A state lawmaker and a governor’s aide said Wednesday that the state’s county clerks are overestimating what it will take to successfully hold an election this year.
This week, the clerks estimated it could cost as much as $15 million extra to conduct the primarily paper-ballot system that Gov. Bill Ritter and legislative leaders have proposed.
But at a Senate committee meeting Wednesday, Trey Rogers, the governor’s chief legal counsel, said the clerks included costs in the estimate that aren’t necessary, such as those for additional ballot-counting machines and for substantially more paper ballots than might be needed. Instead, Rogers said the extra costs could be as low as $5.2 million, of which the state has already committed to fund about $3.8 million through various means.
Sen. Chris Romer, D-Denver, agreed. “No offense, but I think people saw Santa Claus coming,” Romer said at a committee hearing for Senate Bill 189, which lays out the paper- ballot plan.
The committee unanimously passed the bill, which now moves to the Appropriations Committee.
The suggestion infuriated several clerks, who oppose the paper-ballot bill along with Secretary of State Mike Coffman.
“What they’re basically trying to do is to say, ‘Secretary of state, county clerks, you don’t know how to run elections, so we’re going to do it for you,’ ” said El Paso County Clerk Bob Balink.
Balink estimated he needs to order 2 million paper ballots, even though his county has only about 350,000 registered voters. He said he needs the extra ballots to report results by precinct and to make sure there are enough ballots depending on when and where people vote. The bill says clerks don’t have to report results by precinct.
Jefferson County Clerk Pam Anderson estimated she needs more than $400,000 to lease additional ballot-counting machines so she can put machines in each polling place. Anderson said it is more secure and efficient to count ballots at polling places instead of driving them to a main office to count.
“With our size and the number of ballots we would have on Election Day, it’s a better way to go,” she said.
Sen. Ken Gordon, a Denver Democrat who is sponsoring SB 189, said that is the ideal solution. But, he said, the state can’t afford it.
“We’re dealing with limited resources,” he said. “We need the clerks to work with us and recognize that we’re not trying to hurt them.”
Committee members took out a requirement from SB 189 that counties pay the return-postage costs for people who vote by mail. That will save the counties about $1.3 million, Rogers said. Gordon said officials are working to find more money for the counties.
John Ingold: 303-954-1068 or jingold@denverpost.com
