TITLE
Recommendation to receive and file an overview and summary of the 2018 Election Cycle.
DISCUSSION
Elections:
On April 10, 2018, the City of Long Beach, Office of the City Clerk, coordinated a Primary Nominating Election to fill the Mayor, City Attorney, City Auditor, City Prosecutor, and Council Districts 1, 3, 5, 7 and 9 seats. The City Attorney, City Auditor, City Prosecutor, and Council District 1 seats were unopposed. The voter turnout for the Primary Nominating Election was 15.83 percent.
For the Primary Nominating Election Official Sample Ballot Booklet, the Office of the City Clerk revised the cover and fonts with bright colors and photography using the slogan “Long Beach Turns Out.” Employees and residents entering the main lobby of City Hall interacted with a new map installation featuring all the polling locations and historical landmarks. The map installation was created using overlays of existing GIS maps. In addition to past engagement strategies, two billboards were used to advertise the election.
The deadline to consolidate the City of Long Beach General Municipal Election with the Los Angeles Registrar-Recorder/County Clerk Statewide Primary Nominating Election compressed the canvass period from 21 days to 8 days. The Office of the City Clerk was able to meet this deadline and process every single ballot cast.
To facilitate the processing of all Vote by Mail ballots for the compressed timeline, the Office of the City Clerk acquired the AccuVote Envelope Scanner. This is a remote signature verification system which includes hardware and software to process Vote by Mail envelopes. AccuVote-ES successfully captured Vote by Mail envelope signatures against the voter database and updated the voter history. Any signature that did not match the signature in the voter database using a pre-defined acceptance level was verified manually. All Vote by Mail ballots without a valid signature were individually processed by election staff teams who...
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