Clerk and recorder reviews elections operations, seeks equipment to bring balloting in-house; HB 192 will change recording-fee flows

Clerk and recorder staff briefed the Board of County Commissioners on May 1 about elections, records preservation and GIS budget items and outlined several operational changes intended to reduce printing and mailing costs.

Paula Buff, elections manager, told commissioners the office removed projected revenues and corresponding expenses for reimbursable municipal and special-purpose elections from the baseline budget so the county will instead use budget amendments when those elections occur. The office combined special-purpose district elections with school district ballots to create a single ballot style per elector and said costs will be billed on a prorated basis to participating districts after an election. “Ultimately, it’ll be a lot easier for the electors,” Buff said.

Buff described an in-house absentee-mailing workflow the office piloted for a recent large mailing: staff used a 14-person in-house team and avoided mail-room services that previously cost about 3 cents per ballot. The elections manager said the office is researching a folding/stuffing machine and a printer that could allow the county to print envelopes and ballots locally; current contracted print costs were described as roughly 32 cents per printed ballot plus shipping and about 12 cents for stock, figures the office cited as illustrative during budget discussion.

Sheena Sterling, clerk and recorder manager, summarized broader clerk office changes tied to House Bill 192 (HB192). Sterling said current recording fees are $8 per page and that the bill will change the fee structure and move some portion of revenues into the state Land Information Account and a records-preservation fund rather than into the general fund. Sterling said the office expects roughly $85,000 a year to flow into the records-preservation fund under the new law; she described the state’s earlier practice of covering birth/death certificate paper costs as ending and estimated a roughly $4,803 increase in office supplies to cover certificate stock moving forward.

Sterling said the county will need to decide how to allocate any new HB192-related funds and that the records-preservation account’s increased revenue might support digitization or additional staffing; she suggested considering an additional full-time position as records accumulate.

No formal action was taken; commissioners requested corrections to ensure projected reimbursable revenues are removed where related expense lines were removed.