Still the only voter ID anyone should need
Darcy Hood mailed her voter registration application to the Tarrant County elections department in July, after she turned 18.
Months later, her application still hasn’t been processed. And it’s unclear when it will be.
With the Oct. 6 deadline to register to vote in the November constitutional amendment election approaching, tens of thousands of Texans are in the same situation, waiting in suspense for their applications to go through, a process that normally takes a few days or weeks.
In interviews, private conversations, and emails, county elections officials from across the state point the finger at the state’s voter registration system, known as TEAM, which has long had functionality problems. They say that after the software was overhauled in July, the problems began proliferating: Voters’ previous addresses override their new ones, their voting precincts don’t populate correctly, and sometimes the registration information doesn’t save at all.
“One day it works and we can get stuff done, and the next day it doesn’t and nothing gets done,” said Pam Hill, the elections administrator in San Patricio County. “That’s the trend right now.”
The executive board of the Texas Association of County Election Officials met on Sept. 2 with Christina Adkins, the state’s elections division director, and Deputy Director Kristi Hart to discuss the problems. In an email sent afterward to association members and obtained by Votebeat, the board said it “unambiguously stated the level of frustration from our members” regarding the need for clear guidance and training, the absence of which “has placed unexpected burdens and stress on our members.” The board said it would begin offering some training and peer support itself.
The Texas Secretary of State’s Office said it anticipated some technical issues with this “once-in-a-decade upgrade.” Adkins told election officials this month that many of the problems stem from county officials not knowing how to use the updated system.
But several county election officials said the system didn’t work well during training sessions earlier this year, which limited opportunities for hands-on testing.
Meanwhile, the unprocessed registration applications keep piling up. Hood’s application is one of around 13,000 that Tarrant County election officials say are pending state verification. Travis County says it has more than 12,000 applications that need to be processed, and Bexar County has more than 40,000. A Texas voter whose application was received on time but not processed by the time of the election can still cast a provisional ballot, but there’s a risk those ballots won’t be counted.
“I hate that our voters are going through this, and it’s through no fault of their own,” said Clinton Ludwig, the Tarrant County elections administrator. The voters are doing what they’re supposed to do, and we’re also trying to do what we’re supposed to do.”
[…]
State officials have pushed back on some of the counties’ complaints. “There is a difference between a county saying this doesn’t work and a county saying, I don’t know how to do this,” Adkins, the state election director, said in a Sept. 17 video call with local election officials that was recorded by the state and shared with Votebeat. “We want to really make sure that we’re drilling down on the things that are issues versus areas where you need more training.”
In statements to Votebeat, the Texas Secretary of State’s Office said that the rollout of the updated version of TEAM is a multi-stage process, and that the office has “planned accordingly.”
The task involves “migrating more than 20 million records and training more than 2,500 users,” the office said. “Technical issues are to be expected with a rollout of this size, and that is why we chose this constitutional election cycle for this transition.”
“We are working long hours to help our counties prepare for the November election and upgrade to a new version of TEAM that will ultimately result in more efficiently managed elections,” the office said.
The state and the vendor that developed the system “continue to respond to issues and concerns,” the office said.
The Secretary of State’s Office has assigned 30 employees to work directly with counties to train them and answer technical questions about the new system, the agency said, three times as many as it had in the previous TEAM update.
“As we are in the middle of a once-in-a-decade upgrade of the state’s voter registration system, our focus right now is on supporting counties in preparation for the upcoming election,” the agency added. “Any verdict on the new system is far too premature at the moment.”
See here for some background. I don’t know what to make of this. There’s still some time to get this fixed, and if she really wanted to, SOS Jane Nelson could ask Greg Abbott for an emergency order allowing people whose registrations were made on time but not processed on time because of this still eligible to vote. Beyond that, all I can say is check the registration of any new or updated voter you know. My 18-year-old is in there, but yours may not be. At least this should be fixed in time for next year’s election.