A few bills were amended with substantial changes, including:
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HB1633 – originally moved all municipal elections to even-numbered years. NOW, it was stripped and replaced with text for the SOS to conduct three regional meetings in 2025 to discuss moving municipal elections to even-numbered years AND whether all counties should move to a vote center model; and
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SB355 – originally moved all municipal elections to even-numbered years. NOW, an amendment would require all towns with a population of 10,000 or less to move their elections to even-numbered years. Towns with a population of more than 10,000 will move their elections to even-numbered years UNLESS they opt-out by December 1, 2025, to keep their elections in the odd-numbered years. Cities would keep their elections to odd-numbered years but can opt-in and move their elections to even-numbered years by December 1, 2025.
A few “live” bills still have some concerning changes like:
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SB10 – includes language where a university ID could no longer be used for voting purposes. It also forces counties to send a mailing to voters who have not voted in the last two federal elections, which in my view is duplicative to the state’s requirement to do a (much broader) program under state law.
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HB1680 – would not permit a voter registration form to be completed by anyone other than the voter, unless the individual has a disability. It would also require any absentee ballot to be rejected if the voter’s signature line does not include an “accurate” date. Expands who can challenge a voter in a primary election to any voter (before it was just a voter of the precinct – assuming this is due to the issue in Perry County last May where a Republican official was found to have violated state law by the county election board for improperly challenging a voter).
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HB1643 – Starting January 1, 2027, all local office candidates and PACs that file with campaign finance reports with a county election board will have to file their reports using the state campaign finance database and county election boards will have to have access to the database to manage their campaign finance filings. As many of you know our current CFA database system is too old to handle this change and will require us to replace the system. The bill leaves IED with limited time to find a new system and stand it up for both state and county use.
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SB287 – Makes school board offices partisan and candidates will file to run for office like any other local office candidates. For Ds and Rs, school board candidates would be nominated at the primary election.
Dead bills
Senate Bill 284 would have cut the period of in-person early voting from 28 days to 14 days. Again, the month-long early voting has been around for years. Many people stop at their county office and vote during the week and some counties have satellite locations on the weekends.
Senate Bill 201, which would’ve closed Indiana’s primary system. Right now, Indiana’s is partially open, meaning you can ask for whichever partisan ballot you want when you vote in a primary. No one registers specifically as a Democrat or a Republican. But a move to get Democrats to vote in the Republican gubernatorial primary last year riled up the GOP and they want to close the primary completely.
House Bill 1662, authored by Rep. Michelle Davis, R-Whiteland, would have created a criminal penalty for “camp(ing), sleep(ing), or us(ing) for long term shelter land owned by the state or a political subdivision, unless the land has been authorized for that use by law.”
An Indiana bill that sought to tackle homelessness effectively died in the House after it was not called for a vote on Thursday, a key deadline. But bill language could still reappear elsewhere before the legislative session ends in late April.
