Help America Vote Act Monies to be Distributed

Counties Will Benefit

PHOENIX – Secretary of State Ken Bennett announced today that he will be releasing $5 million of Help America Vote Act monies to the counties in the form of block grants.  The Help America Vote Act (HAVA) addressed issues with voting systems and voter access that were identified following the 2000 election.

Examples of projects for which HAVA monies may be used by counties are voting machines, voter registration enhancements, voter education, and poll worker recruitment and training.

“In addition to the block grants, I will also be distributing $2.5 million of HAVA monies to the five counties that did not receive Adios Chad monies in 2004.” The Adios Chad program provided approximately $9 million of HAVA monies to ten counties to purchase punch card voting machine replacements. At the time, Maricopa, Pima, Apache, Graham and Yavapai had already purchased optical scan equipment and did not receive the benefit of the Adios Chad program.  “This is an attempt to provide some cost sharing to those counties that were proactive in obtaining optical scan equipment.

“I look forward to working with the counties on this very exciting new phase of HAVA projects to enhance elections for all Arizona citizens.”

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