Author: Kim Strach, Executive Director
Section 5.4 of S.L. 2013-381 (H.B. 589) requires the State Board of Elections to include in all its forms a prominent statement that submitting fraudulently or falsely complete declarations is a Class I felony under Chapter 163 of the General Statutes. Our office has been actively revising all of its forms to be compliant with this provision. State Board of Elections forms will now bear the statement:
Fraudulently or falsely completing this form is a Class I felony under Chapter 163 of the N.C. General Statutes.
Here is our plan for implementation of this change:
- Modifications to all SEIMS forms will be included in the next SEIMS release (January 2014). This includes the one-stop application, the OVRD ATV form, the SEIMS voter registration form, the incomplete letter forms, etc.
- The North Carolina Voter Registration Application already bears a statement that says “Warning: If you sign this form and know it to be false, you can be convicted of a Class I felony”; however, this form is being revised to remove preregistration language and to include information regarding the provisions related to photo ID.
- Modifications have either been made or are in the process of being made to the template of several physical forms or envelopes, specifically:
- Voter registration postcards (verification, confirmation, NCOA)
- Authorization to Vote Form
- Absentee container-return envelopes o Provisional envelope and application
- Challenge application and envelope
- Candidate Filing Form
- Petition Templates
Given the condensed time for implementation of this bill, we wanted to provide county boards of elections with wide latitude in how you comply with these changes. Thus, for purposes of the 2013 October and November elections, county boards of elections should make every reasonable effort to comply with this statutory mandate. At your discretion, you may use one or more of the options below on your various preprinted printed forms or envelopes:
- Reprint any physical form/envelope that does not currently bear a prominent statement.
- Use a stamp or label to add the prominent statement to any preprinted form.
- Provide voters with an addendum to any preprinted form that includes the prominent statement. The voter would only need to sign the actual form and not the addendum.
- Some other method that you preclear in advance with our office. For clarification, you do not need to make any special accommodations for forms printed from SEIMS.
↓ Prominent Statement on SBOE Forms and 2013 Municipal Elections: Numbered Memo 2013-04 (PDF)