County Clerk readies April election, seeks funding to replace decades-old ethics database

Jennifer (Jen) — identified at the meeting as the LaSalle County clerk — briefed the committee on election preparations and on a planned ethics-software upgrade. Jen said the office is preparing for the April 1 election and that early voting begins Feb. 20. She said the office had received candidate certifications and was still accepting write-in forms until Jan. 30.

On election operations, Jen said she has three routine election resolutions for the committee to approve: closing the clerk’s office for non-election business on election day, establishing polling places and approving who may be present in the clerk’s office and collection sites during tabulation. The committee approved each of the three resolutions and will forward them to the County Board.

Separately, Jen described an effort to replace the clerk’s aging ethics/statement-of-economic-interest database, originally created around 1986. She said IT estimated a vendor cost around $20,000 (a not-to-exceed figure that could change if the county requests many customizations) and that the office is preparing an RFP to send to the state’s attorney’s office. "I'm hoping to get it to the state's attorney's office today," she said. The upgrade would be a two-phase project: first modernize the database, then potentially integrate it with the county website so filers could submit forms online.

Jen said the updated system should be ready for the next filing cycle in fall/early winter (she estimated by October) so the county could use it for the subsequent annual cycle. She told the committee she had not budgeted the project for the current fiscal year and expected to work with the finance committee after the April election to identify funding sources. Committee members asked that the finance committee consider the request and flagged timing concerns because of upcoming election workloads.

Jen also reported that the state's reimbursement for election judge pay was lower than expected (about $28,000 total reimbursement; a per-judge reimbursement in the meeting was cited as $60 rather than $65) and said she is working with the state's attorney and other staff to clarify the difference.

The committee approved the clerk’s December annual report for filing. Jen and staff also reminded members about vote-by-mail volumes and the staffing burden for processing permanent vote-by-mail lists and statements of economic interest. Jen offered to brief committee members after April on a proposed budget change for election-judge reimbursement the following budget year.