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October 20, 2014

Voter Alert

Executive Committee Pueblo County GOP

Wrong ballots mailed to recent City of Pueblo registrants

There are two tax questions on the ballot for City voters. Obviously, only city
voters get to vote on those taxes, but who is qualified to be a city voter?
According to the City Charter, only those voters registered at least 29 days
before the election can vote on city issues. But Clerk Ortiz sent ballots to all
City-residing voters, regardless of their eligibility. This means that he
intends to count votes on those issues of some people who are not legal and
eligible voters.

Pueblo is a home rule city and the voter registration requirements are set by
the City Charter, not by the Council or the state legislature. The requirement
to register 29 days ahead of election day is in the Charter at sections 17-8
and 17-9.

Given that several hundred ballots have been sent to newly registered City of
Pueblo voters, what will Ortiz do to ensure that only eligible voters votes are
counted on those two taxes? If either of the measures is close, those ineligible
votes could impact the outcome.

The measures that Ortiz must put in place to exclude the ineligible votes on
those two issues, must also have a way to protect the secrecy of the ballot for
those unsuspecting voters who marked those questions, and their marks
must now be disqualified. No election workers or watchers can be allowed to
know how those unfortunate voters voted, even during the process to discard
their votes on those two issues.

This is not a surprise to Ortiz. He was sued only a year ago for the problem
he created when he did not honor the minimal residency requirements of the
special districts, municipalities and school districts on the Pueblo ballot.
Some state laws were changed to coordinate voter eligibility dates. The Citys
laws were not changed. Ortiz should have created a separate ballot style that
did not contain the City questions for those voters who are not yet eligible to
vote in the City.

The Pueblo County Republican Party visited the election department this AM
to inquire what plan or protocol is in place for separation of ballots since no
different ballot style was provided. They stated no special protocols are in
place and no plan is in place for implementation. The election department
stated they have referred the matter to their attorneys.

Taxpayers on both the YES and NO sides of the issues have a right to be
concerned about whether the outcome will be fair and verifiable.

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