At a joint interim meeting of the Joint Corporations, Elections & Political Subdivisions committee, county clerks, the Secretary of State’s office and several civic groups asked legislators to carry multiple election-related topics into the interim for further study.

Mary Langford, representing the Wyoming County Clerk’s Association, and Malcolm Irvin, Platte County Clerk and president of the association, told the committee they submitted four election items for interim work: election equipment testing and auditing procedures; absentee ballot security and chain of custody; election security for voters and election officials; and voter-registration list maintenance and enhancements. “We think that testing and auditing of the systems is the backbone that really needs to be continued to strengthen,” Irvin said.

The secretary of state, Mr. Marino, asked the committee to monitor implementation of bills that passed and to continue work on bills that did not finish this session. Marino highlighted voter list hygiene and the “SAVE” system interactions with the federal Systematic Alien Verification for Entitlements process, and said he wants continued updates as new tools and implementations emerge. He also raised ballot retention and noted the current statutory references to retention schedules in 9-2-411; Marino reviewed retention-duration figures during his remarks and requested that the committee consider placing ballot-retention rules directly in the election code rather than in a general records retention statute.

Other witnesses pressed for changes the clerks proposed. Janet Mader, a longtime elections judge from Campbell County, urged restricting who may observe logic-and-accuracy testing: she said the draft language in House Bill 278 allows “members of the public” to attend testing and that observers should be registered voters in the county and limited to observing, not handling equipment. Marguerite Herman of the League of Women Voters recommended exploring ballot-tracking and curing systems used in other states so voters can see whether a mailed ballot was received and, if a signature problem occurs, be notified to cure the ballot.

Advocates and several committee members also raised hand-count proposals and machine-testing clarity. Marino and others noted statutory ambiguity on what testing is required — for example, whether every individual machine must be tested or only types of machines — and asked for clearer statutory language and stronger rigor in testing protocols. Marino also mentioned absentee-voter ID proposals and authentication of IDs as topics for the interim.

Committee members acknowledged the volume of submissions on similar subjects and directed members to rank topics; leaders said they will consolidate overlapping items and return a prioritized interim list to management council.

The public testimony and committee discussion identified multiple concrete next steps the committee could pursue in the interim: clarify election-machine testing statutes and procedures; consider statutory language for ballot retention; examine chain-of-custody practices for absentee ballots; review ballot-tracking/curing systems used by other states; and consider whether authentication standards for ID used with absentee ballots should be included in statute.

Ending: Committee leaders said they will accept topic-ranking forms from members and meet to combine and prioritize overlapping election proposals for formal interim study.