Another Round, Another Win: Washoe County's Voter Roll Maintenance Pays Off.
Washoe County's elections office just wrapped up another round of voter roll maintenance.
8,755 registrations got moved to inactive status this month, right before the federal blackout period kicked in on Aug. 5.
That's the headline. Here's the backstory.
Three years ago, our team at Citizen Outreach and our Pigpen Project couldn't get anyone at Washoe County's elections office to take our data seriously.
We flagged bad registrations. We got silence. It felt like pulling teeth.
Then a new team took over, led by Registrar Andrew McDonald. Commissioner Clara Andriola helped broker a call between us.
And for the first time in years, we were actually talking instead of fighting – unlike the hostility we still get from the Secretary of State’s office.
That relationship has paid off. Since Mr. McDonald came in, his office has canceled or inactivated more than 70,000 registrations countywide.
Back in February, the Pigpen Project submitted 86 names of voters we'd identified as having moved out of state but who were still sitting active on Washoe's rolls. The county processed them after the primary.
81 of the 86 got cleared.
That's the kind of cooperation we've been asking for statewide. Nevada Secretary of State Cisco Aguilar's office still won't give us the time of day. Washoe County did.
Now here's what happened this month.
Following the June primary, the Registrar's office mailed 19,554 address confirmation notices to voters flagged for possible inactivation. State law requires a 33-day waiting period after that.
Voters who didn't respond or update their registration during that window got moved to inactive. That's the 8,755 figure.
Of those, 8,506 came from mail ballots returned as undeliverable. The other 249 came through the Electronic Registration Information Center, known as ERIC.
Worth remembering here: ERIC doesn't cover every state. If a Nevada voter moves somewhere ERIC doesn't track, that voter can stay active on the rolls indefinitely unless someone else catches it.
That's exactly the gap the Pigpen Project's data was built to fill.
Mr. McDonald told county commissioners in June that more than 15,000 ballots, nearly 4.7% of everything mailed, bounced back undeliverable during the primary.
Forwarding orders, illegible addresses, vacant houses with no mailbox. Ballots can't be forwarded like regular mail.
One thing worth being clear about. Inactive doesn't mean removed. These voters are still registered and still eligible to vote.
They just won't automatically get a mail ballot dropped at their door anymore.
Restoring active status takes minutes. Online, by mail, at a vote center, or by calling the Registrar's office directly.
“With the general election right around the corner, our recent voter roll maintenance is an important reminder for voters to check their registration,” Mr. McDonald said. “A quick review can confirm that your status is active, your information is current and you are ready to vote.”
One more thing. The 90-day blackout only stops the county from running its own bulk cleanup. It doesn't stop any voter from updating their own registration right now.
If you live in Washoe County, take Mr. McDonald's advice. Check your status at registertovote.nv.gov before ballots start going out for November.
And if you're wondering why this kind of progress isn't happening everywhere in Nevada, ask Cisco Aguilar's office. We already know what they'll tell you: nothing at all.
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