Rockville Election Laws at Risk: Board Pushes for City Attorney Action
During the September 30, 2024 Rockville City Council meeting, two members of the Board of Supervisors of Elections, Robert Kurnick (Chair) and David Sklar, addressed the council to express serious concerns about the enforcement of the city’s election laws following the 2023 election.
Election Law Crisis
Kurnick emphasized that Rockville faces a crisis regarding its election laws. The city attorney has declined to enforce citations issued against candidates who violated campaign finance laws in the 2023 election. According to Kurnick, the rationale provided—that violations are not “ongoing” and therefore not enforceable—renders Rockville’s campaign finance laws essentially “unenforceable.” Kurnick urged the council to direct the city attorney to enforce these violations to maintain the integrity of the city’s election laws. Without enforcement, Kurnick warned, there would be no incentive for future candidates to comply with campaign finance regulations, leading to a breakdown in transparency.
Impact on Election Integrity
David Sklar, another member of the Board, echoed Kurnick’s concerns, stating that the decision not to enforce these laws undermines the entire election process. Sklar pointed out that the failure to hold violators accountable erodes the purpose of having campaign finance laws in the first place. He noted that the current approach could lead to candidates repeatedly violating election laws with no consequences, rendering the role of the Board of Supervisors of Elections meaningless. Sklar added that if the city continues down this path, he would resign from the Board, as there would be no reason to analyze campaign finance forms if the law itself is ignored.
Continue reading →Database Error Leaves nearly 1,000 Rockville Voters Without Ballots
Due to reporting errors, the City of Rockville has suspended the ballot tracking system for the imminent election. Several voters lodged complaints with the Board of Supervisors of Elections in Rockville, stating they were notified via email that their votes had been cast, despite physically holding their ballots. David Sklar, a board member of BOSE, relayed an incident where a voter received an email alert that his ballot was en route for delivery, and within five minutes, another email confirmed the receipt of his voted ballot at the election office, even though the ballot was still in the voter’s possession. This incident raised concerns about potential election fraud.
At the Board of Supervisors of Elections’ (BOSE) meeting on Thursday, October 26, 2023, Chair Robert Kurnick acknowledged the severity of the issue, “Rather than trying to ascertain what should have happened, I think what we have to tell people is that the system was flawed in several respects. We’re sorry but it’s Taylor’s system….The whole point of this is to confirm voter confidence and it’s doing the opposite….It’s really bad.” Officially on the City’s website it’s described as an “unexpected issue technology affecting the ballot tracking system,” but there’s more happening behind the scenes. Turns out nearly 1,000 voters in Rockville did not receive ballots for the upcoming Mayor and Council election due to an error in the voter database.
The Taylor Corporation (no relation to City Clerk Sara Taylor-Ferrell) is a private company that manages the packaging and mailing of Rockville’s ballots but is largely invisible to voters. Although the ballot voters received in the mail has the return address of the City Clerk’s Office, it was mailed from another address and Taylor’s name does not appear on the materials. The State of Maryland uses Taylor for processing other government documents and the City of Rockville hired Taylor to package and mail the ballots this year.
The process is confusing but according to BOSE Chair Robert Kurnick, the “State of Maryland Board of Elections provides names and addresses to the Taylor Corporation, and they send out the ballot. In the last election, Maryland permitted voters to get delivery of their ballots online, so when the State of Maryland provided the name and addresses to Taylor, it would have a name and an address but for some people, it had a name and a ‘web delivery.’ So Taylor did not have addresses for those people, who in the last election, asked to have their ballots delivered online…of which there are hundreds.” The City Clerk stated it was about 800-900 ballots that were not mailed due to missing addresses in the State’s voter database. The City Clerk discovered the error when she received a copy of the database earlier this week.
The City Clerk is in the process of mailing the missing ballots and BOSE has prepared a statement for the Mayor and Council and the candidates for the upcoming election (see below), along with a message on the City’s website that noted, “This technical issue has not affected the integrity of the city’s election process. This issue affected only the ability of voters to track their ballots through the United States Postal Service. The issue had no effect on the actual delivery of ballots.” No mention of the missing ballots, alas.
The City Clerk also mentioned that a couple of thousand ballots have already been received and will be sent to the Montgomery County Board of Elections for processing. Ballots received will be posted on the City website starting on November 1; ballots are not counted until the polls close on Election Day.
Please remember to vote early by mail. Ballots must be received by (NOT mailed to) the City of Rockville by 8 pm on November 7. If you’re running late, two outdoor drop boxes are located at City Hall and Montrose Community Center. Four indoor drop boxes are located at the Senior Center, Lincoln Park Community Center, Twinbrook Community Center, and Thomas Farm Community Center only during hours of operation.
Max for Rockville 