Tuesday, October 21, 2008

A Call From The Associated Press

It is election time and the State of Washington is one of only two states that allow absentee ballots to be mailed as late as election day.

Translated...that means that we don't know the outcome of our close elections until days after the elections are over. That is a total drag for candidates that lose sleep wondering if they have won or not....I mean...what do you tell the kids???

Most states only count ballots that arrive by election day. The exceptions are ballots mailed from out of state or from the military.

In 2004 I introduced legislation that would require ballots to be in by election day. The bill was signed by conservatives and liberals and actually got a positive editorial from the usually "We don't like Pam Roach" Seattle PI editorial board. The bill unanimously passed out of my committee, but failed to become law.

The national AP is interested in the odd way we do this and so today I was called on to comment.

Last week the TV cameras came out to the house on yet a different issue. (The story hasn't broken so I won't mention the subject yet. But, yes, it does involve DSHS.)

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

How long before it does break?