SB 213-MUNICIPAL ELECTION BOARDS  8:24:25 AM CO-CHAIR LEDOUX announced that the final order of business would be SENATE BILL NO. 213, "An Act relating to the appointment of municipal election boards." LARRY SIMMONS, Staff, Senator Peter Micciche, Alaska State Legislature, said SB 213 allows municipalities to conduct elections efficiently. Currently, Alaska statute requires that an election board be established for every election and for every precinct. If an election is conducted by other than in- person balloting, the municipality still has to hire an election board, but the board does not have a job to do in every precinct, because people are not voting in person, he explained. "This bill simply allows, through statute, for municipalities to conduct elections efficiently by means other than in-person balloting," he said. There is a zero fiscal note, and it has the support of the Alaska Municipal Clerks Association, he said. The Kenai Peninsula Borough requested this change, he added. 8:26:04 AM REPRESENTATIVE KITO III asked if Alaska allows non-in-person municipal elections. MR. SIMMONS replied yes, Alaska statute allows for other balloting, like mail-in ballots. 8:26:37 AM CO-CHAIR LEDOUX noted that the Lake and Peninsula Borough holds all municipal elections by absentee ballots. Is it true that, currently, that borough has to have an election board even though the board would have nothing to do? MR. SIMMONS said his understanding is that in conducting elections, there must be an election board for each precinct. He said he does not know what the make-up of the Lake and Peninsula Borough's election precincts look like, but the current statute says that they must have an election board for each precinct, and this bill would allow a municipality to choose to only have election boards at, for example, an absentee precinct, "so that people would be able to go to an absentee precinct and vote in person, and the rest of the mail-in ballots would not require - because they're not voting in-person - it would not require an election board at each precinct." 8:28:09 AM CO-CHAIR LEDOUX inquired as to what an election board does. MR. SIMMONS suggested that a clerk answer that question. CO-CHAIR LEDOUX opened public testimony. 8:28:46 AM JOHNI BLANKENSHIP, Clerk, Kenai Peninsula Borough, said "we requested this bill" because [the Kenai Peninsula Borough] would like to conduct elections by mail, and in reviewing the state statutes it became clear that even if the borough did conduct its elections by mail, it would still have to hire election judges to sit at polling locations where there was no balloting actually taking place. She explained that SB 213 would allow municipalities to conduct elections by mail or other means and to only hire election boards where necessary. 8:29:51 AM CO-CHAIR LEDOUX asked if there are election judges at every polling place, in addition to the person checking in voters. MS. BLANKENSHIP said those people are one in the same. Those who check voters in are considered the election board and judges, she explained. 8:30:37 AM CO-CHAIR LEDOUX recalled that in Kodiak there was one precinct where no one could vote-it was a mail-in precinct. "So election judges had to be hired specifically for that precinct even though nobody was going to vote there?" MS. BLANKENSHIP said the current law is written such that the municipality "shall appoint an election board composed of at least three judges for each precinct." She said she does not know that that was done [in Kodiak], but "we wanted to make sure that the statutes allowed us to conduct the elections in such a way that we wouldn't have to hire people when there was nothing but by-mail balloting going on." 8:31:52 AM REPRESENTATIVE HERRON asked if the reason for an election board is because identification cards are not required to vote if a judge knows the voter and can confirm his or her identity. MS. BLANKENSHIP answered yes, if the voter is personally known to one of the three judges [no identification card is required]. CO-CHAIR LEDOUX, upon determining no one else wished to testify, closed public testimony. 8:32:57 AM REPRESENTATIVE HERRON noted that he supports SB 213. CO-CHAIR NAGEAK moved to report SB 213 out of committee with individual recommendations and the accompanying fiscal note. There being no objection, SB 213 was reported from the House Community and Regional Affairs Standing Committee.