State, county officials decry dubious voter registration letter

The Washington D.C.-based Voter Participation Center sent out the bulk mailing, which election officials say is, at the very least, confusing and often, flat-out wrong, in as much as many of the recipients are, in fact, registered.

Pima County Recorder F. Ann Rodriguez said she has gotten hundreds of complaints from voters who have received the official-looking mailer. 

“We do not know where this group obtained their mailing information, but it does not accurately reflect the voter registration records in Pima County,” she said.

Her office has no legal authority to regulate these mailing to the public, she said.

Page Gardner, the president of the nonprofit, nonpartisan Voter Participation Center, said her group is solely focused on trying to registering voters. Since 2004, she said her group has registered two million voters.

She concedes, however, tracking down addresses of unregistered, but otherwise eligible voters is more art than science.

“Unfortunately, no state makes available a list of individuals who are unregistered or ineligible to vote. As a result, VPC must use commercially available residential databases and match them to the state’s voter file,” Gardner said.

The organization recently sent out about 312,000 mailers in Arizona.

Less than one percent of the mailings will reach the wrong person, Gardner asserted.

The mailings, she said, also tells those who actually are registered voters to “please disregard this notice” and provides the state’s website address to check current registration records.

Matt Roberts, the director of communications in the Secretary of State’s Office, said he shares Rodriquez’s concerns about the mailers. 

This is not the first time the group has run afoul of Arizona election officials, however.

In 2007, then-Secretary of State Jan Brewer chastised Gardner for “misleading and deceptive” sent by the group when it was called Women’s Voices Women Vote. 

Brewer also pointed out a rather large mistake on the return envelope seven years ago.

“In addition, our State Capitol Phoenix is embarrassingly misspelled “Pheonix” on the return address envelope,” wrote Brewer.