Voter list ruled to be public record / Decision should end legal dispute
Source: By Mike Miller, Capital Times (WI), April 26, 2006
The troubled state voter list is indeed a public record, state officials decided Monday, thus paving the way to ending a legal squabble in which a political consulting business was suing to obtain copies of the list.
......Congress passed legislation in 2002 requiring all states to create a state-wide voter list by Jan. 1, 2006. Creation of the list has been a massive headache for the Elections Board, whose executive director, Kevin Kennedy, decided to contract out the work to a private firm instead of using state employees. The Bermuda firm that got the work, Accenture, also had contracts in other states but those states dropped the firm, citing continuous delays in getting the work done. Wisconsin is the only state still using Accenture. The latest prediction is that the list, which backers in Congress said will make it easier to track voters and to assure that only qualified voters are allowed to vote, probably will not be finished in time for the fall elections.