Cleveland, OH–Low-income
Ohio citizens will be ensured access to voter registration at Ohio public
assistance offices as a result of a settlement agreement submitted to Federal
District Court Judge Patricia A. Gaughan over this past holiday weekend.
The settlement
successfully resolves a three-year old lawsuit filed against the Ohio Secretary
of State (SOS) and the Director of the Ohio Department of Job and Family
Services (ODJFS) in September 2006 by Lorain resident Carrie Harkless,
Cleveland resident Tameca Mardis, and the Association of Community
Organizations for Reform Now (ACORN) charging widespread violations of the
federal National Voter Registration Act (NVRA). Section 7 of the NVRA requires
public assistance agencies to provide voter registration opportunities to their
clients.
Extensive
pre-suit investigation and discovery in the case revealed that many of Ohio’s county public assistance
offices were ignoring their responsibilities to provide voter registration to
their low-income clients.
Currently, only seventy-one percent of low-income Ohioans are registered
to vote compared to ninety percent of affluent Ohioans.
Before the lawsuit,
there was no state official overseeing the state’s compliance with the federal
law. Although Ohio has designated
the Secretary of State as its chief election official responsible for NVRA
compliance, at the time the lawsuit was filed, then-Secretary of State Kenneth
Blackwell contended that the state’s obligation to provide voter registration
services to its low-income residents was satisfied by the maintenance of a
toll-free hotline for public assistance offices to call. ODJFS claimed that
Ohio law prohibited it from ensuring compliance by county offices.
“As a result of the
steps the Secretary of State and ODJFS Director will take, we expect hundreds
of thousands of voting-eligible low-income Ohioans to be registered to vote,”
said Lisa Danetz, Senior Counsel in the Democracy Program at Demos and co-lead
counsel for the plaintiffs.
“We applaud the integration of voter registration into agency
processes as well as the planned monitoring of the county public assistance
offices.”
The case was filed
in the United States District Court for the Northern District of Ohio, and
after a decision by the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals, the case
returned to the district court where it settled after extensive fact
discovery. The Court of
Appeals decision established an important precedent that state officials have
ultimate responsibility for compliance with this federal law, even when local
agencies also have day-to-day responsibility for administering public benefits
programs.
“The changes made
under this agreement represent a long-overdue recognition of the need for an
active program of voter registration at public assistance offices in Ohio” said
Jon Greenbaum, Legal Director of the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under
Law. “With nearly a full year before the next federal general election,
we believe that the implementation of these improvements will bring many thousands
of Ohio citizens who would otherwise be unregistered to the polls on election
day 2010.”
As a result of the
agreement, the provision of voter registration services will be
institutionalized within the office procedures at county DJFS offices, and both
the SOS and ODJFS will make sure such services are provided. In particular:
— A notice of the
availability of voter registration and a voter registration application will be
integrated within each agency’s benefits forms;
–The provision of
voter registration, and its details, will be incorporated into the ODJFS
statewide computer system used by all frontline caseworkers;
–The state will
implement an extensive and regular training program for those employees with
voter registration responsibilities;
— There will be
regular reporting and monitoring of important data from the statewide computer
system, county boards of elections and county DJFS offices;
— The SOS will
conduct at least 20 unannounced spot checks of local agencies each year;
–Both the SOS and
ODJFS will follow up with counties whose local agencies appear not to be
providing voter registration services;
–ODJFS will conduct
a regular review of voter registration services, using the same mechanisms that
it employs to oversee the local provision of the Supplemental Nutrition
Assistance Program (formerly food stamps); and,
–To broaden voter
registration among low-income residents, the SOS will designate the Department
of Veterans Affairs, in its administration of medical services and services for
homeless veterans, as a voter registration agency. The SOS will also work with the Ohio Department of
Rehabilitation and Correction to encourage voter registration among recently
released offenders.
“This settlement is good news for all citizens in Ohio and especially
the low income communities we serve. The fact that the state of Ohio will
honor its duty under the law by assisting people to register to vote when they
are in government offices will help more citizens become voters,” said Mary
Keith, a member of Ohio ACORN’s Board of Directors.
“Across
the country, the people least likely to be registered to vote are those from
low-income households,” said Teresa James, Election Counsel for Project
Vote. “Our hope is that other states that have been ignoring the NVRA will
not wait to be sued to fulfill their obligations to these millions of
unregistered Americans.”
“We are
delighted to have worked with our co-counsel and Ohio officials to ensure that
Ohio citizens receiving public assistance will be afforded a greater
opportunity to register to vote and participate in the democratic
process,” said Neil Steiner, a partner at Dechert LLP.
The groups have
filed similar lawsuits in Indiana and New Mexico, and in 2008 successfully
settled a lawsuit in Missouri that has led to a vast increase in voter
registration applications submitted at the state’s public assistance offices.
In fact, agency-based registrations in Missouri skyrocketed from 8,000 a year
to more than 100,000 in just eight months after the court-ordered settlement.
It is estimated that proper implementation of the NVRA’s public assistance
provisions nationwide could result in 2-3 million additional voter
registrations per year.
The plaintiffs in
the Ohio case are represented by Demos, the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights
Under Law, Project Vote, Dechert LLP and Cleveland attorney Donna Taylor Kolis
of Freedman, Domiano & Smith. The full settlement agreement can be viewed here.