Happy Municipal Clerks Week! We're excited to bring you a special edition celebrating the happy memories, hard work, frustrations, and innovations you all bring to Wisconsin's elections!
A Note from WEC Administrator Meagan Wolfe and the WEC staff
Hello and happy Professional Municipal Clerks Week to our nearly 1,900 partners out there serving their communities and the great state of Wisconsin!
At the Wisconsin Elections Commission, we could not be more pleased to pause this week to offer recognition for the great work that our clerks carry out on a daily, weekly, and annual basis. Honestly, for us at the WEC, every week feels like Clerks Week because we have front-row seats to the passion and commitment that you all bring to your roles.
We hope this week the public gets that same chance to recognize and celebrate our clerks, who work so hard as the “unsung heroes” of each election cycle in Wisconsin.
Below, please find a story featuring Cindi Gamb, the municipal clerk-treasurer in the village of Kohler, who also serves as current president of the Wisconsin Municipal Clerks Association. Cindi outlines well the role of clerks.
Here’s to Professional Municipal Clerks Week, with deep thanks from all of us at the WEC.👏
You’ve told the WEC training team that you’d like more training opportunities on absentee voting procedures. In response, we’re in the process of creating a presentation you may see at your conferences and district meetings along with a new training series in ElectEd dedicated to the ins-and-outs of this topic.
What do we need from you? We would like to hold an absentee in-service in Madison for new clerks to preview the content, ask their absentee questions, and generally provide feedback.
If you have been a clerk since spring 2023 or later and would like to participate, please take the survey below and let us know which of the following dates and times would work for you to come to Madison:
June 5, 10 a.m. - 12 p.m.
June 5, 1 p.m. - 3 p.m.
June 6, 10 a.m. - 12 p.m.
June 6, 1 p.m. - 3 p.m.
The date and time will be chosen based on your responses so please include ALL that work. The session will not be offered virtually. We look forward to hearing from you!
EL 6.05 Uniform Instruction Rule Economic Impact Analysis Comment Period Now Open
On March 20, 2024, Commission members voted 6-0 to approve the draft language of the proposed emergency and permanent rules relating to the mandatory use of uniform instructions for absentee voting and directed staff to “proceed with the necessary rule making steps.” The current step is the Economic Impact Analysis.
Scope Statements for both the emergency and permanent rules
Draft rule order
Contains the full text of the permanent rule as approved by the Commission
Draft Economic Impact Analysis
Invitation to comment on any economic impacts that might stem from the rule
This round of comments is focused exclusively on economic impacts. The round of comments after this will be a public hearing and comment period, and the Commission will then accept all comments on the text of the rule. Though you may prepare comments on the text and substance of the rule using this draft, please do not submit comments on the rule text until the public hearing and comment period has been noticed by the Commission. You will receive another notice once the Commission has approved a public hearing and comment period.
Economic impact comments will be accepted until 5 p.m. on Monday, May 20, 2024, and can be emailed to Angela O’Brien Sharpe at @email.
Please let us know if you wish to collaborate with us on the Economic Impact Analysis.
Keep Contacts Up to Date to Ensure Quick Communication in Case of an Emergency
Creating and maintaining a list of important contacts will help expedite communication in the case of an election security incident. Various levels of government should be represented, along with contacts’ daytime AND after-hours numbers.
Wisconsin Statewide Intelligence Center (WSIC) can be reached at 1-888-DCI-WSIC
Wisconsin Emergency Management (WEM) maintains a 24/7 hotline: 1-800-943-0003
County Level
County clerk and deputy clerk
Public information officer
Director of operations and/or IT
Corporation counsel
District Attorney
Municipal Level
Municipal clerk and deputy clerk
Public information officer
Director of operations and/or IT
Municipal attorney/legal counsel
Police/fire/EMS: 911
Once you create your list of important contacts, ensure your staff and election workers know where to find it in the office and on Election Day. At least once a year, verify the information to ensure your list is up to date.
Establishing and maintaining important contacts is only one aspect of a comprehensive emergency response plan. Materials to help you create an emergency response plan and other contingency materials can be found on ElectEd in the Contingency Planning tile.
Commission to Consider No Labels Ballot Status Petition May 14th
On May 14th, members of the Wisconsin Elections Commission will convene in open session to take up a petition for ballot status from No Labels Wisconsin. The Commission will also consider No Labels’ ballot order. No Labels Wisconsin petitioned for ballot status under Wis. Stat. § 5.62(2)(a) on March 28, 2024.
The petition makes use of an uncommon path for a political party to achieve ballot status. If the Commission finds the petition to be sufficient, the political party would have the opportunity for its candidates for President and Vice President to be printed on the General Election ballot.
Achieving ballot status through § 5.62(2)(a) would also entitle No Labels to a separate ballot for all partisan offices at the August 13, 2024 Partisan Primary and for all other offices at the November 5, 2024 General Election.
The petition from No Labels to achieve ballot status must contain valid signatures of at least 10,000 Wisconsin electors, including at least 1,000 signatures of electors residing in each of at least 3 different congressional districts.
Also on May 14th, Commissioners plan to approve ballot proofs for the August and November 2024 elections.
WEC Partners with Department of Homeland Security on Trainings
This summer the WEC will be partnering with the Department of Homeland Security's Cybersecurity & Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) to put on a series of trainings for Wisconsin election officials.
The next training, Threats to Election Officials, will be on May 20th and will feature not only representatives from CISA but also representatives from the Wisconsin Department of Justice as well.
We're super excited to bring these training opportunities to you and hope that you can join us.
Every ballot cast in Wisconsin is either cast on paper or backed by a voter verifiable paper record. Wisconsin, like many states, prohibits purely electronic voting. While voting machine data is secure, having a paper record for each voter ensures that a person’s vote can be counted accurately. As Wisconsin election officials know, the ballots and paper records of the election are never held centrally – they are secured among the thousands of town, village, city and county clerks in Wisconsin.
Another security measure in place is the statutorily required audit processes performed by selected municipalities after each general election. The audit requires an auditor to validate paper records – such as ballots and voting machine results tapes – by hand and cannot be manipulated by electronic trickery.
Paper records are checked at the municipal board of canvass, county canvass, and certified at the state level. The post-election reconciliation process to meticulously compare both electronic and paper records to ensure figures match is another check in place.
Wisconsin Statute § 5.40 governs the use of voting machines and electronic voting systems, and subsection (1) explains that a municipality with a population below 7,500 is not required to use voting machines or electronic voting systems for every election.
However, each municipality is required to adhere to 52 U.S.C. § 21081(a)(3)(B), which is a federal law that requires a minimum of one piece of accessible voting equipment to be programmed, set up, and ready for use in every polling place.
Maintaining your contact information and staff list in WisVote is crucial for ensuring that voters can contact your office, and that only active election officials have access to this sensitive database. You can easily verify that your municipality's clerk contact information is correct by using MyVote. Click on the "Find My Clerk" link in the footer and enter a local address.
Also, as a matter of routine, please keep the WEC Helpdesk aware of any incoming staff members who need WisVote access, or outgoing staff members whose access should be removed, and the dates to change their access.
Please contact the WEC Helpdesk if you have any questions about your staff's WisVote.
Hundreds of "Pretties" line the walls of Emery Blagdon's The Healing Machine. After years of cleaning and conservation this artist environment and others just as unique can now be seen at the John Michael Kohler Arts Center Art Preserve just outside of Kohler in Sheboygan (admission is free!). Photo: Rich Maciejewski, courtesy of John Michael Kohler Arts Center.
WMCA President Wishes All A Happy Clerks Week
Cindi Gamb
Veteran official says the mission is a bonding force for clerks
Cindi Gamb, who is president of the Wisconsin Municipal Clerks Association (WMCA) and about to hit her 30-year-mark as the village of Kohler’s deputy clerk-treasurer, isn’t slowing down during the 55th annual Professional Municipal Clerks Week May 5-11.
So it often goes with municipal clerks, even those at the top of their profession with years of experience. Recognition of their efforts can be scant, and the work doesn't stop.
Gamb said she will be sending hand-written notes during Clerks Week to each WMCA board member “thanking them for their work and letting them know I appreciate them, and that we’re going to get through [the 2024 November] election.
Of course, as all clerks know, administering elections is just one element of a very fluid, multi-faceted, often thankless profession. Gamb says that is why Clerks Week is so appreciated.
“It’s nice to be recognized, and for people to realize all of the work that we do,” Gamb said. She quoted what a fellow clerk recently mentioned: “Nobody notices the municipal clerk until we don’t do our job, and then it becomes clear that we really do need clerks.”
In 1969, the International Institute of Municipal Clerks (IIMC) realized the need to educate the public about the importance of these dedicated, hardworking, yet unsung professionals. That’s when the IIMC established the Annual Professional Municipal Clerks Week.
It is endorsed by all U.S. and Canadian IIMC members, as well as those in 15 other countries. In 1984, President Ronald Reagan proclaimed the first week of May be set aside to celebrate and reflect on municipal clerks, and it has been that way ever since.
The significance of a clerk’s role in each Wisconsin municipality came as a surprise to Gamb when, after she’d spent a decade in the insurance industry, her husband suggested she apply to a newspaper employment listing.
“And I got the job and here we are, 29 years later,” she said.
Gamb now considers the state’s municipal clerks her second “family,” as close-knit bonds have been established through the WMCA and via her contacts as past president of the Municipal Treasurers Association of Wisconsin.
“We do become very close. We all bond, doing the same things; we understand each other,” Gamb said of the WMCA membership.
“I’ve got clerks who’ve retired, and we all still get together, have lunch and keep up with everyone, so it is a lifelong friendship that you build when you are in our association.”
It is a profession where turnover, particularly in today’s white-hot political climate, is not uncommon, and one in which rookies and veterans must constantly be learning to stay on top of new laws, regulations, and rules.
“And we’re always willing to help each other,” Gamb said. “We’re all just a phone call or email away.”
In addition, she said the WMCA is routinely reaching out to the entire membership “offering training, telling them about WEC (Wisconsin Elections Commission), pushing the training that WEC offers, getting them involved in that.”
Gamb said she is very excited about WMCA’s Annual Educational Conference set for this August in Middleton, which will put a lot of focus on the upcoming General Election.
Gamb said she hopes the public during this Clerks Week will recognize that their ballots will be in capable and trustworthy hands in November.
“We know what to do, and we’re training our election officials, so we’ll be ready again,” said Gamb.
