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F I S C A L I M P A C T R E P O R T

SPONSOR McSorley

ORIGINAL DATE

LAST UPDATED

1/29/08

HB

SHORT TITLE Post Election Voting System Evaluation

SB 318

ANALYST Ortiz

APPROPRIATION (dollars in thousands)

Appropriation

Recurring

or Non-Rec

Fund

Affected

FY08

FY09

100.0

Recurring

General Fund

(Parenthesis ( ) Indicate Expenditure Decreases)

Relates to HB113 and HB237

SOURCES OF INFORMATION

LFC Files

Responses Received From

Attorney General’s Office (AGO)

Secretary of State (SOS)

SUMMARY

Synopsis of Bill

Senate Bill 318 would amend the Audit Act (NMSA Section 12-6-1 et seq.) and the Election

Code (Article 1, Chapter 1 NMSA 1978) to require the State Auditor, for each general election,

to contract with an “election auditor" to oversee a random voting system check of precinct

electronic vote tabulators, alternate voting location electronic vote tabulators and absent voter

precinct electronic vote tabulators for certain statewide and federal offices. The bill provides for

random selection of samples of those tabulators. The bill repeals NMSA Section 1-14-13.1 of the

Election Code which currently provides for examining and comparing votes tallied in certain

elections.

The election auditor would be required to notify county clerks which tabulators are to be

examined, and the clerks would be required to compare hand counted vote totals for candidates

for selected offices with the respective vote totals from the electronic tabulators.

The bill sets forth additional procedures for verifying the vote counting of absentee ballots by the

electronic tabulators.

Senate Bill 318 – Page

2

The bill allows county vote canvass observers to observe the hand recounts required by the bill.

All costs of a random voting system check shall be paid by the state. The Secretary of State shall

reimburse a county for expenses incurred in conducting a random voting system check.

FISCAL IMPLICATIONS

The appropriation of $100 thousand contained in this bill is a RECURRING expense to the

GENERAL FUND. Any unexpended or unencumbered balance remaining at the end of FISCAL

YEAR 2009 shall revert to the GENERAL FUND.

The appropriation is the Secretary of State to reimburse counties for the costs incurred in

conducting automatic recounts.

SIGNIFICANT ISSUES

Current law, explains the Attorney General’s Office, requires the Secretary of State to direct

county clerks to compare electronic vote tabulations from a certain percentage of voting systems

used in the general election for president or governor with total votes counted by hand from the

paper trail from those systems. NMSA Section 1-14-13.1 (1978). This bill would repeal that

section, and replace it with the sections described above generally transferring responsibility for

vote verification from the Secretary of State to the State Auditor.

ADMINISTRATIVE IMPLICATIONS

According to the Secretary of State, “the methodology advanced in this bill will save precious

resources and time in the post-election period by focusing on those races where the margin is

tight and scrutiny is warranted."

CONFLICT, DUPLICATION, COMPANIONSHIP, RELATIONSHIP

Relates to House Bill 237, which provides for automatic recounts of certain elections; provides

for recount and recheck procedures; amending, repealing and enacting sections of the election

code.

Relates to House Bill 113, which appropriates $500 thousand from the GENERAL FUND to the

automatic recount fund, which is a new fund, for the purpose of reimbursing counties for

expenses incurred in conducting automatic recounts with money from the “Automatic Recount

Fund."

TECHNICAL ISSUES

The Attorney General’s Office suggests that Section D be broken into subsections to make it

more understandable as election recounts can be heated matters. Therefore a statute dealing with

voting accuracy needs to be plainly written for lay people to understand.

EO/bb