Voter Registration Drive Precautions

The Madison City Clerk’s Office urges voters to check their registration online at https://MyVote.wi.gov, especially if they completed a voter registration form with someone who approached them on the street.

The City Clerk’s Office is receiving an unprecedented number of incomplete voter registration applications submitted by national organizations holding voter registration drives.

To save taxpayer resources, the City Clerk’s Office encourages voters to use one of these options if they need to register or update their voter registration:

• Register at https://MyVote.wi.gov if you have a Wisconsin driver license/ID and have an up-to-date address on file with the DMV.
• Register at any Madison Public Library if you live in the City of Madison. Madison library staff are all trained by the Clerk’s Office on voter registration and proof of address.
• If registering with someone out in the community, look for someone wearing a Voter Education Ambassador pin. These individuals have been trained by the City Clerk on voter registration and proof of address.

Registering with groups that do not follow proper procedures may mean you are not registered to vote at your current address. For the August Primary, many Madison polling places saw voters who expected to be listed on the poll book, but the group with which they registered had not submitted a complete registration form to the Clerk’s Office. Fortunately, these voters were able to register at the polls on Election Day.

One example of the volume of incomplete registrations being submitted: When registration closed for the August Primary, a group called Wisconsin Voices mailed the Madison City Clerk’s Office approximately 1,500 registration forms. Of those forms:

• 597 had no proof of address
• 132 had insufficient proof of address – the type of document was not acceptable under state law, the address on the document did not match the registration address, or the attached photo of proof of address was too blurry to read
• 3 were currently ineligible to register to vote
• 82 were duplicate registrations – voters already registered at the address listed

In the past week alone, the Madison City Clerk’s Office sent registrations back to voters in 60 communities – from Ashland to Wyocena – instructing them to send their registration form and proof of address to their own Clerk’s Office.

City of Madison voters whose incomplete registration forms have been returned through the mail are encouraged to visit the nearest Madison Public Library for help with completing the registration process.

The goal of the City Clerk’s Office is that each eligible voter will be able to cast a ballot and have that ballot counted.