Caution Rules in Taking Felons Off Rolls
Inaccurate voter information led to mistakes in the 2000 election.

Lakeland Ledger   09 October 2004

MIAMI About 1,800 new felons were removed from Florida election rolls since a controversial state database of ineligible voters was scrapped in July. But elections officials aren't reviewing old records to see if they may have missed anyone.

When the state bowed to criticism and discarded the flawed list of 48,000 potentially ineligible voters, local elections officials continued what they had been doing for years examining court records each month for new names to purge from voting rolls. They weren't required to make any other checks.

"We don't have the time or personnel to go back five years and check on the felony status of a voter," said Brenda Renfore, executive administrator for Escambia County elections. The county has purged 37 new felons from its rolls since July.

Florida is one of only a handful of states that do not automatically restore voting rights to convicted felons when they complete their sentences. The purge by elections officials has been a hotbutton issue since the 2000 presidential election, during which many citizens discovered at the polls they weren't allowed to vote.

A company hired to identify ineligible voters before that election produced an error-filled list, and elections supervisors removed voters without verifying the list's accuracy. The state hired a new contractor to create another list that election supervisors were to use this year to screen felons whose voting rights had not been restored. That list was scrapped after revelations it had a flaw that excluded Hispanic felons.

The Associated Press surveyed counties on their efforts to purge ineligible voters and received responses from 48 of the state's 67 counties. Nine had not removed any voters from their rolls since the list was tossed. One of those counties was Miami-Dade, Florida's second-largest county, with more than one million registered voters.

"We follow the law, but -within whatever flexibility we have we always do whatever we can do to err on the side of the voter and ensure that our electorate is fully enfranchised," said Seth Kaplan, a spokesman for county's elections office. "We won't put someone in felon status until we can verify that they haven't received clemency."

But some elections officials noted that the burden is on voters, who sign sworn oaths stating they are not felons, to prove their eligibility to vote.

"If they know they committed a felony and their rights were not restored, they're committing another felony at that point," said Rosa Cruz, operations manager for the Osceola County supervisor of elections.

When George W. Bush won Florida and, with it, the presidency by 537 votes, many Democrats were convinced state officials, to ensure a Republican victory, purposely culled too many voters from the rolls who would have supported Al Gore.

In May, Secretary of State Glenda Hood released the list of people identified as potential felons who should be removed from the rolls because their voting rights had not been restored. Many supervisors had expressed concern about the accuracy of the list, and some refused to remove voters.

Hood who was appointed by Gov. Jeb Bush, the president's brother pulled the list July 10 after it was reported that the list contained few Hispanics, who usually vote Republican in Florida. Local elections officials were told to use their own system for making sure felons whose voting rights had not been restored were purged from their voting rolls.

"The law is very clear," said Alia Faraj, Hood's spokeswoman. "Felons cannot vote unless they've had their rights restored. Anybody who's had their rights restored recently, double check with your supervisor of elections. There's plenty of time between now and the election."

Between July 1 and the end of September, more than 750 felons were removed from the rolls in five of the state's 10 counties with the most registered voters: Hillsborough, Orange, Duval, Lee and Volusia.

"I don't think that's an insignificant number," said Howard Simon, executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union of Florida. "Any process that disenfranchises a single voter incorrectly is a process that is troubling."

Kay Clem, supervisor of elections in Indian River County, said she has not removed anyone from the rolls recently because of concerns over accuracy of information from the courts. She said during the primary, her office received court information that inaccurately listed a voter as a felon.

On Election Day, anyone who feels they have been mistakenly removed from the voter rolls will be allowed to use a provisional ballot. Those ballots will be examined later to determine the voter's eligibility.

Sherida Crum, supervisor of elections in Wakulla County in the Florida Panhandle, said she will not remove anyone from her rolls unless she has "black and white proof" they are convicted felons.

"Supervisors are in a bad jam," she said. "If we don't remove them and they're felons, you get in trouble. And if we remove them and they're not felons, we're getting in trouble. Isn't it ridiculous? The law's got to be changed some way, somehow."