of participants in group including facilitator and note taker: 6

Main Topics Discussed: difficulties with transitioning to a voting at home system, special provisions concerning voting at home (homelessness and facilities that use group mailing systems), automatic registrations, utilizing the County Clerk's office

Part of the reason that it is difficult to encourage voter turnout may be because nobody knows what to do; legislators often have never run elections. There are no people who are elected in Congress that have run an election. Also, in KY, legislators defer to county clerks, which adds another layer of difficulty.
There are a number of provisions in place for people experiencing homelessness to still use the Vote at Home option in Colorado. First off, most of the homelessness providers offer the ability for people who frequent there to use their address. The post office also has a deal with homeless shelters to offer them special rates for PO boxes.
Other special provisions in Colorado concern assisted living facilities, as well as jails. If you qualify as an assisted living facility (with combined mail services), they send an election team out to deliver the ballots and bring accessible devices, facilitating the process 3 weeks before the election. The same is done for incarcerated people who are waiting for their sentence If they’re registered in a different county, they’ll pick up the ballot from that county.
In Colorado, automatic registrations are generated most often through the DMV, with state ID and driver's licenses. They also just expanded it to the human service agencies, like health insurance and Medicaid.
- Another big problem is that refugees and immigrants are often told to just sign voter registration forms, which can lead them to unknowingly committing voter fraud by filling out a form they’re not supposed to. Automatic registrations would alleviate some of this risk.
One recommendation is to go to the County Clerk's office (there are 120 in Kentucky) and get buy in. In order for progress to be made with voter registration, we need the County Clerk's support.