On-line Vote Registration and Change of Address

• Seeking legislative authority to allow Ohioans with a valid drivers’ license or state identification card to register
to vote and change their address on-line, increasing access for voters and reducing the cost of processing paper
documents for county boards of elections.
• Approximately 10 states are currently, or plan to offer on-line registration, including Arizona, California, Colorado,
Delaware, Indiana, Kansas, Louisiana, Oregon, Utah and Washington. A number of other states are considering
legislation.

Statewide Standards to Govern Absentee & Early Voting

• Setting the window for absentee voting at 21 days by mail and 16 days in-person prior to Election Day. (The voting
period for military voters would remain 45 days).
• Requiring all boards of elections to be open from 8am – 12pm for the two Saturdays within the in-person voting
period and to be closed on Sundays.
• Closing all in-person absentee voting the Friday before the Election Day in order to give boards of elections time to
update their poll books and voter rolls.
• Establishing statewide standards to govern the absentee voting process, including the prohibition of boards of
elections from mailing unsolicited absentee ballot request forms or pre-paying the postage for returned absentee ballot
applications or voted ballots and clarifying the information necessary for the voter to provide to obtain and cast an
absent voter’s ballot.

Certification of Electronic Poll Books

• Several counties have already successfully piloted electronic poll books. Granting the Secretary of State more
authority to certify the technology will allow for more testing and consideration to deploy the technology statewide.
• Instead of relying on printed poll books and maps, electronic poll books have tremendous potential for reducing
costs for local boards of elections and enhancing a voter’s experience at the polls by increasing information flow and
accuracy and helping to reduce provisional ballots.

Enhanced Statewide Voter Database

• Developing a more centralized database to help improve accuracy by cross-checking voter information files against
existing state data, including the Bureau of Motor Vehicles, the Ohio Department of Health, the Ohio Department of
Job & Family Services and the Ohio Department of Rehabilitation & Corrections.
• Allowing the Secretary of State to pursue agreements for data sharing with other states to better track voters who
move from one state to the other to better ensure the integrity of Ohio’s voter rolls. In this effort, Ohio could join other
states with existing data sharing compacts, including Arizona, Arkansas, Colorado, Illinois, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky,
Louisiana, Mississippi, Missouri, Nebraska, Oklahoma, South Dakota and Tennessee.

Improved Verification Process for Valid Provisional and Absentee Ballots

• Requiring voters who are registering to vote or voting an absentee or provisional ballot who chose to use their Social
Security Number for identification purposes, to provide all nine digits instead of just the last four, thereby increasing
the ability for the board of elections to successfully determine the validity of the ballot.