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Clerk briefs committee on poll-pad rollout, record amendments and increased genealogy requests
Summary
Gardner's city clerk updated the committee on election operations — including poll-pad rollout and training — and described growing workloads from voter-registration corrections, hospital-submitted birth amendments, and genealogy requests tied to new Canadian citizenship rules.
The city clerk told the committee April 27 that new poll pads and expanded training helped smooth the September primary and November general elections and reduced paperwork and misdirected precinct visits.
"It just saves people from going on goose chases," the clerk said, describing how the tablets pre-populate voters and flag out-of-precinct lookups. The clerk said she ran two mandatory training sessions and follow-up one-on-one classes; 75 of 95 poll workers attended the mandatory sessions.
The clerk said in-person early voting will be offered for local elections this year (one week for the primary, two weeks for the general), and stressed that ballot testing remains open to the public. She also described an operational problem with automatic voter-registration imports from the Registry of Motor Vehicles: many records arrive missing either a license number or the last four digits of a Social Security number, forcing staff to return registrations to voters for completion.
Beyond elections, the clerk outlined rising demand for vital-record services. Hospitals have submitted records needing corrections, including gender and name errors that trigger lengthy amendment processes. The clerk said older handwritten books and faded cursive entries make genealogy and citizenship verifications especially time-consuming.
On supply and software, the clerk reported problems with the records-management vendor software (some data not printing correctly) and said she was working on alignment and printing issues for marriage-intention forms. She also noted a new state death-record system called Maverick that assigns state registration numbers automatically but requires staff training.
The clerk asked whether the VIPs volunteer program could be used to help the backlog on records processing. Committee members acknowledged budget and program limits; the clerk said she would check with Director White about VIP capacity and funding rules.
The clerk also reported operational items: online dog licensing via OpenGov is functioning, a new copier has been installed, and the 2026 census second mailing depends on vendor postage payment. She closed by noting a new workflow: items now move through standing committees and into folders before full council consideration.
The committee had no formal questions after the report and thanked the clerk for the update. The clerk said several of the operational and staffing matters will be addressed in upcoming budget hearings.
