Vote anywhere? Not anytime soon. Kansas rules frustrate Sedgwick County commissioners

You may not be allowed to vote anywhere other than your designated Sedgwick County polling site on Election Day next year, despite a 2019 law intended to allow you to vote anywhere.

The law has yet to be implemented, and county commissioners have signaled they’re ready to drop the idea, citing frustration with Kansas Secretary of State Scott Schwab’s rules and regulations for it.

Sedgwick County government has been the main proponent of the “Vote Anywhere” law and helped move it through the Legislature as Senate Bill 130.

Now, two of its most vocal supporters – commissioners David Dennis and Jim Howell – have backed away after Schwab’s appointed county election official asked the county last week for nearly $1 million, in part to implement Schwab’s rules by 2023.

“We have to be thoughtful, cautious and deliberate to get this right for our citizens,” Sedgwick County Election Commissioner Angela Caudillo told county commissioners. “That’s what we want to do, and that’s what they expect.”

Caudillo said the election office needs to get several pieces of equipment if it’s going to turn all 83 polling sites into vote centers that are open to voters from all precincts:

▪ Replace and add to its electronic poll books (400 replacement iPads and 158 new iPads): $420,000

▪ Upgrade voting systems with software that would place multiple ballot questions on the same screen, instead of the one-question-per-screen setup the county has in place: $345,000

▪ An additional 55 ballot on-demand printers to ensure there’s one at every polling site: $176,000

▪ Hire a consultant to do data analysis and survey work to help create a plan for implementing voting centers: unknown cost

The estimate was unwelcome news to a commission that pushed for the new law for several years.

“I’m ready to forget Senate Bill 130,” Dennis said. “It was a great idea that’s developed into something that has just turned into a nightmare.”

“I’m about to jump horses here because this Senate Bill 130 is a great idea, but we’re making this so difficult that it’s almost like it’s not worth the trouble,” Howell said.

Schwab did not respond to questions for this story.

It’s the latest skirmish in a years-long battle between Sedgwick County government, which had hoped to expand voter access in the 2020 presidential election, and Schwab, who has effectively blocked the county from doing so until 2023 at the earliest.

Last year, Schwab fired Sedgwick County Election Commissioner Tabitha Lehman, a fan of the new law, after she violated a Kansas policy on accessing the state’s voter registration database while working from home in 2020.

Lehman, a Republican appointed by former Secretary of State Kris Kobach in 2011, was receiving cancer treatments at the time and her doctor told her not to work at the election office following a directive by Schwab that voters be exempt from state and local mask requirements.

Lehman’s firing was made public in January 2021. Schwab didn’t name her replacement, Caudillo, until July 16, two days after Sedgwick County Manager Tom Stolz had presented the 2022 recommended budget and less than three weeks before the August primary election.

Caudillo last week estimated that the county would likely need to spend more than $940,000 this year to be able to use vote centers in 2023. Without it, the earliest residents could “vote anywhere” on Election Day would be 2025 (unless a special election is called before then).

Sedgwick County has used voting centers during early voting for several election cycles. But state law has barred the county from doing so on Election Day until it complies with Schwab’s rules and regulations attached to the law.

Those rules and regulations – not completed until last spring – kept Sedgwick County from expanding voting access in 2021. They require several months of planning, testing and public outreach, and then a detailed planning document filed at least six months in advance of the election.

The rules and regulations also block the county from expanding voting access in the 2022 election cycle, which includes statewide gubernatorial, attorney general and secretary of state races and a constitutional amendment aimed at eliminating women’s right to an abortion in Kansas.

The rules prohibit county election commissioners from using vote centers for the first time in a general or primary election in an even-numbered year.

“It keeps pushing back a year every time we ask,” Dennis said.

Dennis also disputed Caudillo’s cost estimate, saying many of those expenses were unnecessary and could be pared down, such as a software upgrade that would place multiple questions on one screen, saving voters from having to hit a button after each question.

“I can stand there a couple more seconds and press a couple more buttons and save $345,000 possibly,” Dennis said.

“That is an accurate statement,” Caudillo said. “There are some additional benefits to the software. It does improve our programming. It does upgrade our operating system, replaces our server and some of the hardware. Technology is always changing and we do, especially where voting is concerned, we do want to be on the front of it rather than trying to catch up, but I believe your comments are correct. Not changing the voting system would not affect voting. You are correct.”

Caudillo’s cost estimate was presented at a county staff meeting, where the commission does not take action on agenda items. But the consensus was that the extra $1 million price tag was a non-starter.

“The theory we had when we started this process is not where we ended up,” Howell said. “Where we are today, the complexity that they’ve created around this, in my opinion, I’ve kind of lost interest in the whole thing, personally.”