CHAPTER 88

HB 1378 - FINAL VERSION

9Mar2016... 0496h

2016 SESSION

16-2635

03/01

HOUSE BILL 1378

AN ACT relative to disabled voters requiring assistance.

SPONSORS: Rep. Fields, Belk. 4

COMMITTEE: Election Law

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ANALYSIS

This authorizes a disabled voter who is unable to access a polling place to vote with an absentee ballot.

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Explanation: Matter added to current law appears in bold italics.

Matter removed from current law appears [in brackets and struckthrough.]

Matter which is either (a) all new or (b) repealed and reenacted appears in regular type.

9Mar2016... 0496h 16-2635

03/01

STATE OF NEW HAMPSHIRE

In the Year of Our Lord Two Thousand Sixteen

AN ACT relative to disabled voters requiring assistance.

Be it Enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives in General Court convened:

88:1  New Section; Assistance in Voting; Disabled Voter.  Amend RSA 659 by inserting after section 20 the following new section:

659:20-a  Assistance in Voting; Disabled Voter.  Any voter who declares to the moderator under oath that said voter is unable to access a polling place due to physical disability, after appearing at the polling place location to vote in person shall, upon the voter's request, have an absentee ballot delivered to the voter outside the guardrail by the town or ward clerk or one of his or her assistants.  The absentee ballot delivered by the town or ward clerk shall be delivered and processed using the same procedures as any other absentee ballot except that the voter shall be treated on the marked checklist as having voted in person.

88:2  Effective Date.  This act shall take effect 60 days after its passage.

Approved: May 19, 2016

Effective Date: July 18, 2016