13,000 Receive Voter Registration Purge Notice

Some 13,000 registered Natrona County voters recently  got notice they could be dropped from voter registration lists.

Notices went out indicating  that, because the voter did not vote in November, they would soon be dropped from polling lists unless the elections office heard otherwise.

Natrona County Clerk, Renee Vitto, says since then they've gotten a big response from residents who say they did, in fact, vote and that they wish to remain registered, with some  expressing concern that  their vote had not been counted.

Vitto assures however, "the voters vote did count, because they voted in the polling place and their ballots are never correlated to their name."

Vitto says they had expected a large purged after a swell in 2008 of new voters, but, she says,  13,000 goes well beyond that.  She says county clerks across the state are seeing  similar errors  and together they're looking for patterns that might point to where the trouble lies.

"Were finding out that some of these people who did vote- they actually made a change to their voter registration as far as party change or maybe it was their address change."

Vitto suspects those changes made on election day may have triggered a glitch in the system.

The state switched to a new state-wide system in 2008 and, she says, that's seems to be when the trouble started. Despite that, Vitto believes the new system is better, providing greater access to data and less work for elections staff.

If you received the card suggesting you'll be purged from registration lists and you want to remain registered you should notify the County Clerk's office. You can call, email or drop by the offices located in the County Court House on Center Street in downtown Casper by February 15th to let them know.