Procedure and House Affairs committee  Hi, it's nice to be with you. I'm honoured to be able to speak with you today. Louisiana has such a unique election system. I believe we have more elections than any state in the United States. You were speaking about voter fatigue, and that is a big problem in Louisiana. Gene

Procedure and House Affairs committee  That's correct.

Procedure and House Affairs committee  It's fairly new. It has been successful. In terms of the people who register, if they're 17 years old and they're going to turn 18 prior to the election, they are allowed to vote. The students seem to really like that. The other thing we have is that we allow them to work as a

Procedure and House Affairs committee  We do. In the State of Louisiana there are 64 parishes. Each parish's clerk of court offers training. We have an outreach program that goes into schools. The great thing, and my favourite part, which I've done since I was 19 years old—I've been in elections since I was 19, and

Procedure and House Affairs committee  I can't think of one problem that we've had. I really can't. It's been a great tool in helping people to get out there, register, be involved, and turn out to vote. Anything we can do to try to help with that is a great thing.

Procedure and House Affairs committee  I don't know if you know, but we don't have party primaries. Did you know that? In Louisiana, everyone qualifies, no matter what party they are in, and then we have a primary election and a general election. It's not, I don't think, as in—

Procedure and House Affairs committee  That's right. Whoever wants to qualify for the primary does qualify. We run our election, and the top two people there go into the general one.

Procedure and House Affairs committee  In Louisiana, we have a separate division—it's not part of my department—with regard to campaign finance. It's called the Office of Campaign Finance. That is how all of the rules and guidelines are provided to each candidate when they qualify in the state, and they have to abide

Procedure and House Affairs committee  Yes. It's 16.

Procedure and House Affairs committee  It's if they would like to be. Let's say your parent went in to register, you went with them, and you wanted to be put on the list. You'd fill out your information with the office of the registrar of voters. Each parish has a registrar of voters.

Procedure and House Affairs committee  It's just the young person signing up. You don't need to have a parent or guardian with you.

Procedure and House Affairs committee  No. They're not added to our.... We have a system called the ERIN system. It's our voter registration system. You're not added to the ERIN system until the date when you are actually eligible to vote. In terms of documentation, if somebody asks for a commercial list of voters tha

Procedure and House Affairs committee  I think it's only been for two years. I'd have to get back to you.

Procedure and House Affairs committee  Sure. To our knowledge, we haven't had any problems or issues. There's been nothing like that.

Procedure and House Affairs committee  No, because if they're not added into the ERIN system for that, then they can't possibly be.... They couldn't even accidentally do it. It's a completely separate registration.