clerks, because that requires action at a time that they don't have control over that could be as early as 30 days could be as late as the day before to it depends when they receive a ballot. But as soon as they're receiving a ballot they're then on the clock to take action on that ballot. And as we've talked about it's really the only way to have a meaningful opportunity to cure in a fair one to all voters across towns. So, then there was, we discussed it. We kind of the discussion I don't think completely completed itself last time about when, at what point you stop requiring oh excuse me I'll back up that the notification that would result from that review process would be a postcard mailing. I think that the Secretary of State's office will develop these postcards that the clerks hopefully have sitting in a little easy to access place on their desk pre posted that when they determine a ballots defective. They quickly address the postcard and send it in the mail to the voter at that time. I've discussed also that voters and I think the way I would probably suggest this happens is that it's specific on their absentee ballot application for that election if they have one that they would, they would take that notification by phone call or text message or email if they provide that information to the clerk. I guess Carol's thoughts about that because I think part of the idea to was that I think it almost be easier for the clerks to just send a postcard, then try and be making phone calls and writing emails. If the postcards are there and ready and pre posted. So I think we'd want to write it in such a way that it could be up to the clerk what means of notification they use, and that they could use one of those others if provided. They could just decide to do a postcard to everybody if that's the easiest thing for them, but they have to notify everybody and so if they don't have the information they have to send the postcard. Then there was the discussion of when that necessity to send a postcard might stop in advance of the election, given the mailing times. I think 10 days had been talked about. I personally think that even at 10 days you could put a postcard in the mail to a remaner and it'll be there within three days and give them a meaningful chance to come cure a ballot. So the more I had thought about it I thought that that might move closer to say five days before the election. And so that way I did do not know the level of detail you wanted me to get into now but you asked the appropriate question right of what you address in the statute and what you don't. So if you were to get to the ones I think you probably would address in the statute. And then if you leave the details of how those are addressed up to the clerks and I and Amarin. And then you guys take a look at what we present and say no I want seven days no I want three here. That makes sense to me if it does to you. And that's where we because we need to we need to get to the actual things that need to be in statute and, and have, and have Amarin, the ability to, to draft them up so that then we can make sure that we're talking about the same thing and if there are things that need to be in the statutes that we didn't address right that you need to bring that to a couple of those because there are a couple of those I think. But there are a couple to that I think would be better dealing with administratively and I guess I'll say to you in general. There's a lot that needs to be addressed outside of what we're talking about in the details of this of course that was all I went through last year but none of it's worthy of putting into statute I don't think. Okay. Carol talked about how you handle undeliverable balance that come back to you and I think that might be worth putting in statute also. And I think that could be part of, and I haven't thought this through entirely. The other part of the curing and defective ballot conversation that we had is sort of appropriate recording of that information in our election management system. And I want to simplify the categories Carol of return right it should just be that it's returned and counted. It's returned and defective and possibly a third would be returned and undeliverable. I'm not a voter I'm sitting here I haven't gotten my automatic ballot yet, and I can go and check the my voter page and say oh it went back to the clerk undeliverable I got to get down there and see what the problem with the address was for voting person at the office. Try and simplify those categories and put into statute that that's part of the action they need to take so they need to when they make the determination say it's defective. So postcard in the mail or notify the voter by the other means if they choose to and have them, or, and not or, and mark in the election management system the status of that ballot return, putting in that it was one of those three that I just talked about. And that that happens in that same 32 hour period to the hopefully there's less instances of those undeliverable ballots and it gets to the discussion about the checklist but I think many of the clerks have used the information that they got from ballots coming back to them to make informed decisions about challenging voters going forward. And if we're just doing it to active voters they aren't going to get mailed a ballot if they're a challenged voter and that's not going to get bounced back to the clerk so hopefully there's less of that but there will always be some of it and it's important to address it. The other one Carol I forget I don't think you would flag this one but it came up a lot and I think it might be worth actually putting in the statute also is a statement about what how you handle people who register after the mailing goes out. And I think that those should potentially be put into two baskets, which is that if it's a true first time registrant for the first time in Vermont. You go ahead and automatically send a ballot to that person, because you're not worried that there's already been a ballot sent to them in the statewide mailing that happened however long before that. But if instead they've, they were previously registered in another town and are moving to your town that I would like to craft some language that says a ballot isn't sent to that person until the status of the ballot was previously sent at the state is determined either they bring it back and here's my Barton ballot, it's you can see it's unvoted and then they can contact the Barton clerk and say take them off your list and take their absentee activity away, whatever it might be but just to determine that it's not out there hasn't been returned in the past town, and I'm happy to talk with Carol more about the details of how we would phrase that but that caused a lot of confusion and concern on the part of the clerks, knowing that a ballot may have been issued in the previous town. I'm getting there. First time registrants movers. Cure. I think I've covered most of it Senator way I wanted to know a couple things though in terms of comments that have been made. Yeah, on the voter checklist number one that last year, made a lot of progress on the voter checklist. Number two that we're finally getting engaged with this group Eric that I've told you all about over the spring and summer this year for further cleaning of the checklist. And yesterday I had a conversation with some folks advocating for the possible expansion of automatic voter registration to some of the social service agencies, particularly Medicaid, and the fact that they met that might move us forward in terms of more frequent address updates to Medicaid recipients who are already registered on the checklist, which was making sense to me when we were having that conversation yesterday. They visit their their Medicaid provider more than more frequently than the DMV even for instance. So that's constantly on our mind, updating the voter checklist and making it more accurate. Last in terms of the pursuance of voter fraud. I think that the phrase use and I'm not being defensive here at all was known cases of voter fraud. And I just my answer to that is if I am really presented with evidence of a known actual voter fraud. I will forward that to the Attorney General's office that the band mentioned sort of public proclamations of it. If I really saw a public proclamation that was actual voter fraud I would follow up with that person and try and contact them and say what are you talking about you have evidence of this. The voter fraud proclamations that we saw last year were ballots being delivered to residences for either previous residents or deceased persons, etc. And we just you know continue to make the point it's not voter fraud until somebody picks up that ballot purgers themselves on the envelope and sends it back to the clerk and if I hear about that I'm reporting it to the Attorney General's office. So that's that was a side issue. I really appreciate the common ground that the folks in this room have reached on vote by mail. I think it is smart policy. I can't tell you the number of people who've contacted me and said, I don't typically vote, but because the ballot was sent and put in front of me and put in my living room. I filled it out and sent it back and it felt great and I had no idea it was that easy. And those are the feel good stories and that's why we saw the, the crushing of the voter turnout records that we saw in November. So if you think I've accurately kind of framed up how we're moving forward, then I look forward to bringing back some pen on paper and starting to parse through the details. Thank you that's Senator Clarkson. That was great. That was great. The whole thing was that was just that was terrific. It was wonderful to listen to and just such an extraordinary effort. Two questions. What, you know, we have a specific number and I just need a reminder of how many people actually voted we have. We got 73%. What was the 73% actual number. It was at 328. No, it was more than that 370. So that's more than 73%. If you're looking at 450. 370. Okay, great. And my other question is, how many did we actually take, how many effectively did we take off the checklist as a result of the work around the postcard and the primary. I can't answer that yet. Part of the reason is you're, you're primarily not just taking those people off. You're sending them the notice letter. Your challenge on notice. Yeah. Okay. And you're challenging them. So you were. And do we know how many that is. No, I mean, I could tell you how many I would have to get back to you. I could tell you how many have been challenged since the general election. Those aren't necessarily all because of the postcards, but it would still be informative to you. I think it would be, I think that would be helpful for us because when we're talking about improving the checklist, it would be interesting for us to know how effective this incredible effort, what it resulted in in terms of how many additional challenge vote. People that that would be great. Thanks. Thank you, Senator Clarkson. Just to look on a couple of those numbers. I don't want to leave leave them out there. I want people to be clear that the 75 ish percent was of people who actually voted so voted by mail. No, I got that it was 73% of the total check of the registered voters and voted. No, so the total number of voters are somewhere around 500,000. 75% was of those 370,000 who voted 75% of them voted early voted by now. Right, I got that. The total number of people who voted were five. I thought you test by 450,000 people on our checklist. Those active voters after you pull out. Okay. Of about 40 to 50,000 challenged voters people in the challenge list. And the. Okay, great. But 370 is about 75% of 490 of our total universe of voters. 370,000 ballots cast this year that's 75% of our total universe of voters. It's great. So I would just like to point a personal gratitude. I did have a constituent that will and Chris were very generous and working with who who had thought there was fraud and ended up, it ended up sort of disappearing, because it was one of those issues it was other town or somebody who died it was a it was not a fraud issue per se it was a, you know, ballot going to another address or, you know, to somebody who moved I can't remember what it ended up being but it wasn't fraud. Thank you. Still, I am going to, I'm going to ask the committee if they have any questions or concerns or anything about this and then we'll try to get this written up in a draft form but first, I want to acknowledge that the issue of putting more burden and I acknowledge that that is what we're doing here by request requiring town clerks to send out some kind of a postcard or some kind of a notification to people who have a defective ballot returned, but I'd like to point out the the I think Paul did you sent this to everybody. He did an analysis of how many, what that meant for each town and I don't know if everybody got that but it tells there on how many towns received defective ballots and how many they received and the kind of burden that we would be putting on the town clerks and it clearly is more of a burden in a larger town because but Paul did you send that to everybody. It's posted on our website I think. Okay. It isn't that the missive you sent where everybody signed it at the bottom. No, no, this is. This is more recent and I'm not sure that everybody got that. Okay. If you can both send that to everybody and also to Gail to post it on the website because it gives numbers of and I'm not sure if it's every town but it gives numbers of in different towns how many defective ballots, what that would mean in terms of sending out a postcard and in many towns and meant nothing. There weren't any returned and in some there were five and then some 10 so it isn't as if we're asking every town clerk to send out 250 postcards. So I thought that was very instructive. I'll send that information to Gail and to the full committee. Thank you. Thank you. So committee will quick comment. I think that's very useful data I want to know it's it's only as is reported to us by the clerk so. Yeah, I always put that note on there and I wanted to that discussion though made me think of something is spent in Carol and john if you're listening. Does the committee want to give me any direction on how we would treat clerks with way less than regular office hours. So I would probably suggest some language that said within 72 hours, or the next time you have regular office hours potentially say the ballot lands on a Wednesday you're not going to ping them if they're not in until the next Monday. I think you need to have that flexibility. Because we don't want Congress to feel that they have to every day, go in and check their mail if they have to be checking that was the questions. Yeah, yeah. So do committee members have any questions or comments or anything to any of the people who've spoken to us or about any of the issues right now. Nope. Senator Polina, you're muted. Sorry about that. I just wanted to add my kudos to will and Chris for all the work they've done it's really incredible achievement. Others have said it but I feel need to make it clear that I really appreciate what they've done. I have to say that if you're, if you're doing this for the 2022 election, and it's you five and you have one more person, you're going to feel like you're on vacation, because you're going to have so much time to prepare and do it. We gotta get redistricting down between now and then to by the way. That's going to be a fun one. The other in Vermont is going to be down to Massachusetts. Any other committee members want to add their thoughts or concerns or anybody else. I don't see any hands waving. So, what I would say is. I think it's important and will and whoever needs to hear. We, if, if it's possible to how is it, tell me if this is possible to have some kind of a draft by Wednesday of next week. Given the holiday that might be a little difficult. What holiday. Monday is a state holiday. Oh, I forgot. I know that's because we never get it. Right. And if we had an election day holiday, we wouldn't get that either. We only have holidays when we don't go shopping or interact with the public at all. Let's see. Given that, would it make more sense for us to switch some days next week then and do elections. On a different day. Could, could we do that you think by Friday? Yeah. Is that reasonable? We haven't we just switched everybody to. Oh, next week right. No, next week. So that I'm looking at the amaran. I mean, it's hard to know until we're in it. How long it's going to, I would say. Friday is a possibility. I would say the next week is more comfortable, but we can see how far we can get. Not this Friday. Right. No, next Friday. And right. And I think the secretary of state might have some language already around some of these. Yeah. So. A possibility too that comes to mind would be. Maybe we have enough done. To discuss. What we have. Next week. If it's not everything, but it's enough for a session on Thursday or Friday would be preferable to me. But I think we can certainly have enough for the committee to discuss. And I think we can certainly have enough for the committee to discuss. And I think we can certainly have enough for the committee to discuss. And I will have to meet and make some changes here, but let's aim for Friday then. And we'll do as much as. As much as we can. And hopefully everybody will be with us again so that we can look at the details. And. And the way we tend to. Do these is if we have the draft and we're going through them. And then we'll look at the bill as a whole afterwards. Okay. That work for everybody. Yeah, that sounds terrific. And I just want to point out that Ben Kingsley is in the crest running here. He's added another. Quite beautiful crest. I know I see that. I don't know. I mean, we're going to go from pick photos. I mean, you know, that's like yesterday. Now we're into crest. That's high praise. I appreciate that. Thank you. Well, Carols is pretty rocking. I don't think I can compete with Carols. I'll be honest. Okay. So the competition is on. Yeah. Everybody's going to be getting up. So anything else committee that we need to. No, I think this was good work today. Also. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. All right, Gail. Can we stay on for just a little while? That would be. Are you okay with letting the rest of us go? Yeah. Unless you want to stay on. I mean, you're welcome to stay on. Talk about next week, but. I'm going to stop the YouTube then.