Online voter registration will bolster Ohio’s goals

Ohio has come a long way, baby, toward encouraging voter participation over the past decade. After all, it wasn’t that long ago when the Buckeye State starred as the shameful poster child of voter suppression. Many can readily recall that during the 2004 presidential election, an estimated 175,000 voters did not cast ballots in many urban areas because of overcrowded and disorganized polling sites where wait times were seven hours or longer.

Out of that shame came productive and progressive action, largely accomplished under the leadership of Jon Husted, Ohio’s secretary of state for the past five years. Albeit with bumps along the way, our state continues to work toward expanding free and unfettered access to the ballot box.

Among voter-friendly reforms, the state now mails out absentee ballots to all registered voters, ranks among the leaders in the nation for early-voting opportunities and enables residents to update voter registrations online without the time, expense or hassle of traveling to a board of elections office.

The logical extension to those moves, of course, would be launching online voter registration. Sadly, however, an effort to do just that has struck another pesky bump in the road.

After the state Senate overwhelmingly passed Senate Bill 63 last spring to institute online registration, the measure stalled seven months in the halls of the Ohio House.

Then, when it finally came up for hearings, efforts to torpedo this public-spirited measure took center stage this week. A leader of the Ohio Christian Alliance misguidedly pleaded with lawmakers to slam the brakes on the reform this year.

In opponent testimony before a House committee Monday, Chris Long, director of the organization, said, “To open online voter registration at this time would be ill-advised.”

Further, he raised the spectre of a boogeyman hacking the online database of registrants as a means “to game the system.”

From our vantage point, the only ones playing games are Long, his organization and other opponents who seek to sidetrack and stonewall this proven tool to broaden Ohio’s voter base. Husted has pointed out that 300,000 residents have used the new online system to change registrations without any hints of irregularities or fraud. Further, the National Conference of State Legislatures reported that in the 29 states where online registration operated last year, “ no fraud or security breaches are known to date.

SECURE AND EFFICIENT SYSTEM

If that isn’t enough proof, the proposed Ohio system offers an added layer of security. All online voter registrants names, citizenship and other data would be cross-checked for accuracy against similar data housed within the Ohio Bureau of Motor Vehicles. If they don’t match or questions arise, registration would be delayed or denied.

Online registration also would promote greater efficiency and fiscal responsibility. The expansion would substantially lessen the use and risk of errors from paper forms whose data must be transferred into electronic databases. The savings in clerical costs alone would reach about $1 million per year for boards of elections, Husted estimates.

With so much going for it, state House members would shirk responsibility by failing to act quickly to advance Senate Bill 63 to Gov. John Kasich’s desk for enactment. The clock, however, is ticking fast. That’s because Husted needs to have the measure approved by next month in order to build the network for completion in time for registration for the all-important presidential election this fall.

As a critical swing state once again in this topsy-turvy election year, the eyes of the nation will be focused on Ohio, which has a reputation of making and breaking presidential aspirations. Given that spotlight, the state should not draw negative attention to needless debate over cutting options for ballot access.

Making voter registration easier, more convenient and less costly represents the next logical step toward constructing a more robust participatory democracy within our borders. Those who attempt to sabotage that effort do little but promote suppression of the vote.