Like voting by mail? New legislation in the D.C. Council would make it permanent for every election going forward.

On Tuesday, Councilmember Charles Allen (D-Ward 6) introduced the Elections Modernization Amendment Act of 2021, a bill he says is intended to make voting in D.C. accessible to more residents. The legislation, co-sponsored by six of Allen’s colleagues, would give every registered voter access to mail-in voting, distribute more ballot drop boxes citywide, bring back the vote centers used during the 2020 election cycle, and make Election Day a holiday for D.C. public schools.

“There are times when necessity is the mother of invention, and that’s exactly what we saw when a pandemic and a general election collided,” Allen wrote in a statement. “D.C. held a safe, secure, and accessible election by making it easier to vote and safe to vote from home. These are common sense and popular changes we need to make a permanent part of our elections moving forward.”

The bill would also create a new election data portal on the D.C. Board of Elections’ website and require the board to provide more support to Advisory Neighborhood Commissioners who are currently incarcerated (as one currently is, representing the residents of the D.C. Jail), among other measures.

D.C. officials expanded absentee voting and limited physical voting sites during the 2020 primary election due to the COVID-19 pandemic, but problems abounded with ballots lost in the mail, poor tracking of whether votes had been counted, and long lines at polling places. Some of those issues were resolved in time for the general election, when the D.C. Board of Elections decided to send every registered voter a ballot in the mail (instead of making them request one), opened large vote centers where anyone could cast a ballot (instead of having to go to their usual precinct), and distributed dozens of ballot drop boxes across the city.

The changes were well received, with twice as many voters opting to mail in their ballots than vote in person. (All told, more than 200,000 voters cast ballots by mail.) Advocates of voting by mail say that when voters try it, they tend to want to stick with it; some Western states now conduct all of their elections by mail. Earlier this year D.C. election officials said they were considering making some of the 2020 voting changes permanent, though some would require legislation from the council.

Voters in D.C. will be heading to the polls in June 2022 to nominate candidates for mayor, council chair, one at-large council member, four ward council members, attorney general, House delegate, U.S. representative, and national and local party committee members. The general election will be held in November.

The Elections Modernization Amendment Act will be assigned to a committee and receive a hearing at a date to be announced. And it isn’t the only elections-related bill the council will be taking up: Next week lawmakers will hold a hearing on bringing ranked-choice voting to D.C.

Previously: 

D.C. Residents Seem To Like Voting By Mail, Though Some Hiccups And Challenges Remain

Why There’s No Vote-By-Mail System In The Washington Region… Yet