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* From the Illinois Policy Institute’s news service…
The woman in charge of elections in McLean County is skeptical of a proposed independent election commission, she says, because she trusts voters.
Kathy Michael is the McLean County clerk. She is in charge of elections in the county, but not the city of Bloomington, which has its own election commission.
There are talks to combine the offices, and Michael said it makes sense for voters and for taxpayers.
“Illinois needs to be cutting their units of government,” Michael said. “We have the largest amount of government in the United States, and that includes Texas. It’s long past time that we start to make cuts.”
Michael said consolidating the county election office and the city of Bloominton’s election commission could save $100,000 a year.
But McLean County’s League of Women Voters is threatening to try and scuttle the effort. They want an independent commission.
League leaders told The Bloomington Pantagraph that “anyone can be elected clerk.” They argue an independent commission would be non-partisan.
Michael isn’t a fan on that plan, mainly because she trusts voters more than appointed commissioners, she said.
As you might imagine, it’s not quite that simple.
* The League wants to model the combined county system on Bloomington’s election commission, which has minimum requirements for each party’s representation (the three-person board must include a Democrat and a Republican) and rules forbidding employees from campaigning for a candidate or issue. That stuff wouldn’t happen at the clerk’s office.
The county clerk is a Republican. So, some Democratic folks in Bloomington naturally want to continue having a say in how the elections are administered…
Nikita Richards, a Democrat running for county clerk in 2018, said Sunday she supports a countywide election commission. Kathy Michael, the Republican clerk seeking re-election, said last week, “Moving the Bloomington Election Commission duties into the county clerk’s office makes good fiscal sense.”
* The weird local quirk is that, for whatever reason, the county funds both the clerk’s office and Bloomington’s election commission and the county is now facing a $1 million deficit in the upcoming fiscal year.
They’ve been trying to get something done since at least 2009, according to the League of Women Voters’ website. And they’re still at loggerheads…
Board action would break a long stalemate between the county, which prefers to absorb election duties into the clerk’s office, and League of Women Voters McLean County, which has pushed for a countywide commission for years.
Officials have identified two possible solutions: 1,000 Bloomington voters could petition for a referendum of city voters to eliminate the BEC, or the county could push for a legislative change to allow a countywide referendum on establishing a new commission covering all McLean County elections.
Springfield saved about $500,000 a year since it consolidated its election office with the county clerk. Peoria got a legislative change a few years go that allowed it to create a bipartisan election commission, which saved $300,000 per year.
posted by Rich Miller
Thursday, Oct 19, 17 @ 1:33 pm
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Consolidating between the city and the county is a good idea. I’m not too stressed over whether that’s in the clerk’s office or an independent election authority, though I prefer there to be a single, independent office in charge of elections.
Comment by Arsenal Thursday, Oct 19, 17 @ 1:36 pm
The real mess is in Aurora. The City of Aurora is in FOUR counties: Kane, Kendall, Will and DuPage. The DuPage County portion is handled by the DuPage County Election Commission while the other three counties - which each also have their own elected county clerk - are handled not by the county clerk but by the Aurora Election Commission. Complete confusion for residents and campaigns - and costly for taxpayers.
Comment by Anon Thursday, Oct 19, 17 @ 1:39 pm
As a McLean county voter I am less worried about partisanship of the election oversight as opposed to the overall incompetence of the staff in the clerks office as it pertains to basic election law. For that reason alone, as a voter in the county, I support the commission.
Comment by Spliff Thursday, Oct 19, 17 @ 1:41 pm
Spliff,
My favorite moment years ago in the office was voting absentee in a primary and loudly one of the workers responded to my request, “A Democrat? We haven’t had one all week!”
Comment by ArchPundit Thursday, Oct 19, 17 @ 1:46 pm
That I would be ok with. But basic management of a voters data is where i draw the line on competence.
Comment by Spliff Thursday, Oct 19, 17 @ 1:59 pm
The arguments against consolidation always includes a loss of influence and unrepresented groups.
This is where school districts wrestle with their small town’s identity versus the better the student MAY be served with consolidation.
To the voting angle and election oversight boards,
The distrust or mistrust is fueled by hyper-partisans on both sides fearful that “influence” will be either lost to “keep things honest” in one’s eyes or that the other will magically allow rampant “fraud and abuse” and corrupt the election process as a whole…
…
… in hundreds of precincts that are still legally monitored with credentialed poll watchers.
The fear is always real to “some”.
Comment by Oswego Willy Thursday, Oct 19, 17 @ 2:00 pm
I’m always in favor of county consolidation for elections. So much more organized. Take Wisconsin, for example. They don’t have county control for their elections anywhere, which means they have somewhere in the range of 1,852 separate election commissions. That’s a mess.
Comment by QCLib Thursday, Oct 19, 17 @ 2:58 pm
OW, my concern is not with the integrity of the election or the hacking of data by Russians or anyone else. My problem is with basic neglect of voters individual data, to which when I confronted them about my own, they did not even know that each individual had a unique voter ID # assigned by the state so that people couldn’t be registered more than once in different counties.
Comment by Spliff Thursday, Oct 19, 17 @ 3:51 pm
Peoria combined a few years ago into the Commission. I believe the transition went smoothly and it works well.
Comment by gdubya Thursday, Oct 19, 17 @ 3:56 pm
===My problem is with basic neglect of voters individual data, to which when I confronted them about my own, they did not even know that each individual had a unique voter ID # assigned by the state so that people couldn’t be registered more than once in different counties.===
Consolidation with Education.
None of this will be easy, or on equal knowledge or footing.
Stepping up their game and knowledge is part and parcel of consolidation.
Comment by Oswego Willy Thursday, Oct 19, 17 @ 4:02 pm