Georgia’s Secretary of State’s office will “instruct” local elections officials to automatically update addresses for people who move within the same county as part of a settlement reached in a lawsuit filed by the ACLU of Georgia against Secretary of State Brian Kemp, and the Fulton County Board of Registration and Elections.
In the short term, the mutual agreement means the information of 35,000 Georgians will be updated. It will also make voting easier in the future for people who move within the same county, said Sean Young, legal director with the ACLU of Georgia.
“If someone’s address isn’t updated they may show up at the wrong polling place,” Young said. “They’re supposed to be given an opportunity at that point to go ahead and vote and have the opportunity to change their address at the polling site. But sometimes what happens is the voter gets frustrated and then they’re turned away. They look for their correct polling place and they may not have enough time to find the correct polling place.”
Last year, a pool of 168,941 registered voters who moved within the same county were sent notices by the Secretary of State’s office. If they did not respond within 30 days, they would have been listed as “inactive,” triggering a process that could ultimately result in their name being removed from the voter rolls.
That would have happened if they didn’t vote in the next two federal elections, officially contact elections officials, or update their registration information.
