http://www.jacksonville.com/tu-online/stories/071308/met_303114996.shtmlVoter law threatens to cloud elections
The law charges a fee for registration drives; a group is fighting it.
By DEIRDRE CONNER, The Times-Union
Confusion over how citizens can register to vote is threatening to muddle upcoming elections in Florida.
Voter registration drives statewide are under fire from a new state law that establishes stiff fees for groups who undertake them. The League of Women Voters is challenging that law.
It's leading to confusion over what's allowed right now, said Jennifer Davis, spokeswoman for the Florida Department of State.
Locally, elections officials are trying to reach out to "inactive voters," or people who haven't voted recently or have moved without updating their address.
More than 100,000 people in Northeast Florida are on inactive voter lists, which means they could face trouble at the polls as early as August.
State law says elections officials must declare inactive any voter who hasn't returned a prepaid address confirmation within 30 days or whose mail has been returned as undeliverable.
Most people on the list are still eligible to vote. But if the county elections office doesn't have a correct address, they might end up at the wrong polling place. They'll have to fill out new paperwork and, depending on their new address, could have to go to a different polling place.
On a busy Election Day, that extra time could make or break the chance to cast a ballot.
"What we worry about is if they go to their old precinct at 6:45 and the polls close at 7," said Jerry Holland, Duval County elections supervisor.
A whopping one in six Duval County voters is considered inactive. In suburban counties, that figure was about one in 10.
Inactive voters who haven't voted in two general elections are purged and would have to re-register before voting again. But the purge won't happen until after the November election.
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The League of Women Voters of Florida is suing the state, saying the 2007 law will have a "chilling" effect on registration drives. They argue that the regulations disproportionately affect poor, African-American, Hispanic and women voters because they are twice as likely to register through a drive, said Dianne Wheatley-Giliotti, past president of the league.