Absent voter early tabulation

All communities are allowed to authorize an AV counting board (AVCB), separate from an early voting site, to process and tabulate AV ballots on the Monday before Election Day. Cities and townships with a population of at least 5,000, and cities and townships with a combined AVCB, may process and tabulate AV ballots on any of the 8 days before Election Day.

After the local clerk has verified the signature on the envelope and that the voter hasn’t already voted, an absent voter ballot may be approved for tabulation. The clerk should write or stamp the date the envelope was received and indicate that the ballot is approved for tabulation. 

The deadline to notify the Secretary of State that a clerk intends to participate in preprocessing and tabulation of absent voter ballots is Tuesday, Jan. 30. This notice should be emailed to Elections@Michigan.gov with the subject line: Early tabulation notice. No later than Feb. 9, 2024, clerks who are participating in early tabulation must post on their website and in their office the dates and hours, location, and number of election inspectors who will be participating in processing and tabulation.

Locations for early voting sites for the presidential primary must be finalized by Dec. 29, 2023. Notice for newly established early voting sites and polling places must be sent no later than Jan. 13, 2024. A sample early voting site notice is available in eLearning.

The election records retention schedule has been updated. A retention period has been added for drop box video recordings. If the footage is created, it must be retained for 30 days after the creation date. Drop box collection records must be retained for two years after the date of certification of the election. Because a voter’s QVF record serves as the official record of a voter’s request to be placed on the permanent ballot list, there is no need for the clerk who receives the original application to forward it to another clerk when the voter moves. Those applications are subject to the regular absentee ballot application retention, which is six years after the certification of the first election held after the application is received. 

Under the recent early voting legislation, once a polling place or early voting (EV) site is approved, the appropriate clerk must send a notice specifying its location to each voter eligible to vote at that polling place or EV site. Because the Feb. 27, 2024, presidential primary is the first time most voters will participate in early voting, most voters (those who did not participate in the Nov. early voting pilot) must receive the notice. The notice must be sent by Jan. 13, 2024, and must include all of the following:

• All EV sites established or changed by Dec. 29 (the sixtieth day before the election) where the voter is eligible to vote.
• If any additional polling places have been established or changed for the presidential primary, their locations.
• The days and hours of operation at each site for each day early voting is offered.

If a temporary change to a polling place/EV site occurs between Jan. 12 and Jan. 27 (for an EV site offering 9 days of early voting) or between Jan. 12 and Feb. 6 (for polling places), clerks must send an additional notice. If a temporary change is necessary within 20 days of the election or start of EV because the location has been damaged, destroyed, or rendered inaccessible or unusable, a notice need not be sent but the clerk must post a notice on the former polling place location/EV as well as on the local website and SOS website.

The notice of EV sites must be provided as a separate notice by mail via postcard or letter. A sample EV site notice postcard is available on eLearning.

Precincts and polling place change notices-effective for Feb. 27, 2024

If your local election commission intends to redraw precinct boundary lines to be in effect for the Feb. 27, 2024 Presidential Primary, this action must be made no later than December 29, 2023. Please send precinct boundary change requests to ElectionData@Michigan.gov, with SUBJECT: Precinct Boundary Change, and include a brief description of the request and, if necessary, the approved resolution and marked up street index (including maps) with your change request.

Following the action taken by the local election commission, only voters affected by a precinct number change must be issued a new voter identification card listing the new precinct number. If the precinct boundary change requires a change in polling place for the voter, the new voter identification card will reflect the new polling place. The deadline to notify voters of any change in a polling place is 45 days prior to the first election implementing the change, or Jan. 13, 2024.

Finally, we are aware of an issue with generating voter ID cards using the Custom Voter List. The QVF Redistricting Guide includes instructions for using the redistricting tool to generate ID cards for voters in certain regions.

Upcoming BOE closures

Accessibility spotlight

The Bureau is continuing to feature a series of videos and articles designed to increase familiarity with general accessibility requirements and best practices. 

As election officials, it is critical that we support all individuals’ right to vote and provide the necessary resources to help voters feel more engaged and confident.  

We believe that this series will be educational and help us all continue to ensure that everyone can vote privately and independently, whether they vote at a polling place or at home. We encourage you to review the previous accessibility spotlights and use these videos in your trainings.

Reminders 

2022/2023 Clerk Continuing Education must be complete by Dec. 31, 2023

All modules and documents needed to complete the 2022/2023 Continuing Education Curriculum are available in eLearning. To remain accredited, clerks must complete all the continuing education training requirements by the end of the year. The continuing education curriculum consists of the following:

Please note that the “Signature Verification Training” and “Address Confidentiality Program Module” documents are the same documents that have been previously shared with clerks and have been in eLearning since this summer. The Signature Verification, Voter Notification, and Signature Cure Document has been updated to reflect the changes made by Proposal 2022-2 and implementing legislation. The trainings must be completed by Dec. 31, 2023, to maintain accreditation. The Bureau estimates it will take approximately one hour to complete all three trainings. 

If you have already completed these trainings, you do not need to review them again by Dec. 31 to maintain your accreditation. However, all clerks should review the updated Signature Verification, Voter Notification, and Signature Cure Document prior to the Feb. 27 Presidential Primary Election to ensure you have received the updated training.

Presidential Primary Ballot Selection Form report in QVF

The Presidential Primary Ballot Selection Form, which must sent at least 60 days before the Presidential Primary to voters on the permanent mail ballot list who have not made a political party ballot selection, is now available in eLearning. Although the form cannot be generated directly out of the QVF mass mailing module, BOE has created a report that will allow clerks to mass-mail the application on their own or with a vendor.

The “Presidential Primary Ballot Selection Form” report in QVF and can be found under “Absentee Voter” on the “Reports” page. This report has been updated so that you can choose a label format from the “Report Style” options dropdown, either 2- or 3- rows across on a sheet of labels. An updated guide on using this report is available in eLearning under “Quick Guide – Ballot Selection Form”.

We recommend that you print two copies of these labels, one for the outgoing mail to the voter, and one for the return envelope.

Election legislation in 2023

As you know, 2023 has been a busy year for election-related legislation! The Bureau has compiled a summary document of election-related bills that were signed by the Governor, along with descriptions of those bills, the Public Act (PA) numbers assigned to them, and the dates they will take effect. Most bills did not receive immediate effect from the Legislature, so they will take effect 91 days after the Legislature adjourns for the year, or Feb. 13, 2024 (note: one previous update mistakenly identified this timeline as running from the governor’s signature, rather than Legislative adjournment). This means all early voting bills will be in effect for the start of the constitutionally mandated period of early voting beginning Feb. 17, 2024.

QVF’s Mass Ballot module will not support Presidential Primary

Clerk’s offices should plan to use AV Scan or AV Details in QVF to assign ballots to voters for the Presidential Primary. The Mass Ballot module that allows the recording of ballot numbers in bulk cannot accommodate assigning ballot numbers by party or ballot type.