Allegheny County executive asks Harrisburg for funding, flexibility for elections

Allegheny County Executive Rich Fitzgerald on Tuesday urged state lawmakers to provide funding for elections, allow for earlier pre-canvassing and give counties greater flexibility in the way they manage how their elections are run.

Fitzgerald testified before the Pennsylvania Senate’s Special Committee on Election Integrity and Reform via Zoom. The committee heard testimony from Fitzgerald and officials from Philadelphia, gauging election concerns from the commonwealth’s most populous counties as part of their comprehensive review of the 2020 General Election.

In his testimony, Fitzgerald called changes to the voting process that were passed by state lawmakers in 2019 and 2020 “unfunded mandates.”

Abiding by those changes and dealing with a pandemic more than doubled the cost of holding elections in 2020, he said.

In 2019, Allegheny County’s elections cost just under $6 million. In 2020, that number rose to about $14 million — an increase of about 130%.

Of that $14 million, $7.5 million was paid by taxpayers, Fitzgerald said in a written testimony provided to the Senate committee.

Fitzgerald said federal CARES funding (pandemic relief money) helped defray the costs of last year’s election. But he noted those funds wouldn’t be there to offset election costs in the future.

The county also used $2 million from the private-sector nonprofit Center for Civic Life, which was used for staffing satellite locations.

“We do request, if the state is going to have these mandates on elections departments to do things in a certain way, we don’t think that should be borne by the county property taxpayers,” he said. “There should be help by the state government with these mandates that continue to come down.”

Increased postage costs, printing costs, a marketing campaign, training needs and personal protective equipment (PPE) contributed to the extra expenses incurred during the 2020 election, Fitzgerald said in his written testimony.

The county also invested more in hiring additional workers to manage the absentee and mail-in voting processes and the additional election offices to accommodate over-the-counter voting demands.

The Help America Vote Act, which the United States Congress passed in 2002, came with federal funding, Fitzgerald noted. He wants the state to similarly fund their voting requirements.

He also asked for an earlier pre-canvassing period. Pre-canvassing means verifying ballots, opening them, flattening them in order to be put in a voting machine and counting them.

Under the current system, canvassing can begin at 7 a.m. on Election Day. Fitzgerald proposed pre-canvassing should be allowed to occur “at any time following the deadline to file any challenge to absentee or mail-in ballots.”

That presently would be on the Friday before the election, he said.

During the 2020 election, Fitzgerald said, election workers spent up to 16 hours on Election Day counting mail-in and absentee ballots before they took a break at 2 a.m. to ensure workers wouldn’t begin making mistakes.

“Pre-canvassing, and indeed canvassing, are not easy or quick processes,” Fitzgerald said.

He noted states such as Florida and Ohio are allowed to begin the pre-canvassing process earlier.

Fitzgerald said he would like to see Pennsylvania allow for earlier pre-canvassing “so that we can have results and confidence for the public on election night.”

Greater flexibility also would help the election process and potentially help cut costs, Fitzgerald said.

Specifically, he wanted flexibility in staffing requirements. Currently, they are required to staff each of the county’s 1,323 polling places with six people each — five election workers and a constable. Those workers must work the entire 13-hour shift.

Fitzgerald requested that the county be able to decide how many workers are needed at each polling place. He also suggested giving counties the option of allowing people to work split shifts, a move that might make it easier to recruit poll workers.

Fitzgerald also urged state lawmakers to make the deadline to register to vote earlier than 15 days before the election, or alternatively, to allow for Election Day registration.

He suggested the deadline for mail-in ballot applications should be earlier than seven days before the election.