State upgrades 'cumbersome' voter registration system
Move comes as Department of State canceled contract for new system over delays
As the April 23 primary nears, the Pennsylvania Department of State has been shoring up SURE, the problem-plagued computer system used to store statewide voter registration data.
The move to upgrade the Statewide Uniform Registry of Electors comes as the Department of State in December canceled a $10.7 million contract for a new system after a review found the contractor was unable to meet the timeline for completion.
“The SURE system replacement was well behind schedule before the first day of this administration,” said Commonwealth Secretary Al Schmidt, who was appointed by Gov. Josh Shapiro, who took office in January 2023.
As his department evaluated the contract, Schmidt said, “The decision was made first to do the upgrades we needed to make to keep the SURE system safe and secure and reliable for 2024.”
The Department of State itself issued a statement saying, “Thanks to routine IT upgrades and regular maintenance to SURE – as well as the updated hardware and software the Department of State recently provided to all 67 counties – the Department is confident SURE will continue to function securely for the April 23 primary.”
Schmidt recently discussed the upgrades with Armchair Lehigh Valley and during a March 27 meeting of the House of Representatives’ State Government Committee.
Held together by Band-Aids
SURE was established in 2003 under the Help America Vote Act, which was signed by then-President George W. Bush in 2002. While Pennsylvania counties own their voter registration records, the federal law requires states to ensure the data is held in a centralized system that is secure and ensures accuracy.
Each county election office maintains their voter rolls through SURE. Under the system, each new voter who meets eligibility requirements is given a unique registration number. Election offices have instant access to the data so they can add, modify or delete information should a voter move, change party registration or die.
The data also is used to create poll books for voting precincts and track mail-in ballots from request to receipt at election offices on Election Day. (Voters can sign up for emails on the status of their mail-in ballot requests.) The system tracks if voters cast ballots but not how they voted.
The system is not connected to the internet. Instead, counties sign in via dedicated computers.
SURE has been beset by problems that include slow and failed connections.
While ongoing upgrades have been made over the years, Timothy Benyo, chief clerk of elections and registration in Lehigh County, has likened them to a Band-Aid approach to keeping the system running.
The system is “completely outdated and cumbersome,” Benyo told Armchair Lehigh Valley.
Frustrated workers in one county kept a tally of failures on a whiteboard. Like a factory logging days without safety violations, Schmidt said, it had “the number of days since SURE was last down.”
Mail-in voting, which was used for the first time in 2020, has further strained the system.
As an example, voters who switch parties between the primary and general election are not automatically listed as having done so in the mail-in ballot database. The information must be entered by hand.
SURE doesn’t allow counties to send customized emails to voters who, for example, may have accidentally asked for mail-in ballots twice, Benyo said.
‘Sloppy recordkeeping’
As the problems continued, then-Auditor General Eugene DePasquale released an audit in 2019 that found more than 50,000 cases of potentially inaccurate voter records.
DePasquale, a Democrat, said part of the problem was that counties weren’t updating their voter rolls in SURE in a uniform way, leading some to wait longer than others to add, remove or update information on voters. He said the Department of State did not adequately show that it was regularly monitoring counties to verify data was entered correctly or that the system had enough tools to help prevent data entry errors.
“The Department of State must work harder to verify that registration records are accurate and up to date,” DePasquale said at the time. “My audit team found too many instances of potentially bad data and sloppy recordkeeping that requires guidance from the state to help counties resolve issues throughout the year.”
Aware that then-Gov. Tom Wolf’s administration was working on plans for a new system, DePasquale said incorporating edit checks and other improvements into the design of the replacement system would reduce data errors and improve accuracy.
In December 2020, the Department of State signed a nearly $10.7 million contract for a new system with BPro Inc., an election software vendor from South Dakota. The end date of the contract was Dec. 27, 2024. Two months later, KNOWiNK, an election software company based in Missouri, announced it had acquired BPro.
Not meeting timeline
Secretary Schmidt is a Republican who served for 10 years as one of three commissioners overseeing elections in Philadelphia. While there, he worked to modernize operations, improve efficiency and bring greater integrity to the process.
Schmidt publicly challenged former President Donald Trump’s legally unfounded claims of election fraud. He testified before the U.S. House of Representative committee examining the Jan. 6, 2021, breach of the Capitol about being singled out by Trump in a tweet and the threats he said he and his family received.
When he came onboard in early 2023, first as acting secretary, Schmidt said it was clear that the new SURE was behind schedule. The deadline for completion had been pushed back “multiple times,” according to the Department of State.
Lehigh’s Benyo said he saw a demonstration of KNOWiNK’s early test model. “My impression was that it wasn’t working how we needed it to work,” he said.
Benyo and others said part of the problem has to do with aligning a computer system with Pennsylvania’s election laws.
“Unfortunately, when new laws have been created, the old ones were never removed … hence the conflicts,” Benyo said. “The people writing the new laws have not taken the time to clarify the nuances of the Election Code, but yet want ‘black & white’ procedures.”
Schmidt said it was a mutual decision with KNOWiNK to end the contract. He said the state was able to claw back the $720,000 that the state paid to KNOWiNK in 2023. KNOWiNK did not respond to an email seeking comment.
He said the Department of State did not recover the approximate $1.7 million that had been spent by the Wolf administration.
At the House committee meeting, members peppered Schmidt with questions on why the contract was canceled.
Schmidt said the reasons were the acquisition of BPro by KNOWiNK, the delays in meeting the contract and the inability “to meet our new standards and expectations for the safety and security of the system.”
Legislators’ concerns
At the House committee meeting, State Rep. Brad Roae, R-6th, wasn’t happy about the refund amount.
“We should be getting all of the money back,” Roae said. “Did you attempt to get a refund going on clear back to day one or did you only focus on getting the refund for what had been paid under this current administration?”
With a review showing the contract was behind schedule, Schmidt said, “The appropriate step to take was a speedy termination of that contract and the return of [$720,000].”
Regarding the Wolf administration’s decision to enter into the contract, Schmidt said, “I can't speak for decisions made in the prior administration or the level of specificity in the contract when it was first issued.”
Roae called the situation “very disappointing – taxpayers paid for something we didn't get.”
State Rep. Dawn Keefer, R-92nd, questioned whether DePasquale’s concern over county lag times in updating voter records has been addressed.
"The performance audit .. had 50 recommendations, but one of the most pressing ones was that the Department of State needs to provide clearer guidance to help the counties ensure accuracy of voter records,” she said.
Schmidt said the new SURE system will take care of a lot of the issues identified in the audit.
He said the upgrades made to the existing system, including faster connections, will make it easier for counties to keep their records up to date.
He further said, “We are in constant contact with them. We track whether they've completed their list maintenance requirements or not.”
However, Schmidt noted, the Department of State does not possess the legal authority to dictate a time frame on how quickly counties must update their rolls when they receive notification of a change.
“One thing we would welcome is a requirement that counties complete that work by a set time as opposed to it's something they need to do,” he said.
State Rep. Wendy Fink, R-94th, was dismayed to learn that five years after the audit that “we’re going to be using this archaic system.”
“You're telling me that they're not going to be fixed? I just don't see how I can go home confidently telling my constituents that they should be having faith in this election,” Fink said.
In response to the concerns raised, the Department of State issued the following statement:
“With regard to voter list maintenance, counties use reliable information obtained through Pennsylvania’s membership in the Electronic Registration Information Center (ERIC) to make continuous updates to the voter rolls contained within the SURE system to ensure they reflect the latest information about Pennsylvania’s registered voters.
“Over the past year, the Department has enhanced its ability to provide training to county officials on, among other things, uniformly conducting voter list maintenance, and it conducted additional outreach to voters who appear to have moved to give them an opportunity to update or cancel their voter registration record. All of these tools comply with federal and state laws regarding the removal of voters to ensure that voters are not removed from the rolls indiscriminately.”
Upgrades, new contract
Meanwhile, Schmdit said the upgrades to the existing SURE were implemented to help election offices deal with the expanded work that happens in a presidential election year.
The upgrades include new computers with updated software that feature improved connectivity and the ability to handle high volumes of data.
In Lehigh County, the upgrades are complete. Benyo said the system is more secure, has a faster connection and offers more protection to the data.
Schmidt said the Department of State is planning to put out a request for proposal for a new SURE system this spring and hopes to have a vendor in place by the summer.
He said the department engaged the services of Gartner, an IT research and consulting firm, to assist with writing the new RFP.
In addition, the department hired a chief modernization officer, whose job includes working with Gartner to develop a new RFP that more clearly defines the priorities of the department, counties and voters.
The Department of State said it will be using the feedback it got from county election offices to “develop more detailed requirements to be included in the upcoming RFP.”