Civil Rights Leaders Hail Settlement in Florida Election Suit
Feature Story by Civilrights.org staff - 9/5/2002
A class-action lawsuit brought by a coalition of national civil rights organizations on behalf of voters who asserted that they had been effectively disenfranchised in the botched 2000 elections in Florida has ended in a settlement NAACP President & CEO Kweisi Mfume called "significant.""Florida officials finally recognized the need to correct past election process problems, particularly in the areas of election administration, voter list maintenance and poll worker training. The new state laws following the 2000 election did not go far enough to make sure all Florida voters would have equal access to the polls on Election Day. The NAACP will continue to monitor the situation to make sure that not only Florida, but also all states, ensure equal access to the polls and follow the spirit and the letter of election laws," Mfume said.
NAACP was joined in the suit by the Lawyers' Committee for Civil Rights Under Law, People For the American Way Foundation (PFAWF), the Miami law firm of Williams and Associates, the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, Inc., the Advancement Project, and the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU).
The settlement is the result of two years of legal wrangling between the civil rights advocates and defendants, including the Florida Secretary of State, the Director of the Division of Elections, the Department of Highway Safety and Motor Vehicles, the Department of Children and Families, Hillsborough and Orange, Leon, Miami-Dade, Broward, Duval and Volusia counties, DBT/Choice Point, Inc.
"If fully and aggressively implemented, these Settlements will help to ensure that practices such as improper purges of names on voter rolls and poorly trained poll workers will never again deny the precious right to vote to so many," said Penda Hair, Co-Director of Advancement Project and one of the lawyers representing the plaintiffs.
"However, if voting rights are again threatened in Florida, we can enforce this agreement by returning to court, if necessary," warned PFAWF Vice President and Legal Director Elliot Mincberg.
Some of the provisions of the agreements include:
Central Voter Database
Eligible voters who were removed from the voter rolls in error will be identified and restored to the lists. New procedures will be implemented to help prevent mistakes, such as misidentifying voters as having been convicted of a felony, or incorrectly identifying voters as having registered elsewhere, from occurring in the future as the new statewide Central Voter Database is put in place.
Poll worker Training
The Division of Elections has prepared a poll worker manual that provides examples of election administration procedures as required by the new election laws. Under this agreement they will collect data on how elections are run throughout the state, including whether the procedures outlined in the manual are actually followed. The Division will report to the Legislature, beginning in 2003, on the extent of variations across the state in Election Day procedures and may make recommendations to improve effectiveness and bring about greater uniformity in a wide variety of specific areas. Florida citizens who are registered and seek- to vote should have an equal opportunity to cast their ballot.
Alternative Voting Procedures
These include provisional ballots and voting by affirmation. Counties will be encouraged to notify people who vote by alternative procedures if their vote is not counted and to give them an explanation of why the decision was made not to count their vote.
Voter Registration
The State has created a position for a National Voter Registration Act (a.k.a. "motor voter") Coordinator within the Division of Elections who will help the Secretary of State carry out his responsibility to coordinate the state's activities under the law. The NVRA Coordinator will be authorized to visit agencies and offices within the state that are required to offer their clients and consumers voter registration opportunities, to collect data from the agencies/offices, and to provide training for agency and office personnel when needed to remedy or prevent noncompliance with the NVRA.
