Virginia registrars scrambling to process more than 100,000 backlogged voter registration applications
Hampton Roads election staff will work overtime in the lead up to the November election, processing thousands of new voter registrations after technical issues delayed the procedure for more than 100,000 Virginians.
State election officials identified about 107,000 voter registration applications, address updates and other voter information changes submitted through the Department of Motor Vehicles that were affected. Local registrars reported receiving thousands of applications this week, some dating back to May.
The Department of Elections blamed the delay on “intermittent network issues,” but said in a statement Thursday the issue has been resolved. The department sent a letter to local registrars Sept. 30 instructing them to start processing the new registrations in VERIS, the state’s voter registration system, by Friday so registrants’ ability to vote won’t be impacted.
“No voter registration data was lost, but the issue will cause an increase in processing voter registration applications at the local level,” reads a statement from the Department of Elections.
The Department of Motor Vehicles declined to comment and deferred questions to the Department of Elections.
The total number of new registrations affected delayed will not known until local registrars finish processing them.
Virginia Beach Registrar Christine Lewis said her office received almost 7,500 applications starting Sunday. As a result of the issue, she said her staff would probably be working 2-3 hours of overtime each day through Oct. 17 to process the applications.
She said Oct. 17 is not a “hard deadline” for staff, because voters can still register in person through Election Day. But it’s the date they believe they can have the registrations updated by while dealing with the new ones coming in.
“It won’t impact the operations of the voters,” Lewis said. “It’s just going to cause additional overtime that we weren’t planning for. But we’ll get it done.”
As of Friday afternoon, Lewis said her office had made it through several hundred applications and had 5,888 left to process.
“I’m just glad the Department of Elections caught it,” Lewis said.
Norfolk Registrar Stephanie L. Iles said the Norfolk Office of Elections had 3,352 new registrations dating back to May 1 sent to them over this past week. The new registrations started to come in over the weekend.
“All the registrars and all the localities are working to process these applications to make sure that people are properly registered in the correct location so that they can vote on Election Day,” Illes said.
She said she’s unsure how many additional hours this will add to her staff’s workload but said she would approve overtime. Fortunately, she said the issue should not impact anyone’s votes.
“We’re gonna do what it takes to get it done,” she said. “We’ll be ready.”
Newport News Registrar Vicki Lewis said the city received about 2,700 new registrations dating back to May. She said staff would end up working Saturday to address the issue and doesn’t anticipate any impacts on people being able to vote.
“We’re going to process the applications and assume everything should be fine,” she said. “Once everybody processes, they’ll be sent a voter informational notice to let them know where they vote at.”
New this election cycle, Virginia residents also have the option of same day voter registration after the Oct. 17 deadline. Eligible voters can go to the office of their general registrar or satellite location during the early voting period to obtain a provisional ballot, but on Election Day must go to their precinct’s polling place.
Gavin Stone, 757-712-4806, gavin.stone@virginiamedia.com
Josh Janney, joshua.janney@virginiamedia.com