Florida Senate - 2020 COMMITTEE AMENDMENT
Bill No. SB 1312
Ì561048-Î561048
LEGISLATIVE ACTION
Senate . House
Comm: RCS .
02/28/2020 .
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The Committee on Appropriations (Montford) recommended the
following:
1 Senate Amendment (with directory and title amendments)
2
3 Delete line 179
4 and insert:
5 (6) Nothing in this section precludes a county canvassing
6 board or local board involved in the recount from comparing a
7 digital image of a ballot to the corresponding physical paper
8 ballot during a manual recount.
9 Section 5. Effective upon becoming a law, subsection (2) of
10 section 101.5612, Florida Statutes, is amended to read:
11 101.5612 Testing of tabulating equipment.—
12 (2) On any day not more than 25 10 days before prior to the
13 commencement of early voting as provided in s. 101.657, the
14 supervisor of elections shall have the automatic tabulating
15 equipment publicly tested to ascertain that the equipment will
16 correctly count the votes cast for all offices and on all
17 measures. If the ballots to be used at the polling place on
18 election day are not available at the time of the testing, the
19 supervisor may conduct an additional test not more than 10 days
20 before election day. Public notice of the time and place of the
21 test shall be given at least 48 hours prior thereto by
22 publication on the supervisor of elections’ website and once in
23 one or more newspapers of general circulation in the county or,
24 if there is no newspaper of general circulation in the county,
25 by posting the notice in at least four conspicuous places in the
26 county. The supervisor or the municipal elections official may,
27 at the time of qualifying, give written notice of the time and
28 location of the public preelection test to each candidate
29 qualifying with that office and obtain a signed receipt that the
30 notice has been given. The Department of State shall give
31 written notice to each statewide candidate at the time of
32 qualifying, or immediately at the end of qualifying, that the
33 voting equipment will be tested and advise each candidate to
34 contact the county supervisor of elections as to the time and
35 location of the public preelection test. The supervisor or the
36 municipal elections official shall, at least 30 15 days before
37 prior to the commencement of early voting as provided in s.
38 101.657, send written notice by certified mail to the county
39 party chair of each political party and to all candidates for
40 other than statewide office whose names appear on the ballot in
41 the county and who did not receive written notification from the
42 supervisor or municipal elections official at the time of
43 qualifying, stating the time and location of the public
44 preelection test of the automatic tabulating equipment. The
45 canvassing board shall convene, and each member of the
46 canvassing board shall certify to the accuracy of the test. For
47 the test, the canvassing board may designate one member to
48 represent it. The test shall be open to representatives of the
49 political parties, the press, and the public. Each political
50 party may designate one person with expertise in the computer
51 field who shall be allowed in the central counting room when all
52 tests are being conducted and when the official votes are being
53 counted. The designee shall not interfere with the normal
54 operation of the canvassing board.
55 Section 6. Except as otherwise expressly provided in this
56 act and except for this section, which shall take effect upon
57 becoming a law, this act shall take effect January 1, 2021.
58
59 ====== D I R E C T O R Y C L A U S E A M E N D M E N T ======
60 And the directory clause is amended as follows:
61 Delete line 115
62 and insert:
63 102.166, Florida Statutes, are amended, and subsection (6) is
64 added to that section, to read:
65
66 ================= T I T L E A M E N D M E N T ================
67 And the title is amended as follows:
68 Delete lines 19 - 20
69 and insert:
70 tabulating equipment for manual recounts; providing
71 construction; amending s. 101.5612, F.S.; revising the
72 timeframes for conducting public preelection testing
73 of automatic tabulating equipment; providing effective
74 dates.