COMMONWEALTH OF PENNSYLVANIA HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
APPROPRIATIONS COMMITTEE BUDGET HEARING
DEPARTMENT OF STATE
STATE CAPITOL HARRISBURG, PENNSYLVANIA ROOM 140, MAJORITY CAUCUS ROOM
TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 21, 2017 3:00 P.M.
BEFORE: HONORABLE STANLEY SAYLOR, MAJORITY CHAIRMAN HONORABLE JOSEPH MARKOSEK, MINORITY CHAIRMAN HONORABLE KAREN BOBACK HONORABLE JIM CHRISTIANA HONORABLE SHERYL DELOZIER HONORABLE GEORGE DUNBAR HONORABLE GARTH EVERETT HONORABLE KEITH GREINER HONORABLE SETH GROVE HONORABLE MARCIA HAHN HONORABLE SUE HELM HONORABLE WARREN KAMPF HONORABLE FRED KELLER HONORABLE JERRY KNOWLES HONORABLE NICK MICCARELLI HONORABLE JASON ORTITAY HONORABLE MIKE PEIFER HONORABLE JEFF PYLE HONORABLE MARGUERITE QUINN HONORABLE BRAD ROAE HONORABLE JAMIE SANTORA HONORABLE CURT SONNEY HONORABLE KEVIN BOYLE HONORABLE TIM BRIGGS HONORABLE DONNA BULLOCK HONORABLE MARY JO DALEY HONORABLE MADELEINE DEAN HONORABLE MARIA DONATUCCI HONORABLE MARTY FLYNN 2
1 BEFORE (continued):
2 HONORABLE EDWARD GAINEY HONORABLE PATTY KIM 3 HONORABLE STEPHEN KINSEY HONORABLE LEANNE KRUEGER-BRANEKY 4 HONORABLE PETER SCHWEYER
5 NON-COMMITTEE MEMBERS: HONORABLE ELI EVANKOVICH 6 HONORABLE KRISTIN PHILLIPS-HILL HONORABLE ROSEMARY BROWN 7 HONORABLE RICK SACCONE HONORABLE CRIS DUSH 8 HONORABLE MIKE TOBASH HONORABLE MATT GABLER 9 HONORABLE AARON KAUFER HONORABLE ERIC NELSON 10 HONORABLE DARYL METCALFE HONORABLE BRETT MILLER 11 HONORABLE JAKE WHEATLEY HONORABLE MORGAN CEPHAS 12 HONORABLE CAROLYN COMITTA HONORABLE STEVE SAMUELSON 13 HONORABLE ISABELLA FITZGERALD HONORABLE MATT BRADFORD 14 HONORABLE DAN FRANKEL HONORABLE HARRY READSHAW 15 COMMITTEE STAFF PRESENT: 16 DAVID DONLEY MAJORITY EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR 17 RITCHIE LaFAVER MAJORITY DEPUTY EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR 18 MIRIAM FOX 19 DEMOCRATIC EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR TARA TREES 20 DEMOCRATIC CHIEF COUNSEL
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24 Ti ffany L . Ma st • Ma st Re porting 25 ma streporting@gmai l . com ( 717) 348- 1275 3
1 I N D E X
2 TESTIFIERS
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4 NAME PAGE 5 PEDRO CORTÉS SECRETARY, 6 DEPARTMENT OF STATE...... 5
7 MARIAN SCHNEIDER DEPUTY SECRETARY, 8 ELECTIONS AND ADMINISTRATION......
9 JUSTIN COWAN DIRECTOR, 10 BUREAU OF FINANCE AND OPERATIONS......
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12 SUBMITTED WRITTEN TESTIMONY 13 * * * 14 (See submitted written testimony and handouts online.) 15
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1 P R O C E E D I N G S
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3 MAJORITY CHAIRMAN SAYLOR: We will
4 reconvene the hearing. Those who are
5 testifying, will you please rise and raise your
6 right hand.
7 (All testifiers were duly sworn by
8 Majority Chairman Saylor.)
9 MAJORITY CHAIRMAN SAYLOR: Thank you.
10 Secretary Pedro Cortés, will you please
11 proceed.
12 SECRETARY CORTÉS: Thank you,
13 Mr. Chairman, and members of the Appropriations
14 Committee and the chairs of the State
15 Government, as well as the Professional
16 Licensure Committee. Thank you so very much for
17 having the Department of State, giving us this
18 opportunity to discuss the Department's fiscal
19 year 2017-'18 budget.
20 I submitted in writing some remarks,
21 Mr. Chair. And in the interest of time, knowing
22 that there are many members that probably want
23 to ask questions, if it's okay with you, I
24 respectfully suggest that that testimony be
25 entered into the record without reading it, so 5
1 that we have a little bit more time, but I would
2 like to let everyone know that sitting here at
3 the table with me, to my right is Marian
4 Schneider, Deputy Secretary for Elections and
5 Administration at the Department of State; and
6 to my left is Justin Cowan, Director
7 of the Bureau of Finance and Operations.
8 With that, Mr. Chair, again, an honor to
9 be with you and all of the members.
10 MINORITY CHAIRMAN MARKOSEK: Thank you.
11 Just a welcome from me. I don't have any
12 questions right now; I will just listen in. But
13 thank you for attending, and we'll look forward
14 to hearing your testimony.
15 SECRETARY CORTÉS: Thank you.
16 MAJORITY CHAIRMAN SAYLOR: Just to
17 remind everybody who is new in the room, please
18 make sure your cell phones are turned off. And
19 Mr. Secretary, and anybody who's testifying,
20 please make sure the microphone is close, so
21 that they can pick it up -- the recording
22 individual is doing this remotely -- so that
23 they can hear you clearly.
24 SECRETARY CORTÉS: Thank you.
25 MAJORITY CHAIRMAN SAYLOR: With that, 6
1 we'll start with our first questioner, who is
2 James Santora.
3 Representative Jamie Santora.
4 REPRESENTATIVE SANTORA: Thank you,
5 Mr. Chairman.
6 Secretary Cortés, thank you for being
7 here. One of the areas that I was looking at
8 was professional licensing. I see that, for
9 example, in the real estate licensure, every two
10 years we renew our license, we do our 14 hours
11 of continuing education, we pay our fee, we get
12 our renewal letters in the mail, we get our new
13 licenses in the mail.
14 Has there been any thought given to
15 making it a four-year process to where the fee
16 doubles, the requirement for education doubles
17 over that four-year period?
18 However, the savings of not having to
19 send out the renewals every two year versus
20 being able to do it every four, I would think
21 there would have to be a significant impact.
22 And even staffing, I think it would be -- you
23 would think it would be a little easier on your
24 staff. I know, for example, the Real Estate
25 Commission gets backed up big time. There's not 7
1 much they can do during that renewal period. If
2 you split it up alphabetically, however you do
3 it, there might be an opportunity for some big
4 savings there.
5 Has any thought gone into that?
6 Has it been reviewed or looked at?
7 SECRETARY CORTÉS: Thank you,
8 Representative.
9 At the moment, no, not that I'm aware
10 of, but actually, I'm glad we're talking about
11 it because that's precisely what we like to do
12 as a Department, continue to look for ways in
13 which we can improve the delivery of services
14 and the charge. As it relates to professional
15 licensure, the Department has two mandates that
16 are not mutually exclusive.
17 The first is the protection of the
18 public, the health and safety of the public
19 from, unfortunately, those licensees and those
20 who are not even licensed, that, you know, act
21 unethically or not up to the standards. That's
22 one charge, and we aggressively pursue those who
23 do not.
24 The other charge is to be fair to the
25 licensing community and to provide the services 8
1 that are expected in a courteous, professional,
2 and timely manner. So I will be happy to take
3 back to the Department the consideration.
4 Twenty-nine licensing boards, as you know,
5 within the Bureau of Professional and
6 Occupational Affairs; all of 28 of the 29
7 licensing boards have two-year cycles for
8 renewals. The only one that renews on a yearly
9 basis is the Navigation Commission of the
10 Delaware River.
11 So we, at the moment, don't have any
12 boards that do the four-year renewal process
13 along with the continuing education, but
14 something for us to look at. So I thank you for
15 the suggestion.
16 REPRESENTATIVE SANTORA: Great. Thank
17 you.
18 MAJORITY CHAIRMAN SAYLOR:
19 Representative O'Brien.
20 REPRESENTATIVE O'BRIEN: Thank you,
21 Mr. Chairman.
22 Good afternoon, Mr. Secretary.
23 SECRETARY CORTÉS: Good afternoon.
24 REPRESENTATIVE O'BRIEN: Let's deal with
25 the elephant in the room right away. Now, the 9
1 President has alleged that there has been
2 massive voter fraud in the last election.
3 Was there any fraud, that you know of,
4 in Pennsylvania?
5 SECRETARY CORTÉS: Representative
6 O'Brien, to the best of my knowledge, and this
7 is not wishful thinking, this is talking with
8 the counties, media reports, the Federal
9 entities that looked at our election, and.
10 The answer is no.
11 Pennsylvania, I'm very proud to say,
12 runs good elections, not perfect elections. We
13 have -- elections are a massive endeavor here in
14 the Commonwealth. We're talking about, you
15 know, 9,000 polling places. You're talking of
16 25,000 voting machines in the last presidential
17 election; over 45,000 poll workers; 6.1 million
18 voters.
19 By the way, I point out that we had,
20 percentage-wise, of registered voters, more
21 voters in this past election, 2016, with 71
22 percent, than we did back in 2008 and 2012,
23 where the turnout was 68 and 66 -- 67 percent --
24 respectively. So no evidence of fraud, but we
25 continue, in the Department, to always ensure 10
1 that we're doing our best.
2 And I think what's most important to
3 point out is that when it comes to elections in
4 Pennsylvania, our elections, although I
5 appreciate the credit given to the Department of
6 State, elections are at the local level by a
7 number of election officials and poll workers
8 that are very professional, very caring. Nobody
9 wants to be in the news as being the person who
10 is in error in their duties.
11 So unfortunately, what happened in this
12 past election is that we had a lot of rhetoric,
13 and it was not just here in Pennsylvania; it was
14 everywhere. But people say, why does it appear
15 that people tend to pick on Pennsylvania?
16 The short answer to that is that after
17 the 2000 election and what happened in Florida,
18 people are looking for the next Florida. And I
19 was here to oversee the presidential election in
20 2004. I did it again in 2008, and the third
21 cycle was this past year.
22 Nineteen elections I've overseen so far,
23 longer than anyone in the history of the
24 Commonwealth as Secretary of State. And I
25 remain confident that we do good elections in 11
1 this State, but we continue to be vigilant to
2 make sure that the elections run appropriately.
3 REPRESENTATIVE O'BRIEN: So to the best
4 of your knowledge, did the previous
5 administration report any instances of fraud?
6 SECRETARY CORTÉS: In voting, not that
7 I'm aware. There are some instances of voter
8 registration, in which someone who might not
9 have been a citizen registered. And most of the
10 time, those issues were related to PennDOT
11 registrations. When you go to PennDOT to get
12 your driver's license, if you happen to be a
13 legal permanent resident, or someone who has a
14 visa with more than one year before it expires,
15 you can obtain a driver's license in the
16 Commonwealth.
17 When you go through the process, there's
18 a series of questions that are asked, are you
19 registered to vote and so forth. Part of the
20 issue is that what we have come to learn, and we
21 took remedial steps about it, is the questions
22 about, do you want to register, are you a
23 citizen, used to be sort of buried in the
24 PennDOT process, like five or six questions down
25 from the questions that are being asked. 12
1 We worked with PennDOT to rearrange the
2 order of the questions, so when you get to the
3 question for potential registration, the first
4 question is, are you a citizen? And at that
5 point in time, if you say no, it stops the
6 process.
7 So again, I'm not sitting here to
8 unequivocally say there is no type of any issues
9 or problems or fraud in Pennsylvania -- it's a
10 massive State -- but certainly, nothing that
11 happened. And in fact, to the best of my
12 knowledge, the last administration stipulated
13 that they found no -- the Corbett Administration
14 -- they found no fraud when the elections were
15 administered, no voter fraud, no investigations,
16 and there were no prosecutions back in 2012 or
17 the period between 2011-2015.
18 REPRESENTATIVE O'BRIEN: So it's
19 reasonable to say, whether it's a Democrat or a
20 Republican as the gatekeeper of fair and honest
21 elections, Pennsylvania conducts fair and honest
22 elections.
23 Thank you, Mr. Secretary.
24 Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
25 SECRETARY CORTÉS: Thank you. 13
1 MAJORITY CHAIRMAN SAYLOR:
2 Representative Greiner.
3 REPRESENTATIVE GREINER: Thank you,
4 Mr. Chairman.
5 Mr. Secretary, I'm going to stay on the
6 voting issue concept, a few questions. Last
7 year while we were here, you had mentioned that
8 other States had shown a 50 cent to 1.50 per
9 paper registration savings by going electronic.
10 And that seems to be a theme here today, you
11 know, going electronic. You felt that could be
12 done here in Pennsylvania.
13 I was wondering, have you, through this
14 process, have you been able to quantify the
15 amount of savings to the counties here?
16 And if so, you know, do you feel your
17 estimates are accurate, and how much are they?
18 SECRETARY CORTÉS: Thank you,
19 Representative.
20 So when we were in the process of
21 launching online voter registration, a number of
22 the salient points by which we pointed out the
23 benefits of online voter registration included,
24 among others, cost savings. When Pennsylvania
25 joined and launched online voter registration, 14
1 the States that have reported savings have
2 reported savings anywhere between 50 cents
3 through $2.34, California, per ballot. That had
4 to do with the cost of manual data entry, less
5 errors, that would have required some
6 communication back with the counties and so
7 forth.
8 The sure answer is we're in the process
9 and are working with counties to quantify the
10 savings. What I can tell you, though, is that
11 we had close to 900,000 users of online voter
12 registration in Pennsylvania, which by the way,
13 64 percent were new registrations, but the
14 beauty of it is that 64 percent were individuals
15 updating records that, otherwise, they may not
16 have to, which lessened the number of people who
17 could have potentially gone to the incorrect
18 polling place and had out-of-date records; so
19 900,000.
20 The data entry, and the potential of
21 having to send back letters to correct that sort
22 of incomplete information, was reduced. In
23 addition, while the forms -- printing the forms
24 of voter registration, they're about five cents
25 apiece, you know, five cents times 900,000; 15
1 that's the number. So I like to suggest -- and
2 the question is, can we quantify it at the
3 moment?
4 The answer is, it's a work in progress,
5 but I like to say that we, at the very minimum,
6 are going to realize, you know, the minimum
7 benefits of 50 cents as reported, and I think
8 it's going to be much higher than that. Keep in
9 mind that it's not all about the dollars. It's
10 also about the accuracy. It's about the other
11 benefits that the counties enjoyed, especially
12 in a record-year election like it was in 2016.
13 REPRESENTATIVE GREINER: Just a
14 follow-up, because I do think fraud is a concern
15 when it comes to voting. And not having ID, I
16 think is problematic, and I think a lot of
17 people in this country feel that way. But I was
18 informed that the Department of State was able
19 to find a way to obtain signature capture. You
20 know, as we go in this electronic age, when an
21 individual registers to vote for the first time
22 online, can you discuss how this is
23 accomplished, what the related costs are with
24 that, and what type of funding we need to do so?
25 Because I do -- I'm going to be very up front 16
1 with you. I'm one that has deep concerns, not
2 necessarily in Pennsylvania, I know that we have
3 things at local levels. I know there's
4 impropriety, even. I was made aware of some
5 impropriety, but that's not widespread fraud.
6 But I do think, as we move forward, we have got
7 to make sure this stuff is right and the people
8 that are registering, that they're allowed to
9 be, that they're U.S. citizens and they're
10 allowed to vote. So maybe you can expound on
11 that.
12 SECRETARY CORTÉS: Thank you.
13 So the one thing that is important to
14 continue to point out is that voter
15 registration, whether it is in the traditional
16 paper form, whether it is online voter
17 registration -- and by the way, the majority of
18 voter registrations in Pennsylvania happen at
19 PennDOT.
20 Whatever way those registrations are
21 taken in, it's an application. That application
22 is forwarded to the counties, even on their
23 online voter registration, and the counties do
24 their due diligence review. Those reviews are
25 stated in Federal and State law, but include 17
1 very fine things, simple, make sure the address
2 exists, make sure that you matched a Social
3 Security or a driver's license with a person
4 that actually exists, you check for duplicates.
5 So all of that work and due diligence is done by
6 the counties.
7 Online voter registration provides a
8 methodology, to make it not only easier and more
9 convenient for the voter to register and update
10 records, as I noted before, but again, it
11 lessens the labor intensive review that counties
12 have to do with illegible handwriting and so
13 forth. So I believe that what you were
14 referring to initially, and we were the first
15 State to implement this for the past election,
16 was a signature upload for those who are using
17 the application online, but don't have a record
18 with PennDOT, or may have a record with PennDOT,
19 but you don't have a match.
20 So what we did is we worked with Kofax.
21 Kofax is the same company that works with most
22 banking institutions in the United States.
23 They're recognized when you do deposit of checks
24 now where you can take a picture. It's not only
25 validating the signature, per se; what it does 18
1 is, actually, the Kofax allows you to upload a
2 signature, which you have to still write on a
3 piece of paper, and what it does for the benefit
4 of actually a signature that is on paper, is
5 that it looks at the quality of the signature --
6 not the validity, because we don't know who the
7 person is --
8 REPRESENTATIVE GREINER: Right.
9 SECRETARY CORTÉS: -- but the quality,
10 to make sure the pixels, which actually is a
11 tremendous benefit for the counties, because
12 oftentimes when the counties are updating
13 signatures or creating voter rolls, paper-based,
14 depending on how light the pen was or what have
15 you, it's sometimes illegible for the purpose of
16 copying back to a record.
17 So we implemented the Kofax upload of
18 signatures. We had close to 45,000 people who
19 used that feature. If you don't have a
20 signature that you can upload, if you're trying
21 to use OVR, then the other option is to request
22 an actual card, where you can then receive the
23 card, sign your name, and send it back.
24 Unfortunately, only about 25 percent of the
25 people who asked for that actually follow, which 19
1 then left some counties having to have
2 incomplete registrations.
3 So it costs about -- we had about
4 $250,000 to implement a solution through Kofax.
5 It was all paid with HAVA dollars, Help America
6 Vote Act dollars. And again, we have about
7 45,000 people who used it. So if you're doing
8 the math, the cost benefit analysis is like
9 $5.50 per registration, but that is including
10 some upfront costs that we will not see in the
11 future.
12 So I think, all around, it's good. And
13 in terms of the safeguards, again, they're built
14 into the post-application process that the
15 counties follow.
16 REPRESENTATIVE GREINER: Thank you,
17 Mr. Chairman. Thank you.
18 SECRETARY CORTÉS: You're very welcome.
19 MAJORITY CHAIRMAN SAYLOR:
20 Representative Daley.
21 REPRESENTATIVE DALEY: Thank you,
22 Mr. Chairman.
23 Thank you, Secretary, for being here.
24 It's good to see you.
25 SECRETARY CORTÉS: Good to see you. 20
1 REPRESENTATIVE DALEY: So it's pretty
2 clear, in the numbers that you just gave, and
3 some of the information that you had provided
4 earlier, that the online voter registration was
5 a real success for the Department of State.
6 I've actually also read a survey recently, the
7 Patinkin Research Group, that talked about how
8 Pennsylvania voters really like their voting
9 system, and they want to see it improved.
10 We all want to see improvements, I
11 think, so that seems like a natural thing. But
12 I think it's really good what you've done with
13 the online voter registration system.
14 So can you tell us if the Department has
15 any future plans to further improve voter
16 registration? Because I know that there are a
17 number of bills out there, automatic voter
18 registration being one of them. I'm really
19 interested in hearing what you have in the
20 works, or what you're looking at as real
21 possibilities for Pennsylvania voters.
22 SECRETARY CORTÉS: Let me go back a
23 little bit to that question I did with running a
24 good election. I just got back from Washington
25 D.C. I was there with the National Association 21
1 of Secretaries of State. You may recall that I
2 was president of the Association in years past.
3 In fact, for the presidential election of 2008,
4 I was the president.
5 I was encouraged to hear, not just
6 Federal agencies' advocates, good government
7 people, everyone said it was a great election,
8 despite everything that you heard. Pennsylvania
9 takes the lead on a number of things, for
10 example, having that upload of the signature,
11 which we're the first to do. So we're always
12 looking for ways to improve.
13 In terms of the automatic voter
14 registration, we know that Senator Hughes had a
15 bill to do a form of automatic registration. I
16 know that hasn't yet moved much. States do it
17 slightly different. Pennsylvania is actually a
18 little bit there because most of the
19 registrations in Pennsylvania are handled
20 through PennDOT. So when you come in and you're
21 doing your driver's licensing transactions,
22 you're actually given an opportunity to
23 register. So it's not quite what is happening,
24 but other States have similar, like California
25 and Oregon. 22
1 We're open to all suggestions coming
2 from this body. We like to think that we're
3 innovators and we suggest good ideas to the
4 General Assembly, but ultimately, you're the
5 lawmakers, and we're happy to oblige. I think
6 that there are great opportunities for
7 Pennsylvania.
8 The issue of election reform, and again,
9 notwithstanding the fact that I believe very
10 sincerely that we run very good elections, there
11 is always room for improvement, and the voters
12 demand convenience. One of the things that I
13 will submit to the Committee and to all
14 legislators to please consider is no-excuse
15 absentee voting.
16 There's a lot of discussion about
17 implementing in-person early voting, and I know
18 that that doesn't meet with everyone's support,
19 including the counties, because it would require
20 a new way to do things, having to open polling
21 places ahead of time, how do you finance, how do
22 you get the folks?
23 But consistently, going back to 2005 and
24 the Election Reform Task Force, something we
25 have all agreed on, and when I say we, all of 23
1 the county commissioners, the county election
2 directors, and everyone, is that relaxing the
3 rules for excused absentee voting, so that you
4 can vote without a reason, without an excuse.
5 While that doesn't provide for the physical
6 early voting, it's one manifestation that could
7 get us there. It's not just about convenience,
8 but it's about looking for different ways.
9 I can tell you that the counties right
10 now, based on the Senate resolution that was
11 created through the Joint State Government
12 Commission, the Advisory Committee on Election
13 Technology, there's a report that I hope we'll
14 see before the end of the year that talks about
15 a number of different things, including voting
16 systems. Some are about reforms, and I know
17 that counties, for example, would like to have
18 the flexibility to perhaps do more vote by mail,
19 maybe be able to do vote centers because we
20 recognize that one size doesn't fit all, for
21 example, if you consider Philadelphia and Forest
22 County.
23 So we participate actively in that Joint
24 Commission Advisory Committee and look forward
25 to all the ways. So all of that to say that 24
1 we're open to suggestions. We think we can
2 always improve, and we're looking for ways and
3 your support to do so.
4 REPRESENTATIVE DALEY: I really
5 appreciate that response. In your saying that
6 the county election boards are all on board with
7 this, that basically says to me that this is
8 something that's a bipartisan -- has bipartisan
9 approval, because the counties across the State
10 are of both parties.
11 Would that be accurate to say also?
12 SECRETARY CORTÉS: Yeah, I wouldn't say,
13 unequivocally, 100 percent, but in the totality,
14 especially when you talk about in-person early
15 voting and what can be done to at least try to
16 meet that desire some way, you know, I don't
17 want to say halfway, that's when you get into
18 the conversation of the no-excuse absentee
19 voting as a way to at least relax the rules.
20 But the voting, the Election Reform Task
21 Force in 2005 supported it by majority. The
22 County Commissioners Association has an Advisory
23 Election Reform Committee, and they endorse it,
24 as well. So it has broad support.
25 REPRESENTATIVE DALEY: And just one -- 25
1 MAJORITY CHAIRMAN SAYLOR: We have a red
2 light, so we're going to move on here.
3 REPRESENTATIVE DALEY: All right. Thank
4 you very much.
5 MAJORITY CHAIRMAN SAYLOR: If you wish a
6 second round, we'd be glad to, Representative
7 Daley.
8 REPRESENTATIVE DALEY: Thank you.
9 MAJORITY CHAIRMAN SAYLOR:
10 Representative Miccarelli.
11 REPRESENTATIVE MICCARELLI: Thank you,
12 Mr. Chairman. And thank you for being here,
13 Mr. Secretary.
14 Are you familiar with the FieldWorks
15 voter registration fraud investigations that are
16 going on?
17 SECRETARY CORTÉS: I am, yes.
18 REPRESENTATIVE MICCARELLI: One of
19 those, the Norwood raid, actually occurred in my
20 district, that was conducted by the State
21 Police. And I just had some questions in
22 regards to some of the Department's conduct in
23 that regard.
24 On or about the election deadline, there
25 were two packages sent to my county courthouse 26
1 to the Board of Elections; one was about 10
2 pounds, and the other was about 1 pound. The
3 latter was sent on October 14th to our county
4 election board.
5 The reason I bring this up is the
6 deadline was October 11th. Somehow this group
7 that is being investigated currently by the, or
8 possibly still being investigated by the State
9 Police, for some reason, bypassed the Delaware
10 County Courthouse, which is about 10 minutes
11 from where their office was, and took
12 everything, about 7,000 registrations, to
13 Harrisburg, just to have them sent back to the
14 courthouse. And I was wondering if that struck
15 any chords or made anybody concerned within the
16 Department?
17 SECRETARY CORTÉS: Thank you. And by
18 the way, thank you for your support with the
19 Navigation Commission on the --
20 REPRESENTATIVE MICCARELLI: It's the
21 least I can do.
22 SECRETARY CORTÉS: Well, we greatly
23 appreciate it. Thank you for your leadership.
24 So FieldWorks is an organization that
25 does voter registrations, and in the particular 27
1 instance here, and I'm not going to comment on
2 the State Police investigation, that's beyond my
3 purview, but the main concern was, as you noted,
4 Representative, they collected hundreds of
5 registrations, took them to the Department, as
6 opposed to, you know, driving them to the county
7 board of elections right there in the county.
8 So to provide a little bit of context,
9 and I'll make it very quick, historically, the
10 Department -- and I've been there since 2003,
11 but going back to the 90s -- has had a practice
12 which is not in law, but is against the law.
13 And the counties have never had a concern with
14 it until now, that if anyone had voter
15 registration forms that they had collected, they
16 could either take them to the county, which is
17 what should be done, and is done most of the
18 time, or you could bring them to the Department,
19 we will collect them all, and then we will do a
20 public service and forward those registrations
21 to the counties and go through the process and
22 the expenditure of doing so.
23 Again, with the idea that in instances
24 as this case was an issue because you're right
25 there, but others may have been collecting 28
1 statewide. Not an issue; we simply collect
2 them. And what we have done is we actually will
3 date stamp those forms or at least have a -- if
4 we take a full packet -- we will attach some
5 form of a statement that says these forms were
6 received at the Department of State prior to
7 deadline and therefore are valid; we're
8 forwarding them to you. Never an issue.
9 With the case of FieldWorks -- and I
10 know the county took great issue with it -- I
11 can tell you that the bottom line is that, while
12 we are acting in good faith at the Department
13 and we want to be helpful to voters and others,
14 the reality is that accepting the forms at the
15 Department of State, as is the case here as
16 demonstrated by FieldWorks, is perhaps more
17 problematic than good. Ultimately, those forms
18 should go to the county.
19 So a policy determination, a decision
20 has been made by me, with support from the
21 Governor's Office, to stop the practice. I
22 don't think that -- again, it was nothing
23 illegal, nothing improper. It's a practice of
24 20-plus years. But what we're going to do is,
25 very clearly, we're going to put on our website 29
1 and all of our vocation materials, if you do
2 voter registration forms, whether you're
3 registering individually or you're doing a
4 registration drive, once you complete those
5 forms, take them to the county.
6 Take them directly to the county. Don't
7 take them to us because you're delaying the
8 process. And again, the proper recipient of
9 those forms are the counties, so we have made
10 that policy decision that will be implemented
11 with this election.
12 REPRESENTATIVE MICCARELLI: Well, I
13 think that's a good move, Secretary. Thank you
14 for that.
15 Part of the thing that jumps out at me
16 about the whole thing was the fact that the
17 county received the forms, you know, long after
18 the registration deadline. There was one person
19 registered nine times at five different
20 locations. And I guess part of the problem that
21 the county had was, you know, it was so close to
22 Election Day, trying to weave their way through
23 7,000 forms in that short period of time was
24 very difficult and, you know, there were a lot
25 of problems within the county election board. 30
1 So I'm glad to hear of the policy change.
2 Thank you.
3 SECRETARY CORTÉS: You're welcome.
4 MAJORITY CHAIRMAN SAYLOR:
5 Representative Krueger-Braneky.
6 REPRESENTATIVE KRUEGER-BRANEKY: Thank
7 you, Mr. Secretary, for joining us here today.
8 I've got a few election questions, as well.
9 First of all, special elections. I was
10 elected in a special election in Delaware County
11 18 months ago. Since then, there have been two
12 more special elections. And of those three,
13 only one was held during a regularly scheduled
14 primary or general election.
15 So can you tell us first, what is the
16 cost of conducting a special election that's not
17 during a primary or a general?
18 SECRETARY CORTÉS: Thank you,
19 Representative. Excellent question because this
20 is an Appropriations budget hearing, and we're
21 talking about ways in which we can save the
22 hard-earned taxpayer dollars.
23 So the very precise question: how much
24 does it cost to run a special election outside
25 of the regularly scheduled primary or general? 31
1 In the low end, if you're looking -- I'm looking
2 at numbers here from 2015 and 2014 and on -- on
3 the low end, about $35,000; average, about
4 $150,000.
5 The elections that were conducted more
6 recently in Philadelphia back in March of 2016,
7 there were two for the 192nd and the 200th House
8 District, they were $178,000 each, so that was
9 just about $355,000.
10 There were the three elections in August
11 of last year, 174th, 195th, 195th, that cost a
12 total of $520,000, almost more than half a
13 million dollars. And the average cost, again,
14 runs at least $100,000.
15 So if there is a way, again, and this is
16 the prerogative of the Speaker of the House and
17 the Lieutenant Governor as President of the
18 Senate, if we are looking to save dollars, one
19 way to do so is not to schedule special
20 elections outside of the regularly scheduled
21 elections.
22 When that happens -- what happened last
23 year, if you recall, when I was here, I was
24 asked, hey, how do you deal with all of these
25 special elections; how does your budget absorb 32
1 it? Well, it's an executive authorization, so
2 if we run over, we can ask for extra money, but
3 then I -- I didn't make the mistake; I was just
4 honest -- I said some counties don't ask for
5 reimbursement. I was reminded that I was on TV
6 and I had just said it loud and clear, so
7 Philadelphia and other counties came back and
8 said, I want my money for those special
9 elections, and they started collecting.
10 So just in the last, this last fiscal
11 year that ended, we paid almost over $900,000 on
12 special elections. And this year, so far, we're
13 at close to $400,000.
14 REPRESENTATIVE KRUEGER-BRANEKY: And who
15 bears that cost?
16 So you're saying that counties can
17 request reimbursements, so ultimately State
18 taxpayers are on the line?
19 SECRETARY CORTÉS: Yeah, the Department
20 of State has to pay the counties for special
21 elections, so that is everything from the poll
22 workers, to programming the machines, to if you
23 have optical scan ballot boxes, and everything
24 that goes along with running an election, which
25 is an expensive endeavor. 33
1 So yes, the Department of State has to
2 pay, obviously, our money, at least our general
3 operation dollars.
4 REPRESENTATIVE KRUEGER-BRANEKY: So just
5 to be clear, those numbers again, last year
6 almost a million dollars for special elections;
7 and this year to date, over $400,000.
8 SECRETARY CORTÉS: About $400,000,
9 $381,000 so far.
10 REPRESENTATIVE KRUEGER-BRANEKY: Thank
11 you so much.
12 SECRETARY CORTÉS: Thank you.
13 MAJORITY CHAIRMAN SAYLOR:
14 Representative Delozier.
15 REPRESENTATIVE DELOZIER: Thank you,
16 Mr. Chairman.
17 Secretary Cortés, good to see you.
18 SECRETARY CORTÉS: Good to see you.
19 REPRESENTATIVE DELOZIER: I had two
20 questions that go in line with just some of the
21 line items and some of the increases to ask
22 where those dollars are headed. The first one
23 would be the voter registration education
24 appropriation. That line item, in particular,
25 went up $100,000, but we've been talking about 34
1 the reduction and the need for printing
2 registrations, and a lot of those costs going
3 down. So I'm just trying to assimilate why the
4 item itself is going up $100,000 in request, but
5 yet, the costs that we've talked about, that
6 kind of are associated with that line item, are
7 going down.
8 So if you could just give me a little
9 bit of background on that.
10 SECRETARY CORTÉS: So very good
11 question. By the way, I touted how successful
12 online voter registration was because it was,
13 you know, 900,000 voter applications that
14 otherwise would have been paper. But in a year
15 like last year, we also still had 900,000 paper
16 applications. Si we still have the forms. We
17 still have to print them. When we give them to
18 agencies, State agencies, sister agencies, that
19 have to provide them under the National Voter
20 Registration Act, we have to code those forms.
21 So the additional costs that you see on
22 that line items related to voter registration
23 location is not only the voter registration mail
24 application, but it also includes a PennDOT
25 reimbursement. Every time PennDOT handles a 35
1 registration, we pay PennDOT 7 cents per
2 application. PennDOT alone, last year,
3 processed almost 1,700,000 applications, so we
4 paid 7 cents on that.
5 Then the other is just the voter
6 education programs, but the bulk of it is paying
7 PennDOT, reimbursing them for each form.
8 REPRESENTATIVE DELOZIER: Did that go up
9 last year, or is that --
10 SECRETARY CORTÉS: Yeah, it all went up
11 because, again, we had record numbers of
12 registrations or updates. So we had the 900,000
13 OVR. We had another close to 900,000 also on
14 paper, and we had 1. -- we had about $1.3
15 million to PennDOT.
16 These are all transactions. They don't
17 mean all registrations, but they're just
18 transactions. So we have to print forms. We
19 have to reimburse PennDOT for transactions
20 handled at DMV, at the Department of
21 Transportation.
22 We also, part of what we do, is we have
23 to pay for translation of forms. And in
24 Pennsylvania, for the most part, the forms are
25 just in English and Spanish, but we work to make 36
1 sure that the forms that are now provided
2 through PennDOT, again, because you may have
3 individuals that are citizens, new citizens, but
4 with limited English proficiency, the forms for
5 PennDOT are translated into 10 languages.
6 REPRESENTATIVE DELOZIER: That was my
7 next question, how many languages?
8 SECRETARY CORTÉS: Ten.
9 REPRESENTATIVE DELOZIER: And then, the
10 other question, in dollars and cents, in looking
11 at BPOA, there were four in particular, and I
12 guess I'm just trying to figure out why those
13 particular licensure boards, BPOA, in and of
14 itself, 6 percent increase; the Board of
15 Medicine, a 6 percent increase; osteopathic
16 medicine, 16 percent increase; podiatry, 11
17 percent. It just kind of seemed weird, as to
18 those particular ones.
19 Can you give me a little bit of
20 background as to why -- BPOA in and of itself --
21 just those particular three medical boards?
22 SECRETARY CORTÉS: Sure. So as you
23 know, 29 licensing boards, 26 are grouped within
24 the pocket of funding that is what I will call
25 the big umbrella, BPOA; and then the medical 37
1 board, osteopathic medical, and the podiatry are
2 three separate boards, just by the creation of
3 the statute.
4 The costs that you see in growth within
5 BPOA, generally speaking, are a couple of
6 things. You have what we call -- and we have
7 breakdowns for each of those -- but what you're
8 seeing in terms of increases is what we're
9 calling the cost to maintain operations. The
10 cost to maintain operations, many times, is
11 hardware, replacements of laptops, desktops,
12 technology.
13 We're also, as you know, in terms of
14 cost savings, investing and transitioning all of
15 the users. When we talk about BPOA, you know,
16 which is the largest bureau, if you count also
17 enforcement investigation and legal, which is
18 part of the same group, we are transitioning
19 everyone from traditional individual licenses
20 with Microsoft Office to Office 365, the Cloud,
21 so that we don't have the files, physical files.
22 So there is savings, but there are initial
23 investments with that.
24 We're also upgrading our
25 telecommunications technologies, just to make it 38
1 easier. Part of also what we're doing with BPOA
2 is improving the -- we're rolling three
3 different solutions, License 2000, which we use
4 internally, as well as the My License, which is
5 used by the licensing community, and License
6 Pennsylvania, which is what the public uses.
7 All of that is being rolled into our new
8 Pennsylvania licensing system.
9 So BPOA, you see growth there, perhaps,
10 more than you see anywhere else also because the
11 licensing community keeps growing. And in the
12 moneys that you have there, you have also
13 allocation for additional staff.
14 REPRESENTATIVE DALEY: So everything
15 here with medicine and osteopathic, it's all, in
16 and of itself, going toward the operation of the
17 actual board. It's not going to additional
18 reimbursements. It's not going to anything
19 dealing with the board members and the operation
20 outside of the --
21 SECRETARY CORTÉS: No. No, the
22 operation --
23 REPRESENTATIVE DELOZIER: So it's
24 overhead?
25 SECRETARY CORTÉS: Yeah, overhead. So 39
1 the operations are lien, but what we also have
2 is expert witness, expert witness increases,
3 again, because the board now is looking at a
4 million licensees, and we went up over 2200 just
5 in complaints. So we have growth in the
6 licensing community, which in turn, is growing
7 the number of complaints, especially after we
8 joined JNET, so we get more records.
9 REPRESENTATIVE DELOZIER: Thank you.
10 SECRETARY CORTÉS: You're welcome.
11 MAJORITY CHAIRMAN SAYLOR:
12 Representative Gainey.
13 REPRESENTATIVE GAINEY: Thank you,
14 Secretary, for being here today, you and your
15 staff.
16 First, I know this was the first year we
17 did online registration. I just wanted to see,
18 how did we fair against other States that also
19 have online registration?
20 SECRETARY CORTÉS: So Pennsylvania is
21 the sixth most populous state in the nation
22 after, you know, California and Texas, Florida,
23 New York and Illinois. Our numbers were graded
24 pretty much in terms of what we saw in activity,
25 as I just cited, with use of OVR, traditional 40
1 paper, and PennDOT transactions higher than most
2 States.
3 That date -- we're still looking at
4 reports that will be coming soon from the
5 National Council of State Legislators, as well
6 as the Pew Center and the U.S. Election
7 Assistance Commission that kind of paired every
8 State together. So there's not a lot of
9 empirical data.
10 I know what I have. I'm not sure what
11 other States have, but I think I can tell you,
12 in terms of the attention, we were under a
13 microscope. You know, one thing that folks
14 forget is that our county election personnel are
15 working every single day to get us ready for the
16 election, from voter registration, to education,
17 to training and what-have-you, and this was an
18 unusual year in which we were under more than
19 any other State that I mentioned of those top
20 five. Neither California, Texas, Florida,
21 certainly not Illinois, were under so much
22 attention as we were in Pennsylvania, getting
23 sued by everybody, a lot of what I will call
24 rightful -- you have the right to do so, but
25 distraction. 41
1 REPRESENTATIVE GAINEY: Right.
2 SECRETARY CORTÉS: It took a lot of time
3 and energy from the work at hand, which we were
4 busy as it was. And notwithstanding all of
5 those realities, we're delivering an election
6 that was secure, that was reliable, that was
7 smooth. So I think we did very well.
8 REPRESENTATIVE GAINEY: First, I want to
9 compliment you on that. Congratulations. You
10 did a phenomenal job. But secondly, as more
11 States are moving to early voting, do you think
12 that is something that Pennsylvania really needs
13 to look at in terms of improving voter turnout?
14 Should we be looking more to how we
15 implement early voting?
16 SECRETARY CORTÉS: As far as the
17 question, let's just go to the question of does
18 early voting improve voter turnout? The data is
19 mixed.
20 What really has shown to increase voter
21 participation is Election Day registration or
22 same-day registration. That's something that
23 does -- has been proven, and the States have
24 done so. That does increase the numbers.
25 In-person early voting, not necessarily. 42
1 But I think that we ought to consider,
2 and I think that's what we are going to see from
3 the Joint State Government Commission, the
4 Advisory Committee, from the work that is being
5 done through the County Commissioners
6 Association, the Election Reform Committee, I
7 think that's what you're going to see. You're
8 going to see a number of reforms, and I for one
9 look forward to reviewing all of those with an
10 open mind and then deciding what makes sense for
11 Pennsylvania. Because what makes sense for
12 another State may not be the same here, but I
13 think all of those things ought to be
14 considered.
15 REPRESENTATIVE GAINEY: This is just a
16 statement. I think -- I want to congratulate
17 you again -- but I also think that because of
18 the intense scrutiny that you were under and
19 because of the fact that we had no problems, and
20 we had two -- as a matter of fact, we can go
21 back to Governor Corbett and Governor Wolf,
22 we've had no problems.
23 I think Pennsylvania, all of our
24 counties, we need to stand up and celebrate the
25 fact that we've had no fraud, we've had no 43
1 issues. And I think we need to let
2 Pennsylvanians know that our voting, our voting
3 is good. We don't have to worry about fraud,
4 and we need to celebrate the truth. And the
5 truth is that we're doing well when it comes to
6 voting.
7 I believe we have to eliminate fear with
8 faith; and faith is standing on truth and saying
9 that we've had no problems so that we can put to
10 rest, voter identification, the suppression of
11 the vote, and find out how we really improve
12 voter turnout.
13 MAJORITY CHAIRMAN SAYLOR:
14 Representative Boback.
15 REPRESENTATIVE BOBACK: Thank you,
16 Mr. Chairman.
17 Recently-enacted legislation requires
18 the Department of State, through the State
19 Boards of Medicine and Pharmacy, to create
20 opioid dispensing guidelines. Also, other
21 legislation required licensed prescribers and
22 dispensers to obtain education in pain
23 management, identification of addiction and the
24 use of opioids.
25 Can you give us an update of what's 44
1 going on now with the Department of State to
2 address that legislation?
3 SECRETARY CORTÉS: The Department of
4 State has been working very closely with the
5 Department of Health, which is the agency
6 charged with the overall implementation of the
7 medical marijuana law, to see, you know, the
8 collaboration that we have.
9 Are we talking about opioids, as well,
10 forgive me?
11 REPRESENTATIVE BOBACK: Opioids, yes.
12 SECRETARY CORTÉS: Yes. The opioids;
13 forgive me on that.
14 So in terms of the opioid crisis, what I
15 believe has been very fruitful exercises, this
16 is a collaboration of a number of agencies. So
17 yes, you have the Physician General, and you
18 have the Department of Health taking the lead
19 with the help of the Department of Drug and
20 Alcohol programs, certainly the Department of
21 Human Services and others.
22 The Department of State, because we
23 license the professional community that
24 dispenses the opioids that oftentimes, sadly,
25 become the beginning of an addiction, we have 45
1 been working closely with all of the
2 departments, particularly Health, for continuing
3 education requirements, particularly, for the
4 prescribers, you know, the doctors and the
5 M.D.s, the D.O.s.
6 So overall speaking, we have -- it's a
7 conversation where, for the most part, what we
8 do is we take our cue from the agencies that are
9 dealing right on the front lines. So we work
10 closely with the Physician General, who is, as
11 you know, very passionate about the issue. So
12 we work very closely with her to make sure that
13 we close some of the barriers. One of the
14 things that we've done is we've supported
15 prescription guidelines that were accepted and
16 adopted by all of the Nursing Board, the Medical
17 Board, the Board of Pharmacy.
18 So it's an ongoing collaboration that, I
19 think, ultimately will yield the positive
20 results that we're all hoping for.
21 REPRESENTATIVE BOBACK: Thank you.
22 Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
23 SECRETARY CORTÉS: You're welcome.
24 MAJORITY CHAIRMAN SAYLOR:
25 Representative Donatucci. 46
1 REPRESENTATIVE DONATUCCI: Thank you.
2 Thank you for being here today.
3 SECRETARY CORTÉS: Of course.
4 REPRESENTATIVE DONATUCCI: One of the
5 little-known areas that the Department oversees
6 is the State Athletic Commission, which has
7 events taking place throughout Pennsylvania
8 almost every weekend.
9 Can you comment on the important role of
10 the State Athletic Commission; and how is the
11 Commission doing?
12 SECRETARY CORTÉS: I'm so happy to get
13 questions about the State Athletic Commission
14 because it's truly a gem. The Commission goes
15 back to 1923, in its original creation. And in
16 Pennsylvania, the State Athletic Commission,
17 housed within the Department of State, oversees
18 both professional and amateur boxing,
19 kickboxing, mixed martial arts, and also
20 professional wrestling.
21 I'm happy about the State Athletic
22 Commission because it is probably the only thing
23 that makes me popular with fifth graders. But a
24 couple of things that I like to point out,
25 especially this past year, the State Athletic 47
1 Commission had a record year, last year, in a
2 number of ways.
3 We have close to 2600 licensees. We
4 license the athletes, as well as the agents. We
5 saw a 20 percent increase in those registrations
6 from 2015. Oftentimes, I get asked the
7 question, how can you support, you know, sports
8 where people beat each other?
9 Well, all that means, what I always
10 said, is it's important to regulate sports that
11 are going to happen whether you do so or not.
12 The last thing we want to do is see all of these
13 sports go underground. So the fact that we can
14 regulate provides a measure of oversight that is
15 important.
16 But Pennsylvania, last year, was fourth
17 in the nation when it came to boxing events.
18 The other States that do more boxing events,
19 more than Pennsylvania, it's no surprise because
20 they're much larger: California, Texas, Florida.
21 We're one of the top 10 States when it comes to
22 mixed martial arts. We had a record year, last
23 year, when it came to the funds that we
24 generated, $676,000.
25 Even though it's not a big entity, every 48
1 once in a while, we give money back to the
2 General Fund from the moneys that we collect.
3 And last year -- I'll end with this in the
4 interest of time -- the State Athletic
5 Commission here in Pennsylvania received a
6 rating of excellent from the Fight Fax. Fight
7 Fax is the organization that rates the sports
8 commissions throughout the country, and we were
9 rated as excellent in the operation of the State
10 Athletic Commission.
11 So lots of good work, especially with
12 young people. That happens.
13 Last year, by the way -- I'll end with
14 this -- we hosted the Golden Gloves Finals in
15 Pennsylvania. And we also hosted a program of
16 youth Cuban boxers against Pittsburgh boxers, a
17 program that was hosted on the Roberto Clemente
18 Bridge and received wide support. So, yeah,
19 it's a gem that I wish I could highlight more,
20 but we do really good work with the State
21 Athletic Commission. So it's something to be
22 proud of, and no problems, no controversy.
23 REPRESENTATIVE DONATUCCI: Thank you.
24 Moving in another direction, every so
25 often, the General Assembly feels the need to 49
1 create a new board to oversee the licensure of
2 certain professions and activities in the State.
3 Can you illustrate the process of
4 creating a new board and provide information on
5 the associated start-up costs?
6 SECRETARY CORTÉS: Yes. Thank you.
7 So the process for when you start a new
8 board, we get boards that come from interest
9 groups. Most of the time, they are from the
10 licensee population or the professional
11 population that wants to be licensed. And
12 people say, why do you want to be licensed; why
13 do you want to be under the oversight of
14 government?
15 Sometimes it's to legitimize the
16 profession, as the case might be. So once -- so
17 there is a process to submit an application to
18 the Department, and we call that a sunrise
19 evaluation. So we go through a process of
20 looking, the feasibility of creating a new
21 board, understanding that to create a board,
22 there's a significant amount of expenditures,
23 not just with the regulations, initially, but
24 also the staffing between the administrators,
25 the lawyers and others. 50
1 So we look at a number of considerations
2 to decide whether, in fact, it is feasible to
3 have a new board. In recent years, there was a
4 policy decision made not to create any new
5 boards under any circumstance, no matter how
6 useful and financially viable they may have
7 been. That has since been rescinded. That's
8 not the position, but it's still a very
9 elaborate due diligence process.
10 So that's why you don't see us with more
11 than the 29 that we have now, but we continue to
12 do, on a regular basis, for those applications.
13 And if we see something that has merit, it's
14 certainly something to bring to the attention of
15 the legislature, because oftentimes they require
16 statute for creation.
17 Thank you.
18 REPRESENTATIVE DONATUCCI: Thank you.
19 Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
20 SECRETARY CORTÉS: Thank you.
21 MAJORITY CHAIRMAN SAYLOR:
22 Representative Helm.
23 REPRESENTATIVE HELM: Thank you,
24 Mr. Chairman.
25 Secretary Cortes, within your budget 51
1 materials, I noticed that there are seven new
2 positions proposed for 2017-'18 under the Bureau
3 of Professional and Occupational Affairs.
4 Specifically the Bureau cites a clerk typist for
5 the Bureau of Enforcement and Investigations;
6 two additional funeral inspectors; an attorney
7 and legal assistant for the Office of Chief
8 Counsel, prosecution division; a hearing
9 examiner; and an administrative assistant for
10 the Professional Compliance Office.
11 Can you demonstrate the need for these
12 positions and what areas within the Bureau these
13 new workers will assist?
14 SECRETARY CORTÉS: Thank you. Thank
15 you, Representative.
16 So in terms of growth within the
17 Department, that's the only area where we
18 actually have additional staff, you know, the
19 operations that encompass the support of
20 professional license. The reason for that is a
21 couple of things.
22 The licensing community, if I go back to
23 just two years ago when I came to the
24 Department, the licensing community, in terms of
25 licensees in the State, was standing at about 52
1 900,000, we are now at 982,000. So the
2 licensing community is growing rapidly, all
3 throughout the 29 licensing boards.
4 With that, the growth in the complaints
5 has also increased exponentially. Legally, we
6 saw an increase of over 2200 complaints, just in
7 the last year, which is a significant increase
8 just from a couple of years back. Part of that
9 had to do with the access to JNET, the Justice
10 Network.
11 Now, when someone is arrested or
12 convicted, at the moment -- we have it with
13 three boards, nursing, medical and
14 osteopathic -- we automatically get reports
15 which creates the opening of a file. We didn't
16 have that before. So there is exponential
17 growth in the positions. And these are only
18 intended to help with the work.
19 Let me also point out that in terms of
20 the hearing examiner, a little-known fact, but
21 the hearing examiners are assigned to the
22 Department of State, but we're one, actually.
23 When that hearing examiner shows up, they
24 actually hear cases for 21 State agencies.
25 So pretty much every agency under the 53
1 State, when they have hearings, those hearings
2 are heard by the complement within the
3 Department of State. And again, the growth, we
4 take on more clients, more agencies, and that's
5 growing the number of cases. And what we want
6 to do is make sure that we can investigate, that
7 we can follow on the cases and do so, and
8 maintain the numbers at a significant, good
9 level.
10 In terms of the two positions within the
11 Bureau of Enforcement and Investigations, the
12 funeral directors, what we are doing there, as
13 you know, there have been some cases, some quite
14 appalling in the news, about the fact that you
15 have corpses showing up in garages or something
16 because we had a backlog in inspecting funeral
17 homes, just because, humanly, there are only so
18 many people and so many days to look at
19 everything.
20 So we have taken a very proactive stance
21 to make sure that we stay on and inspect
22 facilities. We inspect, not only the funeral
23 homes, but real estate offices. We do so with
24 car dealerships. We do so with many others. So
25 the idea is that the growth is -- and we can 54
1 afford it -- within the restricted accounts
2 without any additional fee increases that are
3 expected to address the growth in the work that
4 we do within the Bureau of Professional and
5 Occupational Affairs.
6 REPRESENTATIVE HELM: Thanks for the
7 explanation.
8 Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
9 SECRETARY CORTÉS: Thank you.
10 MAJORITY CHAIRMAN SAYLOR:
11 Representative Dean.
12 REPRESENTATIVE DEAN: Thank you,
13 Mr. Chairman.
14 Good afternoon, Secretary Cortés.
15 SECRETARY CORTÉS: Good to see you.
16 REPRESENTATIVE DEAN: Good to see you
17 all. You said that we had maybe banner voter
18 turnout participation in this last presidential
19 election. I think, did you say 71 percent?
20 SECRETARY CORTÉS: Seventy-one percent.
21 REPRESENTATIVE DEAN: Of registered?
22 SECRETARY CORTÉS: Yes; 6.1 million
23 voters, over 6.1 million voters, out of the 8.5
24 million registered voters.
25 REPRESENTATIVE DEAN: And this is maybe 55
1 more curiosity than it's budgetary, but how
2 many, what's the percentage of eligible
3 Pennsylvanians who are registered to vote?
4 And by contrast, how many are not
5 registered?
6 SECRETARY CORTÉS: So at the moment, we
7 have about 8.5 million registered voters. It is
8 anticipated -- based on some numbers that we
9 have, we believe that the number of actual
10 eligible voters is more like 10,750,000. So we
11 have, potentially, about 2.5 million eligible
12 voters that are not yet registered.
13 So we have about 2.25 million people
14 that are not currently registered, that
15 potentially qualify for registration. And
16 again, we have 8.5 million currently registered.
17 REPRESENTATIVE DEAN: And are you
18 finding that the eligible population, because of
19 the online voter registration, that maybe that
20 percentage is beginning to come down?
21 SECRETARY CORTÉS: Yeah. In fact, if we
22 look at January 2016, compared to January of
23 this year, in January 2016 -- and the
24 population, by the way, Pennsylvania, as you
25 know, has been fairly stagnant since the 50s, so 56
1 we are not growing very much.
2 We are at 2.8 million, from 2.5 million
3 just, you know, seven years ago. So last year,
4 we had about 8.1 million people registered in
5 January; this year, it is 8.5. So we saw a
6 growth of close to 400,000. I think those
7 numbers are going to be affected.
8 The other thing that we're doing is, not
9 only through OVR, but also joining ERIC, the
10 Electronic Registration Information Center,
11 we're actually now able to identify if there are
12 individuals on the voter rolls that are no
13 longer living in Pennsylvania, were deceased in
14 other States. So we're cleaning the voter
15 rolls.
16 So we're adding more people, which is
17 good, but at the same time, equally good is that
18 we are making sure that our records are more
19 accurate and so that, I don't call it purging,
20 but so those individuals that are passed or no
21 longer in the State can be removed.
22 REPRESENTATIVE DEAN: I will tell you
23 that my constituents have been very happy with
24 the online and are asking, begging, for other
25 innovations that will make voting easier, 57
1 absentee voting easier and clearer. So you
2 know, I applaud the Department for that.
3 SECRETARY CORTÉS: Thank you.
4 REPRESENTATIVE DEAN: In terms of,
5 again, absentee ballots, again, that's something
6 that my constituents are clamoring for. They
7 don't want to be caught in a position of not
8 being able to predict, particularly elderly
9 people, whether they're going to be well enough
10 to get to the polling place. We put a burden
11 that we just absolutely shouldn't put on people.
12 And if I'm correct, we're one of only
13 now, a dozen or so States that doesn't allow for
14 no-excuse; is that correct?
15 SECRETARY CORTÉS: Yeah, 13.
16 REPRESENTATIVE DEAN: Thirteen?
17 SECRETARY CORTÉS: Yeah, so we're in the
18 clear minority there.
19 REPRESENTATIVE DEAN: I hope we'll move
20 in the direction of that.
21 And then, to give you a chance to
22 educate me a little bit, tell me what your
23 Department does for small businesses and
24 start-ups, in particular for veteran start-ups
25 and small businesses. 58
1 SECRETARY CORTÉS: Thank you.
2 So the Department of State, we have to
3 be careful that we don't -- I used to tout that
4 we're the foundation for economic development in
5 the State because it sounds too much like my
6 dear colleagues across the street at Community
7 and Economic Development, but if you're going to
8 have a legitimate business in Pennsylvania, it
9 starts with the Department of State, because
10 that's where you do the registrations. And
11 we're a driver for economic development because
12 we handle the secure transactions under the
13 Uniform Commercial Code.
14 I remember coming into office in 2003,
15 when our processing times for UCC documents was
16 27 calendar days -- 27 business days; calendar
17 was much more; 36 for other business documents.
18 And anyone who had a phone and my number was
19 calling me and screaming at the top of their
20 lungs that that was an impediment to them being
21 able to do business in this State. We're down
22 to one day today in Pennsylvania.
23 So our role is to be a friendly,
24 easy-to-use point of entry for businesses in the
25 State. However, we recognize, too, it's easy 59
1 for me, as someone who works in the Department,
2 to understand what we do, but if you're a
3 business owner, particularly a small business
4 owner, who can't or won't hire an attorney to do
5 all of that for them, for most people, you want
6 to do business, you have an idea.
7 I just want a single point of contact, a
8 single point of entry. So the Department is
9 working very closely with the agencies that work
10 on economic development, community economic
11 development, the Department of Revenue for tax,
12 the Department of Labor and Industry, if you
13 have the numbers for the unemployment and
14 workers' compensation insurance. So we are, you
15 know, we're part of that conversation to try to
16 truly create a one-stop shop.
17 I will mention this very briefly because
18 I'm very pleased to say, as you know, that there
19 was Act 1 -- and I have it right here -- Act 135
20 was the Act that the legislature passed last
21 year. It was implemented in the 60-day
22 requirement, and this is the new law that
23 provides for veterans and reservice to be able
24 to file their businesses' incorporation and
25 other documents free of charge. 60
1 And I'm very pleased to say that law was
2 implemented. We rolled out the forms on January
3 2nd. And as of today, we've had already 34
4 military and other veteran reservice who have
5 taken advantage of the -- I don't want to call
6 it free -- no charge for the corporation
7 documents.
8 So we'd like to say that we're -- we'd
9 like to think that we contribute positively to
10 the economic growth and in helping our business
11 entrepreneurs in the State.
12 REPRESENTATIVE DEAN: Terrific. Thank
13 you, Mr. Secretary.
14 Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
15 SECRETARY CORTÉS: Thank you.
16 MAJORITY CHAIRMAN SAYLOR: Thank you.
17 At this time, Representative Knowles.
18 REPRESENTATIVE KNOWLES: Thank you,
19 Mr. Chairman.
20 Welcome, Mr. Secretary. It's always a
21 pleasure to see you.
22 SECRETARY CORTÉS: Likewise.
23 REPRESENTATIVE KNOWLES: I cannot sit
24 here and allow some of the remarks that have
25 been made by some of my colleagues go 61
1 unanswered.
2 In October of last year, J. Christian
3 Adams, the President of Public Interests Legal
4 Foundation testified before the State Government
5 Committee that Philadelphia had foreign
6 nationals that self-reported to the City that
7 they were registered and should be taken off the
8 voting rolls. Also, the voting records showed
9 that some had voted in past elections.
10 Any of you who may have any doubt about
11 that, the Chairman, Chairman Metcalfe, has a
12 copy of the names and the addresses and the
13 report if you'd like to see it.
14 So my question would -- first, I would
15 like you to respond to that, Mr. Secretary. Is
16 there anything that you can add that you are
17 doing to ensure that neither legal or illegal
18 aliens are voting in Pennsylvania's elections?
19 SECRETARY CORTÉS: We're talking about
20 non-citizens; if they're legal --
21 REPRESENTATIVE KNOWLES: Legal or
22 illegal legals.
23 SECRETARY CORTÉS: Yeah, I don't want to
24 split hairs, but if you're legal and you are a
25 citizen, but you're talking about -- so let me 62
1 just say the following. First and foremost, we
2 don't claim that elections are perfect. I have
3 said that from the get-go because you're talking
4 about an enormous endeavor.
5 If you talk in terms of general terms,
6 are you talking about systemic fraud,
7 individuals that are not supposed to register
8 registering?
9 Again, I just point you to the records
10 of -- and I don't want to get controversial with
11 the Pennsylvania Voter ID --
12 REPRESENTATIVE KNOWLES: Mr. Secretary,
13 I'm talking about --
14 SECRETARY CORTÉS: I'm giving you the
15 answer, Representative. What I'm telling you is
16 that if you want me here to unequivocally say
17 there is not a single person that is not
18 entitled to vote because they're not 18, a U.S.
19 citizen, or resident -- but you're speaking
20 specifically to citizenship -- that has ever
21 registered and voted; I cannot do that.
22 There are, in fact, some cases, I think
23 someone may have -- and not here, in other
24 States -- but if you're asking me if there is
25 systemic, ongoing, pervasive, massive, it 63
1 happens every day, I would like you to show me
2 the records in terms of convictions. That's
3 what I would like you to basically show me.
4 Anyone can say anything so I will go to the
5 record because I know the Chairman is probably
6 going to speak next.
7 But I will tell you that if what you're
8 trying to get me to say is that there is no
9 fraud in Pennsylvania, I cannot say that; just
10 the same way I cannot say there is any other
11 crime that shouldn't take place. But if you're
12 asking me, am I aware and I think that it is
13 systemic and pervasive and what-have-you, I
14 don't have that evidence. So I certainly
15 welcome --
16 And what am I doing to do it better?
17 Like I said, a couple of things. We knew from
18 the facts that part of those individuals, for
19 example, that went to PennDOT, that got
20 registered, did not vote, got registered, was
21 perhaps because when they were reading the
22 screens, getting a license, in haste, they
23 either didn't understand the language, or in
24 haste, answered on the register. And some of
25 those individuals would have called and said, 64
1 oh, by the way, I received a notice for a
2 registration, and I never intended to.
3 Some people just don't know enough, but
4 if you're asking me, is it pervasive? I don't
5 see it. So we are going to continue to work
6 diligently with all of our partners. That's why
7 we joined ERIC, to make sure that we have
8 records that are more accurate in all of their
9 manifestation insurance terms of individuals
10 that are no longer in Pennsylvania. We want to
11 make sure that we avoid duplicate records.
12 So your concern is the same as mine.
13 Let me tell you, I'm not a masochist. I'm the
14 State's chief election official. Do you think
15 you want me, as part of my legacy, or whatever
16 you want to call it, that I'm allowing
17 individuals that are not eligible to vote to do
18 so? Absolutely not. That makes absolutely no
19 sense.
20 I think when those matters take place,
21 then we need to address them appropriately. If
22 that leads to a conviction, I do hope that is
23 the case.
24 REPRESENTATIVE KNOWLES: I would never
25 say that you weren't doing your job or doing the 65
1 right thing, Mr. Secretary, but some of my
2 colleagues would like you to believe that all is
3 well in the Land of Oz. Well, the bottom line
4 is that we have problems, and the problems, we
5 need to continue to address those problems.
6 Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
7 And thank you, Mr. Secretary.
8 MAJORITY CHAIRMAN SAYLOR:
9 Representative Briggs.
10 REPRESENTATIVE BRIGGS: Thank you,
11 Mr. Chairman.
12 Mr. Secretary, over here; how are you?
13 SECRETARY CORTÉS: Good.
14 REPRESENTATIVE BRIGGS: Thank you for
15 your testimony. I wasn't going to address this,
16 but I want to thank you and your staff for the
17 wonderful job that you do. Every time I have a
18 question, and every time I have a concern, you
19 guys are always very responsive. Eight and a
20 half million registered voters in Pennsylvania
21 is an amazing number, and I want to thank you
22 and applaud you for the great elections that
23 you've run and managed in Pennsylvania.
24 The question I have, over the last three
25 terms, or it might have been four, I've 66
1 introduced a bill regarding requiring campaign
2 finance reports to be filed online. I'm taking
3 a different tack this time. For some reason, I
4 haven't been able to get it addressed by the
5 State Government Committee, but Representative
6 Keller and I are working together, and I'm
7 hoping that with his leadership, we'll be able
8 to get it considered.
9 Could you just tell us the number of
10 campaign committees there are and the percent
11 that file online, if you have that number?
12 SECRETARY CORTÉS: Well, let me, if I
13 can, perhaps, answer the question.
14 First, a statement. Thank you. Thank
15 you. The Department of State welcomes and is
16 working hard to make sure that we provide
17 anything we do, particularly any contract with
18 the agency, whether it is professional
19 licensure, applications or renewals and campaign
20 finance, lobbying disclosure and everything
21 online. There's significant tremendous benefit
22 to that. That's the direction we're moving in,
23 the bureau corporations and charitable
24 organizations, and it makes a lot of sense.
25 It's convenient. It's more accurate. It saves 67
1 time. You don't have all of the data entry,
2 which is expensive.
3 This is what I can tell you in terms of
4 statistics. For the period of July 2016 to
5 January 2017, so we're talking only six months,
6 the first half of this fiscal year, we have
7 already have had 5300 campaign finance reports
8 filed. Of those, and I will just give you a
9 general number, 61 percent are still being filed
10 paper-based.
11 So 61 percent of all of the campaign
12 finance records that we get, and we get over
13 10,000 every year, are being filed on paper,
14 with only 39 percent electronically. I welcome
15 -- we welcome the -- what will that mean?
16 We spend thousands of dollars using a
17 third party to do data entry or to -- you know,
18 when we get a document, we are very quick to
19 scan and put up on the website, but it's not a
20 searchable document. So we work with a third
21 party vendor to do that. That's thousands of
22 dollars.
23 We want transparency. Everybody wants
24 transparency. You want to have quick access to
25 those records. So if we were able to require 68
1 everyone that files campaign finance records to
2 do so electronically, that will have significant
3 benefits, not only for us, but in terms of
4 transparency, in terms of access, in terms of
5 just that spirit of people being able to see,
6 you know, what dollars are being raised and from
7 where. So I hope those numbers satisfy the
8 question.
9 Thousands of campaigns and candidates
10 and others have to report, and not yet 40
11 percent are doing so electronically.
12 REPRESENTATIVE BRIGGS: It satisfies it
13 as an answer. It's disappointing that so few
14 take advantage of the great database that you
15 guys have created. When I first started working
16 on this, it was Secretary Aichele, I guess your
17 successor or predecessor, I'm not sure which
18 way, but we recognize her. We spent a lot of
19 time trying to come up with a bill that would
20 address -- she was more concerned just about the
21 overwhelming amount of overtime that it took to
22 data input everyone's hard paper file because
23 there was a requirement that it's searchable and
24 that it's accessible to all of our constituents.
25 So it was something that we worked on together. 69
1 And hopefully Representative Keller and I will
2 be able to celebrate its passage in due course.
3 A second question I had was, so much of
4 what you're doing is online these days with
5 voter registration and more and more campaign
6 reports. In Montgomery County, we had an issue
7 in the October -- in the November election in
8 October, regarding the absentee ballots and the
9 number of delays in processing and mailing. The
10 Court ended up having to intervene to give us a
11 little bit of a delay.
12 I read in the paper, I think, there were
13 still 300 absentee ballots that were voted or
14 mailed and delivered after Election Day. The
15 county commissioners are taking a review and are
16 going to come up with some recommendation that
17 they think they could do better, and hopefully
18 recommendations that they can pass along to me.
19 But is that something that we could push the
20 envelope with online and with your capabilities
21 and technology to allow that -- I mean,
22 no-excuse, same day, all of that is great, but
23 it seems to me, what was happening, was they
24 were getting overwhelmed, and they were having
25 to key punch in the data. 70
1 Is there a way that a citizen could
2 request the ballot even on an online form?
3 I just want to ask you, are there
4 capabilities there that they could do that?
5 I look forward to working with your
6 staff to try to come up with some simple reforms
7 so that Montgomery County's citizens don't face
8 the same challenges in the future.
9 SECRETARY CORTÉS: So we're looking
10 forward to being innovative, and we would like
11 to do so. We have some limitations, the money,
12 costs, you know, to be able to just expand on
13 what we have with the SURE System, which is
14 aging, but the major issue here is you'll see
15 this from the conversations with the Advisory
16 Committee on Election Technology, but beyond
17 that, it is an issue that our Election Code goes
18 back to 1937, and as it relates to absentee
19 ballots, it provides that you can request an
20 absentee ballot the Tuesday before the election,
21 a week before, but by the way, that ballot has
22 to be back by that Friday.
23 That's not the reality of the postal
24 service nowadays; they simply don't get there.
25 So part of what we did, with the Department 71
1 working with the counties, is a lot of voter
2 education, information and press releases that
3 said, if you wait until the last minute, it's
4 not going to get there; either request one early
5 or go in-person if you are pushing the envelope.
6 In the case of Montgomery, they really
7 got backed up, partially because they were
8 waiting for the question on the judicial race
9 and the age of retirement, trying to get it
10 right. And in the end, they were able to go to
11 the Court of Common Pleas, as you know, and get
12 an extension until Election Day as opposed to
13 the Friday before, but that was certainly not
14 sufficient.
15 So this is an area of major concern for
16 us, absentee ballots. So we appreciate the
17 interest and look forward to working with you
18 and others on it.
19 MAJORITY CHAIRMAN SAYLOR: Thank you,
20 Mr. Secretary.
21 Representative Roae.
22 REPRESENTATIVE BRIGGS: Chairman Saylor,
23 just -- so you're, the financial aspects of the
24 capabilities is what's -- is one of the
25 limitations to what you're facing? 72
1 SECRETARY CORTÉS: A couple of things.
2 We would need legislation that would allow us to
3 do so. So we would have to amend the Election
4 Code to permit the use of an electronic delivery
5 form for absentee ballots. And then we would
6 have to work on our SURE System and build it in
7 such a way that can do so.
8 So legislation, money, a little bit of
9 time to put it together, but certainly we have
10 to drive.
11 REPRESENTATIVE BRIGGS: Thank you,
12 Secretary.
13 Thank you, Chairman, for that extension.
14 MAJORITY CHAIRMAN SAYLOR:
15 Representative Roae.
16 REPRESENTATIVE ROAE: Thank you,
17 Mr. Chairman.
18 Thank you, Mr. Secretary.
19 A little bit ago, somebody mentioned the
20 concern with special elections, how expensive
21 they are. I'm just kind of curious about other
22 election-related things that people do not seem
23 to be concerned with how expensive they are,
24 things like same-day registration, early voting,
25 no-excuse absentee ballot voting. 73
1 It seems like, if you have six million
2 people showing up on Election Day, that all
3 registered ahead of time, and they all vote on
4 the machines, it's almost like a big assembly
5 line. It's pretty efficient.
6 But if you're standing in line to vote,
7 and the person in front of you, they're trying
8 to register on the same day, and they're filling
9 out a form, or if some people decide to vote
10 early and the county has to set up polling
11 sites, not on the regular Election Day, but
12 staff them on days other than normal Election
13 Day, if thousands or even millions of people do
14 no-excuse absentee ballot voting, now you're
15 dealing with all of these paper ballots.
16 It just seems like -- let me ask the
17 question this way. When people show up on
18 Election Day and vote on a machine, isn't it a
19 lot cheaper, the cost, than people who, you
20 know, do absentee voting or anything like that?
21 SECRETARY CORTÉS: Yeah, part of the --
22 well, part of the reason -- well, I guess,
23 because we don't have it, because we don't have
24 some of the forms that you speak of in
25 Pennsylvania, you know, it's hard for me to 74
1 grasp the -- but your point is well taken.
2 I think if you're saying -- that's part
3 of the conversation with the counties. When the
4 counties are looking for, and they're the ones
5 that have said, for example, we will be
6 supportive of absentee, no-excuse absentee
7 voting as opposed to in-person or early voting
8 because we would have to staff a polling place.
9 We'll have to open ahead of time. The
10 considerations there are money-wise, and you are
11 right, additional costs. Some are just
12 logistics, finding the poll workers; that's one
13 of the challenges we have in Pennsylvania, just
14 finding enough poll workers.
15 By the way, there are other reforms that
16 you might hear from this Advisory Committee that
17 they're talking about. Do we even need to
18 continue to elect the Judge of Elections,
19 minority, majority inspector; can they be
20 appointed? It's easier, perhaps, to find the
21 individual.
22 So I will just say very briefly,
23 Mr. Representative, that your point is well
24 taken. So I think there are costs and
25 gives-and-takes. I will only point out that the 75
1 States that, for example, do like all mail, like
2 Oregon, like California, like Washington State,
3 not only have high voter turnout, they have
4 great voter satisfaction. They have some
5 savings that, perhaps, we don't see realized
6 now.
7 The dual systems, I see it both ways.
8 So your point is well taken.
9 REPRESENTATIVE ROAE: Thank you.
10 Because it just seems like, if some polling site
11 has 1,000 people walk in, they vote
12 electronically, that just seems more efficient
13 than if they have 1,000 envelopes of paper
14 ballots that they have to manually count. It
15 just seems like the cost would be a lot more.
16 Now, my other question, totally
17 unrelated; somebody had asked earlier about all
18 of these boards and commissions, and I just
19 wanted to get a clarification. I think you said
20 there are 29 different boards and commissions?
21 SECRETARY CORTÉS: Correct. Twenty-nine
22 licensing boards that all receive 255 job
23 classifications.
24 REPRESENTATIVE ROAE: Now, every single
25 job classification, do they all pay for 76
1 themselves with different license fees and
2 inspection fees and things like that, or are
3 there anywhere subsidies with regular tax money
4 to pay for any of that stuff?
5 SECRETARY CORTÉS: No. Part of the
6 creation of any board is the -- I talked about
7 that sunrise assessment -- is to see the
8 viability. So no, all of our professional
9 licensure boards, by statute, have to be
10 self-funded.
11 What you often run into is that when it
12 comes to the initial implementation of a new
13 board, this is a consideration for a new board,
14 is that once you create a board and before you
15 are able to charge the first registration fee or
16 licensing fee, you go through a process of about
17 two years to put the regs together.
18 So there is an augmentation account
19 that, while every board, their money is well
20 parceled and well accounted for, there is an
21 augmentation account from which you can borrow,
22 and then you have to pay it back. But the
23 bottom line is that all of the boards are
24 self-funded.
25 REPRESENTATIVE ROAE: All right. Thank 77
1 you, sir.
2 SECRETARY CORTÉS: Thank you.
3 MAJORITY CHAIRMAN SAYLOR:
4 Representative Bullock.
5 REPRESENTATIVE BULLOCK: Thank you,
6 Mr. Chairman.
7 Thank you, Secretary, for testifying
8 before us today.
9 As we know, your Department also
10 regulates charities. And I believe I asked you
11 about charities last year. We know also that
12 our middle class and working families tend to be
13 the largest contributors to those charities. We
14 want to make sure that those contributions are
15 protected and that they can be secure that the
16 charities that they're contributing to are
17 registered and are following the rules of the
18 Commonwealth.
19 Can you share with me, I guess, were
20 there any increases in the number of charities
21 that registered in the last year; any increases
22 in the number of cases of fraud; and how does
23 your Department handle those cases?
24 SECRETARY CORTÉS: So there was some
25 growth, but you know, not as significant in 78
1 other areas like voter registration, for
2 example. But in Pennsylvania, we have a little
3 over 11,000 registered charities, but we also
4 have, in addition to that, 427 registered
5 professional solicitors and professional
6 fundraisers, and professional counsel,
7 professional fundraising counsel. As you know,
8 the professional solicitors are the ones that
9 will pick up the phone and call you, or send you
10 a mailer, whereas the professional fundraising
11 counsel counsels the organization.
12 So we have about 11,500 altogether in
13 the State. Pennsylvanians are generous, so we
14 want to make sure that we protect the public
15 trust. A few of the things that we're doing, we
16 have, over the last few years since I've been in
17 office, we have dedicated a significant amount
18 of time and energy to voter -- I'm sorry to
19 informed giving education.
20 So for that, we do -- we have done two
21 very successful Twitter town halls. We do them
22 around the time of the holidays. We have also
23 issued an incredible amount of press releases.
24 We're making good use of social media. So an
25 emphasis is on informed giving. 79
1 We don't want to scare people into not
2 giving. Pennsylvania is so generous, and the
3 charities need the funding. We just want to
4 make sure you do so in an informed fashion. So
5 that's where we are in terms of numbers to
6 charities and what we do.
7 We have taken a very, what I will call a
8 very aggressive stance, on disciplinary actions
9 and review, and I want to give you some
10 specifics related to charities. Over the last
11 year, in terms of charities, we had an increase
12 in the number of consent agreements that we had
13 last year. We had over 22 consent agreements.
14 We have over 52,000 in penalties that we issued.
15 We had a growing number of cease and desist
16 orders. The growth is quite -- it's
17 significant.
18 One of the things that we have done is
19 assign, now, a full-time prosecutor just to
20 specifically handle the prosecutions, and we're
21 working to -- the way that the charities are and
22 how we end up -- the issue, oftentimes, is
23 you're soliciting without letting us know you're
24 doing so in the State. Whether you're a
25 charity, whether you're a professional 80
1 fundraiser or counselor, anyone that is involved
2 in the business, before you do so, you have to
3 come to the Department of State and let us know
4 what you're doing, and we have to give you the
5 okay. Some people do it without approval ahead
6 of time.
7 So the bottom line is that we're taking
8 a very proactive stance with education, very
9 proactive stance with prosecution, very
10 aggressive, and I anticipate that those numbers
11 will continue to increase, and final actions are
12 increasing, as well.
13 REPRESENTATIVE BULLOCK: Thank you.
14 I have a follow-up question on a
15 separate matter. One, I'd like to thank you for
16 your previous responses to my colleague's
17 questions about voter registration fraud and
18 that it, in fact, is not systemic, but maybe
19 some isolated incidents.
20 My question is in regards to your
21 personnel, and I believe last year you shared
22 with me that you had quite diverse personnel.
23 If you could, just share your numbers for the
24 last year, and if there are any significant
25 changes. 81
1 SECRETARY CORTÉS: The numbers in the
2 Department have remained fairly steady in terms
3 of our diversity within the ranks of the
4 Department, diversity in terms of race, but also
5 gender. We are pretty much, in every standard,
6 ever field, we're about the Commonwealth
7 numbers.
8 For example, the number of minority
9 females in the Commonwealth is 8.3 percent; the
10 Department is 10.7. The numbers, pretty much in
11 every category, our numbers are higher. For
12 example, minority males, 8.2 percent in the
13 Commonwealth; 11.1 percent.
14 What I'm most proud of is that the
15 diversity, which is across the board, and
16 doesn't take anything away from anyone, it
17 reflects heavily in the management staff. I'm
18 Hispanic. The Executive Deputy Secretary, she's
19 Hispanic. One of our two deputies is a family.
20 The Director of the Office of Policies is an
21 African-American female. The Deputy Director of
22 Policies is also African-American. The Director
23 of the Office of Communications and Press is a
24 female Hispanic. So all across the board, down
25 to our receptionist. So we're providing 82
1 opportunity somewhere. We're very proud of
2 that.
3 Still, the majority of our staff happen
4 to be white Caucasian, but that's just the
5 general trend of the Commonwealth and the
6 population. But we take the issue of diversity,
7 and always talented individuals, to fill those
8 vacancies very seriously. So we work diligently
9 to accomplish diversity in all of these
10 manifestations.
11 REPRESENTATIVE BULLOCK: Thank you,
12 Secretary. I applaud you for your attempts, and
13 your personnel does reflect the Commonwealth's
14 diversity and talent.
15 SECRETARY CORTÉS: Thank you,
16 Representative Bullock.
17 MAJORITY CHAIRMAN SAYLOR:
18 Representative Keller.
19 REPRESENTATIVE F. KELLER: Thank you,
20 Mr. Chairman.
21 Good to see you, Secretary.
22 SECRETARY CORTÉS: Good to see you, sir.
23 REPRESENTATIVE F. KELLER: Just a couple
24 of questions related around efficiencies,
25 programs that you might be working on within the 83
1 Department to create more efficiencies, save
2 money, streamline some of the operations.
3 Do you have a couple of items that
4 you're working on?
5 SECRETARY CORTÉS: Yeah, so a couple of
6 things, and I want to go back to GO-TIME. I
7 think it's good are for -- well, let me speak
8 generally.
9 So as I mentioned earlier, most of our
10 efficiencies are in working diligently to move
11 many of our services online for convenience. So
12 we're doing that in professional licensure;
13 we're doing it all across the board.
14 So our efficiencies are mostly available
15 in taking advantage of technology. And that is,
16 in the professional licensure, the upgrade from
17 License 2000 to the Pennsylvania Licensing
18 System; and that is already being well received.
19 We are, again, improving in many of -- one of
20 the things that we're working on, in terms of
21 professional licensure, we implemented online
22 list sales. We sell lists of licensees. That's
23 remitted by law. We've done that online.
24 Online voter registration.
25 And then, as you know, we're part of the 84
1 overall Commonwealth review of how we maximize
2 our resources in HR and IT. So we are part of
3 all of those efforts. Everything that we do is
4 with an eye on being very respectful and careful
5 with the public dollars.
6 REPRESENTATIVE F. KELLER: Are all of
7 your projects that you're working on on the
8 GO-TIME website?
9 SECRETARY CORTÉS: Yeah, the ones that
10 we have -- you will see in there, for example,
11 we have a county SURE registration portal. So
12 yes, we have them listed.
13 REPRESENTATIVE F. KELLER: How often is
14 that updated?
15 SECRETARY CORTÉS: Quarterly, is my
16 understanding.
17 REPRESENTATIVE F. KELLER: It's updated
18 quarterly. If I were just to go to like the
19 Governor's GO-TIME, and then go to the list of
20 statewide priorities, there's probably about 150
21 things on that list.
22 Your items would be on that list.
23 SECRETARY CORTÉS: Yes.
24 REPRESENTATIVE F. KELLER: One hundred
25 fifty-four, I see on the list, as I pull it up 85
1 on my smart phone here.
2 So that's where I would find that?
3 SECRETARY CORTÉS: Yes, sir.
4 REPRESENTATIVE F. KELLER: Okay.
5 SECRETARY CORTÉS: And by the way, I
6 want to be as thorough in my response to you
7 today so that we don't have to rely on me
8 sending you more information after the hearing,
9 but always happy to provide any particular
10 details. Again, most of what we're doing is to
11 look into capitalizing technology. For example,
12 I'll tell you, one, cost savings is a driver.
13 When I was in the Office before, we used
14 to have budgets of up to $2 million just to do
15 voter education and to get information out about
16 elections. In the last year, everything that we
17 did, we did in-house with social media. So
18 we're investing heavily in, you know, I
19 mentioned Twitter town halls to internal
20 homemade graphics. Pretty much, most of what we
21 do is with internal resources, all of that is
22 driving towards making better use of technology
23 and not having to rely on taxpayer dollars to do
24 what we do.
25 REPRESENTATIVE F. KELLER: Are the 86
1 internal resources listed on the GO-TIME
2 website?
3 Because I will be honest with you, I've
4 gone out here and I've looked at it, and I see
5 about -- you have lines 139 through 143, most of
6 them listed completed, and have the fiscal year
7 of '15-'16 in them. So I'm looking for
8 something that we'd be looking to do in '17-'18.
9 So I guess what I would ask, because I
10 don't want to take up all of the time with
11 this --
12 SECRETARY CORTÉS: Sure.
13 REPRESENTATIVE F. KELLER: -- but I
14 would ask that maybe we could get together.
15 SECRETARY CORTÉS: Yes.
16 REPRESENTATIVE F. KELLER: And make sure
17 that I'm looking at the proper area because this
18 should be something that is easily searchable --
19 SECRETARY CORTÉS: Agreed.
20 REPRESENTATIVE F. KELLER: -- by the
21 citizens of the Commonwealth.
22 SECRETARY CORTÉS: Sure.
23 REPRESENTATIVE F. KELLER: Again, I've
24 gone to the GO-TIME website, and I see the
25 initiatives. I do commend you for having some 87
1 things on the list, not all departments do.
2 SECRETARY CORTÉS: Sure.
3 REPRESENTATIVE F. KELLER: I'm
4 interested in that, not because people aren't
5 doing a good job, but as you know, in business,
6 if you're not going forward, you're moving
7 backwards.
8 SECRETARY CORTÉS: Absolutely.
9 REPRESENTATIVE F. KELLER: Or if you're
10 standing still, you're moving backwards. So
11 that is one of the things that I want to make
12 sure that we're driving at all of our
13 departments, not that we're not doing the work
14 we should be doing, but what more can we deliver
15 for the citizens of our Commonwealth.
16 So I appreciate the time. I guess I did
17 have one other question. You had mentioned some
18 other States with early voting, and you had
19 mentioned California, Washington, Oregon.
20 Do you have the voter turnout in those
21 States? Because the Pennsylvania one, I
22 believe, was around 71 percent.
23 Do you know what it was in those other
24 States?
25 SECRETARY CORTÉS: So the State with the 88
1 highest voter turnout in the last election, and
2 leading with early voting and in-person voting
3 registration, was Minnesota. They had about 80
4 percent, or just above 80 percent.
5 REPRESENTATIVE F. KELLER: Okay.
6 SECRETARY CORTÉS: And by the way, I
7 think maybe I misspoke. When I mentioned
8 California and Oregon and Washington State, I
9 was referring to vote by mail. Those
10 jurisdictions also have good numbers.
11 Our voter turnout, by the way, is not
12 bad.
13 REPRESENTATIVE F. KELLER: Do you know
14 where we rank?
15 SECRETARY CORTÉS: Yeah, in fact, I was
16 looking at a list. Out of the 55 jurisdictions
17 in the country, we rate within the first 15 or
18 so, 15 or 20 for this election. Again, our
19 numbers were higher at 71 percent than they had
20 been in the last two presidential elections.
21 REPRESENTATIVE F. KELLER: So the last
22 election, we were within the top 15. Again, not
23 that we don't want to improve and so forth, it's
24 just good to understand where we are now.
25 SECRETARY CORTÉS: Sure. 89
1 REPRESENTATIVE F. KELLER: Thank you.
2 SECRETARY CORTÉS: My goal would be 100
3 percent voter participation.
4 REPRESENTATIVE F. KELLER: That would be
5 a good goal for everybody. Thank you.
6 SECRETARY CORTÉS: Thank you, sir.
7 MAJORITY CHAIRMAN SAYLOR: Very good.
8 Before I move on to the next questioner,
9 I want to recognize that we are joined by the
10 esteemed Senator from Venango County, Senator
11 Scott Hutchinson.
12 Next is Representative Boyle.
13 REPRESENTATIVE BOYLE: Thank you,
14 Secretary Cortés, for being here. I know it's
15 the end of a very long day, so I'll try to be as
16 concise as possible. I felt as though I had the
17 duty to pose this question to you after hearing
18 the comments from one of my esteemed colleagues
19 on the other side of the aisle, in specific
20 relation to voter fraud.
21 Whenever I hear the discussion of voter
22 fraud in the State of Pennsylvania, I think that
23 it's certainly code for the City of
24 Philadelphia. And as a Representative of the
25 City of Philadelphia, I wanted to ask you if you 90
1 are aware, in the City of Philadelphia, we have
2 a three-member body, which oversees our
3 elections. There are three city commissioners,
4 one of whom, but per the city charter, is a
5 Republican. There are two Democrats, one
6 Republican. There's no guarantee that it will
7 always be two Democrats, one Republican, but
8 just due to the nature of political voting and
9 patterns in the City of Philadelphia for the
10 last 60 years, the one commissioner has always
11 been from the Republican Party.
12 That Republican commissioner,
13 Al Schmidt, released a study about two years ago
14 that went into great detail and great length to
15 look and attempt to find fraud in the City of
16 Philadelphia. What he found was basically no
17 fraud. He found a few instances here and there
18 of fraud. Oh, by the way, one of the instances
19 was fraud conducted by the Republican Party in
20 the City of Philadelphia.
21 I wanted to see if you were familiar
22 with that study.
23 SECRETARY CORTÉS: Thank you,
24 Representative Boyle.
25 I am familiar with the study. I have a 91
1 very good working relationship, and much respect
2 for, Commissioner Al Schmidt, who, as you noted
3 is the Republican commissioner, the vice chair
4 of the commissioners in the City of Philadelphia
5 that oversee elections.
6 Again, I'm not going to sit here and
7 say, it doesn't happen. I just don't want
8 anyone ever coming out of here saying, you said
9 never, never it doesn't happen. No. I'm just
10 speaking, based on studies on what has been
11 done.
12 Al Schmidt, when he ran for office, and
13 when he put his first study together, basically
14 came out and suggested there's rampant fraud in
15 the City of Philadelphia, and I'm going to get
16 to the heart of it, and he went on to his study.
17 His study suggested some issues that he found
18 problematic. It was very encouraging; and I had
19 nothing to do with it.
20 But when a lot of the attacks came his
21 way to Philadelphia about the last election, he,
22 a Republican, Al Schmidt, Ph.D. and everything,
23 said, hey, I didn't have a change of heart, I
24 just happen to have now the benefit of being
25 here and have access to more information and see 92
1 what is being done, and I, by the way, am
2 literally the lead person overseeing elections.
3 The fraud is not -- we run good elections, and
4 we have good work.
5 One specific example that he pointed out
6 is that there was a report from NBC 10 that
7 suggested there was an investigative report that
8 said there were about 150 people who had been
9 identified as being deceased and voting. And in
10 the middle of the election, he contacted the
11 reporter and said, we cannot go door to door and
12 check all of the records going back years upon
13 years about everyone that you said, but give me
14 25. You choose the 25 cases and let me look at
15 them.
16 They look at the 25 cases; and in all
17 cases, some were still alive; or it would have
18 been the case where it was a son or a daughter
19 with the same surname as the parent; others
20 would have been where you sign, you know, the
21 parent may have been deceased, and for some
22 reason, the record had not been updated,
23 somebody didn't update the record. They were
24 still in the records, but the son or the
25 daughter signed the line for the father. So a 93
1 lot of those things were explained.
2 Elections are not perfect. You have
3 humans. And I'm an attorney, so I look at these
4 issues all the time. I see we have laws that
5 say you don't kill, you don't do this, you don't
6 do that, you don't do that, and people still do
7 it. So I cannot say that it doesn't happen.
8 I'm saying, and I want to assert that we need to
9 be vigilant and do a lot of work, but the
10 evidence doesn't support the massive, rampant --
11 but that doesn't mean that it doesn't happen.
12 It does mean that we have to be alert and
13 vigilant and do something about it.
14 That's why I said in my comments before
15 if that evidence comes to light, I think people
16 ought to be prosecuted and the law take its
17 course.
18 REPRESENTATIVE BOYLE: Thank you.
19 SECRETARY CORTÉS: You're welcome.
20 MAJORITY CHAIRMAN SAYLOR:
21 Representative Quinn.
22 REPRESENTATIVE QUINN: Thank you,
23 Mr. Chairman.
24 Thank you, Secretary, for being here.
25 I'm going to try and make this a speed round. 94
1 SECRETARY CORTÉS: Sure.
2 REPRESENTATIVE QUINN: Listening to the
3 conversations here, I have a question regarding
4 early voting. Either the posters were way off
5 or people changed their mind this election.
6 What is the mechanism in place in other
7 States if someone changes a vote and they've
8 already cast a vote through early voting?
9 SECRETARY CORTÉS: So in early voting,
10 even if the person is physically voting either
11 at the ballot or in the mail, or if they are in
12 person, those ballots are not counted until
13 election night. It's the same as for example,
14 someone who sends an absentee ballot and then
15 show up in person, so they compare and the
16 latest vote is the one that counts.
17 REPRESENTATIVE QUINN: Thank you. I'm
18 going to go back now to the fiscal conversation
19 here.
20 Representative Delozier was asking
21 questions regarding the different State boards
22 and stuff and their increases. I'm curious
23 about the decrease, almost 10 percent, it's a
24 9.3 percent decrease to the Bureau of
25 Corporations and Charitable Organizations. 95
1 Now, I see through your testimony that
2 there have been some efficiencies and some
3 database, you know, technology, and I'm not sure
4 if that's what accounts for the decrease because
5 you did just say that you've actually hired a
6 full-time prosecutor. It seems, you know, to
7 bring on a full-time prosecutor and yet have an
8 almost 10 percent decrease, I'm just curious how
9 that's going there.
10 SECRETARY CORTÉS: So the decrease that
11 you saw of the 900 -- the numbers are getting
12 small here, but the decrease, nevertheless, I
13 have the answer -- the answer is because the
14 bulk of the money, compared to what we have used
15 in years past, was being used for the building
16 of the new solution, the new upgraded corporate
17 filing online application.
18 So we have used the money beginning in
19 years '13-'14, '14-'15; we built the bulk of the
20 solution. So we are at the tail end now.
21 Pretty much, the solution is built. So we no
22 longer have the need for the extra money that we
23 had in the past. So the reduction is simply
24 that we have moneys in to build the online
25 application CoSort, and that project now has 96
1 been completed.
2 REPRESENTATIVE QUINN: So the BEI, with
3 regard to the charities again, they had 83 cases
4 referred for administrative prosecution,
5 however, you only had 22 consent agreements.
6 The others were just -- that's a large number to
7 get that far and then say, have a good day.
8 SECRETARY CORTÉS: Yeah, so the
9 explanation for that is either, in some
10 instances, again, these are complaints that,
11 once properly investigated, may not lead to
12 prosecution. You could have an agreement. You
13 could have someone that maybe was impaired and
14 entered into a volunteer process through our
15 Pennsylvania Professional Health Money Program.
16 So not every case that we open leads to
17 a disciplinary action because A.) the evidence
18 doesn't support it; B.) there are some remedial
19 steps that have been taken. So that's that
20 explained.
21 Actually, the convictions are going up,
22 but percentage-wise, especially with JNET, we
23 get all of the cases. And in the end, they may
24 not amount to something that is actionable.
25 REPRESENTATIVE QUINN: Thank you. That 97
1 $52,000 that came in or that you had, where does
2 that go, to the General Fund, or back into your
3 Department?
4 SECRETARY CORTÉS: Which one are we
5 talking about?
6 REPRESENTATIVE QUINN: The $52,000 that
7 came in in penalties.
8 SECRETARY CORTÉS: Yes. So anything
9 that is penalties within -- we're talking about
10 professional licensure or charities?
11 REPRESENTATIVE QUINN: Charities.
12 SECRETARY CORTÉS: So the good thing
13 with charities, unlike the Bureau, it's all
14 within the Bureau of Corporations and Charitable
15 Organizations, but when it comes to charities,
16 everything that is collected by way of General
17 Fund goes back, 100 percent.
18 For example, we finance the Corporation
19 Bureau with a split of the fees. If you have a
20 Uniform Commercial Code filing, 95 percent goes
21 to the General Fund, 5 percent stays with the
22 Department. In the case of charities, every
23 dollar that is collected through penalties goes
24 back to the General Fund.
25 REPRESENTATIVE QUINN: Thank you. 98
1 That $52,000, what would that number
2 have been for last year? You said that we've
3 gotten really aggressive in the State with
4 regard to disciplinary actions. We've got 22
5 consent agreements.
6 SECRETARY CORTÉS: So those would be
7 individuals that either were registered or were,
8 say, doing solicitations and were not
9 registered.
10 REPRESENTATIVE QUINN: I understand who
11 they are -- I don't mean to interrupt you.
12 SECRETARY CORTÉS: No, that's okay. I'm
13 trying to understand your question.
14 REPRESENTATIVE QUINN: What was the
15 dollar amount that we had in penalties last
16 year?
17 SECRETARY CORTÉS: You're asking for a
18 comparison of both years?
19 REPRESENTATIVE QUINN: I am.
20 In the essence of time, I'm happy to
21 have you get back to me on that. Okay. I was
22 just curious what the efforts of enforcement and
23 the disciplinary, what's that bringing over,
24 over the prior year.
25 SECRETARY CORTÉS: Correct. 99
1 REPRESENTATIVE QUINN: Because $52,000
2 is great; it's not stupendous.
3 SECRETARY CORTÉS: Well, to your
4 point -- and I will give you more details -- the
5 full-time person that we're talking about is
6 something we're doing now. It's not part of
7 last fiscal year. In fact, we have been
8 prosecuting with prosecutors for full-time work
9 for professional and occupational affairs and
10 set time aside to do the charities, because
11 charities, unlike professional licensure, are
12 general government operations, it's not
13 restricted accounts.
14 REPRESENTATIVE QUINN: Thanks.
15 SECRETARY CORTÉS: Sure.
16 REPRESENTATIVE QUINN: I've got a red
17 light, and I just appreciate the work with your
18 Department on that bill that I have on this.
19 Thanks.
20 SECRETARY CORTÉS: Absolutely. Always a
21 pleasure.
22 MAJORITY CHAIRMAN SAYLOR:
23 Representative Readshaw.
24 REPRESENTATIVE READSHAW: Thank you,
25 Mr. Chairman. 100
1 Mr. Secretary, thank you for being here
2 today. I appreciate not only the questions and
3 your responses to the members of the
4 Appropriations Committee, but from a different
5 perspective, in my capacity as a Chairman of the
6 Professional Licensure Committee, albeit the
7 minority chairman at the moment, I just want to
8 say thank you for your past, current, and I'm
9 sure future considerations, from not only you
10 but your entire staff as, in case people aren't
11 aware in the room, we interact frequently on
12 different pieces of legislation. And without
13 your cooperation and professionalism, it would
14 make the Committee's chores much more difficult,
15 so I just thought it was necessary for me to
16 publicly thank you.
17 SECRETARY CORTÉS: We appreciate that.
18 Thank you.
19 REPRESENTATIVE READSHAW: Thank you, Mr.
20 Chairman.
21 SECRETARY CORTÉS: It is a team effort.
22 MAJORITY CHAIRMAN SAYLOR:
23 Representative Grove.
24 REPRESENTATIVE GROVE: Thank you,
25 Mr. Chairman. 101
1 Mr. Secretary, good to see you. Thank
2 you.
3 SECRETARY CORTÉS: Good to see you, as
4 well.
5 REPRESENTATIVE GROVE: First question,
6 Act 146 waivers; you submitted one in August for
7 basically the new office in New Pennsylvania.
8 Did that waiver go through?
9 I know last year's budget, you had a
10 line item, office in New Pennsylvania; that
11 wasn't funded. And then you applied for a
12 waiver under Act 146 of unspent dollars.
13 SECRETARY CORTÉS: Short answer, no; we
14 didn't get the -- we applied for the waiver to
15 get the dollars. The message coming from the
16 House and the Senate was there was no interest
17 in having the Office of New Pennsylvania funded,
18 at least not at the time. So we didn't pursue
19 it further, and the moneys were not allocated to
20 the Department.
21 REPRESENTATIVE GROVE: Kind of with
22 voting, moving forward. If I decided to move,
23 under my new address, I registered, I went in to
24 vote, but sent in an absentee for my old
25 address, what's the process for picking that up? 102
1 SECRETARY CORTÉS: So you're saying --
2 so let me try to understand the scenario. You
3 register in one place, you have moved to a
4 different one, you request an absentee ballot
5 from one place, and --
6 REPRESENTATIVE GROVE: Different county
7 in the State.
8 SECRETARY CORTÉS: So this is the
9 process. So you're only going to be registered
10 in one place. Your old registration -- so let's
11 say from the old, you requested an absentee
12 ballot. That Election Day came; you didn't
13 physically show up there, so at the end, your
14 ballot gets counted.
15 You get to your new county, you show up
16 in person. And you're not going to appear in
17 the poll books, so you're going to be marked
18 provisional. And in the provisional review, the
19 counties do the canvassing afterwards, their
20 comparison of records of voters, in other
21 counties, as well.
22 So very likely, not 100 percent -- we're
23 talking about humans -- but most likely, your
24 provisional ballot will not be counted. They
25 will identify you as having voted in the other 103
1 county. Now, on top of that, if anyone finds
2 word of that and you did it purposefully because
3 you requested an absentee ballot and you've
4 completed it, and you mail it in, and then you
5 -- there's no mistake here -- you still showed
6 up and presented yourself as voting as if you
7 had not voted before you signed the ledger or
8 completed an absentee provisional ballot, you
9 would have committed election fraud, and I do
10 hope -- and that's not because of you.
11 REPRESENTATIVE GROVE: No. I'm not
12 saying me. I'm just saying --
13 SECRETARY CORTÉS: This other person.
14 REPRESENTATIVE GROVE: How do you pick
15 that up? Yes.
16 SECRETARY CORTÉS: So we basically
17 would, hopefully, catch you and it will be
18 something that we will prosecute. And that's
19 sort of the strong message, the balance of the
20 conversation we've been having, we hope it does
21 happen that you're caught. Part of the question
22 about fraud hinges on the incentive to do so.
23 Why would you want to do so?
24 What do you gain from doing so?
25 I am wanted by the police. There's a 104
1 warrant for my arrest. The last place I want to
2 be is at a police station identifying myself,
3 unless I'm a daredevil. It makes no sense.
4 What is the incentive?
5 And that's why we make sure, even on our
6 registration and everywhere elsewhere, even
7 online, we very clearly note you're saying this
8 is a truthful statement, and if you don't,
9 you're liable; you potentially could face jail
10 time and fines and the like.
11 So I always go back to that; what is the
12 incentive?
13 If you're not doing it by mistake, why
14 would you want to put yourself in that position?
15 Say, for example, the undocumented
16 individuals. You live underground. You don't
17 want to be identified, not just for you, but for
18 your family.
19 What incentive is there?
20 I don't see how you could get paid that
21 much.
22 REPRESENTATIVE GROVE: A constituent
23 asked me this. I'll use -- since I'm getting
24 arrested, I'll throw my son under the bus on
25 this example. He's seven, but say he decides to 105
1 go to Rutgers in New Jersey; registers to vote
2 at my house at Dover, goes to Rutgers; registers
3 to vote in New Jersey; absentee ballot to
4 Pennsylvania; votes in person in New Jersey.
5 What do we have to protect, to ensure
6 there's not a double vote in that scenario?
7 SECRETARY CORTÉS: Yes, since we don't
8 have in the country a centralized voter
9 registration database for the entire
10 Commonwealth -- it's difficult enough just to
11 put together the one that we have in this State,
12 but we did it successfully and timely. That's
13 why the Commonwealth joined the ERIC, the
14 Electronic Records Information Center, which is
15 a database that compares States in-house.
16 It's very robust databases, not just
17 Social Security, but the Department of Health
18 and the jurisdictions. So we're finding ways to
19 continue to have ways to compare records.
20 REPRESENTATIVE GROVE: So we do have
21 like an interstate contract with other States?
22 SECRETARY CORTÉS: Correct.
23 REPRESENTATIVE GROVE: Are all 50 States
24 a member of that?
25 SECRETARY CORTÉS: No. At the moment, 106
1 we have 20 States and the District of Columbia.
2 That number is growing, though. When we joined
3 it just last year, we were number 15. So the
4 number is growing, and we see and uptick on
5 that.
6 So, yeah, not something that we will
7 continue to look into, the addresses, but the
8 short answer is, it's not yet the perfect
9 system, but we're looking for ways.
10 REPRESENTATIVE GROVE: Good enough.
11 Thank you.
12 Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
13 SECRETARY CORTÉS: Thank you.
14 MAJORITY CHAIRMAN SAYLOR:
15 Representative Bradford.
16 REPRESENTATIVE BRADFORD: Thank you,
17 Secretary.
18 Thank you, Chairman Saylor.
19 Having served on this Committee the last
20 eight years, actually, every year I've been in
21 the legislature. I will note that the first
22 year I became a chairman is the first year that
23 the Chairman gets his questions last. I will
24 point that out.
25 Real quick, on the voter fraud and 107
1 election integrity issues that have been covered
2 quite a bit today, there is a perverse feeling I
3 have that we're defending the integrity of an
4 election that, regrettably, the party that I'm a
5 member of did not do particularly well in the
6 electoral college. I can only imagine if
7 President Trump had lost the electoral college,
8 the amount of grievance that would be aired.
9 The case that I would point out, though,
10 is Senator Toomey, and this was actually before
11 the election, when the then-rigged election that
12 was forthcoming, he talked, and I quote, success
13 of the American Republic requires citizens'
14 confidence in the outcome of their elections.
15 Voters should respect the outcome because that's
16 going to be necessary to pull us together on
17 November 9th.
18 For whatever reason, that doesn't seem
19 to have been the road we went down. I should
20 point out that on January 25th, in the means of
21 communication that our new President finds most
22 comfortable, he asked for a major investigation
23 into voter fraud.
24 So my first question would be, has the
25 new Department of Justice, has the Federal 108
1 government commenced, to the best of your
2 knowledge, an investigation into alleged voter
3 fraud and irregularities in the most recent
4 election?
5 SECRETARY CORTÉS: At the moment,
6 Mr. Chairman, to the best of my knowledge, there
7 is no -- not a comprehensive review being done
8 by the Department of Justice. Having come from
9 DCS, I noted earlier a meeting with my fellow
10 colleagues. I can tell you that they're split
11 among the issue with a resolution that basically
12 said, we ran a good election; let's move on.
13 Others feel that they have issues they
14 need to address and review. Some of it has to
15 do with fraud in voter registration as opposed
16 to voting, which people speak to. So I know
17 that some of my colleagues certainly would like
18 to encourage the Federal government to do so.
19 It's interesting, I'll just point this
20 out, in a joking fashion during the electoral
21 college, as you know, I'm the temporary
22 presiding officer of the electoral college.
23 I've done three of them. I happened to be
24 talking to some of our friends in the GOP, who
25 had the electoral college. And they said, hey, 109
1 I know why you were so well prepared to deal
2 with some of the lawsuits you did. And I said,
3 why? They said, because had we lost the
4 election, we would have been the ones suing you
5 under the very same grounds.
6 REPRESENTATIVE BRADFORD: Yes.
7 SECRETARY CORTÉS: So we heard it from
8 the -- not a single vote had been cast and
9 people were already challenging the integrity of
10 the election, especially with professionals and
11 individuals, that while we are not perfect, we
12 try to -- we work hard every day. So it's
13 disheartening.
14 That's not your point. The point is, is
15 there an investigation? The short answer is no,
16 not nationally, that I'm aware of. But it is
17 disheartening because you work hard, and there's
18 no evidence whatsoever. And the interesting
19 thing is that no sooner than the election takes
20 place and the results are what they are, the
21 same person that before said, if I lose the
22 election, the only way I can lose in
23 Pennsylvania is if it gets stolen from me
24 because there is all this fraud, as soon as the
25 election takes place, that's the person who asks 110
1 to join the lawsuit in my favor, saying, oh, no,
2 everything was perfect and it worked out
3 beautifully.
4 REPRESENTATIVE BRADFORD: Secretary, I
5 agree completely with that point. And that's
6 what I think, when those before the election
7 were calling into question the integrity of the
8 election and the outcome, they do a disservice
9 to our democracy. I notice Senator McCain
10 recently said, look, there's no evidence of
11 voter fraud. I think that those who allege that
12 have to come up with some substantiation of
13 their claim.
14 President Trump has gone on to say,
15 we're going to look at it very, very carefully.
16 It has to do with registration. And when you
17 look at the registration, you see dead people
18 that have voted.
19 Now, notice, he doesn't say are
20 registered or are duplicate registrations. I
21 don't want to use the words red herring, but
22 when you see multiple registrations, that is not
23 de facto voter fraud. In fact, I think if it
24 is, the Representative who just explained that
25 he may or may not have committed voter fraud in 111
1 York County, that goes to the point that there's
2 a difference. And when we conflate these
3 issues, we do so in a way that potentially
4 damages the integrity of our election.
5 SECRETARY CORTÉS: I've just got a very
6 quick comment because we started the
7 conversation about online voter registration.
8 One of the benefits of online voter registration
9 is that the system will not allow you to submit
10 more than one registration; whereas, many times,
11 what happens with the paper registrations is you
12 submit one because you get stopped in the
13 supermarket, then you didn't hear anything about
14 it, and you have no way to hear whether your
15 application is being processed.
16 And then you apply again at another
17 place, and people keep asking you, and you may
18 end up with five registrations, which is not
19 actually illegal, but it's an inconvenience for
20 the county board of elections, who has to now
21 look at all of these forms; whereas with online,
22 you submit one, and that's it, and it goes
23 through and you have a way to have a tracking
24 system, even before your registration.
25 So one more benefit to online voter 112
1 registration, which I believe is the way of the
2 future.
3 REPRESENTATIVE BRADFORD: Back to that
4 point, the stipulation during the voter ID
5 debacle, I recollect the quote was the
6 Commonwealth has no investigations or
7 prosecutions of in-person voter fraud in
8 Pennsylvania and the Commonwealth has no direct
9 personal knowledge of any such investigations or
10 prosecutions in other States. That was the case
11 two years ago.
12 Has anything happened subsequently to
13 change that, and if so, can you let us know?
14 SECRETARY CORTÉS: Not that I'm aware
15 of, and I was not in office when that case was
16 being reviewed, but not to my knowledge. Again,
17 as much as I've said over the last hour-plus,
18 again, not a perfect system, sure, things do
19 happen. We have to continue to be vigilant.
20 REPRESENTATIVE BRADFORD: I would just
21 wrap it up then by saying, and I will quote
22 Lindsey Graham, a Republican Senator and a
23 veteran of our Air Force, I believe. I would
24 urge the President to knock this off. This is
25 the greatest democracy on earth. We're the 113
1 leaders of the free world, and people are going
2 to start doubting you as a person if you keep
3 making accusations against our electoral system
4 without justification.
5 I think that's probably a good point for
6 all of us. Thank you, Secretary.
7 SECRETARY CORTÉS: Thank you.
8 MAJORITY CHAIRMAN SAYLOR: Just make a
9 note, Representative Bradford, that you did go
10 over your time, and the reason the Chairmen of
11 the Appropriations Committee decided to move
12 chairmen to the last was because they have an
13 opportunity to pontificate their wisdom since
14 they are senior members of the Committee. So I
15 thought it would be good to have the chairmen of
16 the members last.
17 REPRESENTATIVE BRADFORD: Thank you,
18 Chairman.
19 MAJORITY CHAIRMAN SAYLOR: At this
20 point, we'll recognize Representative Dunbar.
21 REPRESENTATIVE DUNBAR: Thank you,
22 Mr. Chairman. Being neither a chairman or a
23 long-term member, I won't pontificate at all.
24 And in fact, I will try and make my speed round
25 a lot speedier than Representative Quinn's, who 114
1 I still saw a red light on.
2 With that being said --
3 REPRESENTATIVE BRADFORD: Thank you for
4 pointing that out.
5 REPRESENTATIVE DUNBAR: With that being
6 said, Representative Briggs had brought up about
7 filing campaign finance reports online, which I
8 do support and agree with. I just had a really
9 quick question.
10 Is there some reason why, when people
11 file by mail, these reports just can't be
12 scanned and put on the Internet?
13 And if there is some type of data entry
14 that they have to do, which does cost money, if
15 so, why can't we still just do that? Because I
16 believe that the only reason that individuals
17 don't file online is because they're somehow
18 trying to get some type of advantage by delaying
19 having their information posted by a few days,
20 although I have no idea why.
21 SECRETARY CORTÉS: Even quicker answer.
22 We do both. So as soon as they come in, within
23 two days, we scan and we put up. The reason for
24 the data entry is because that's what permits
25 the transparency of searchability. 115
1 REPRESENTATIVE DUNBAR: Okay.
2 SECRETARY CORTÉS: So we scan, so the
3 PDF document can come up and people can see it,
4 but then the document, as provided per the Code,
5 has to be data entry so that you can search.
6 REPRESENTATIVE DUNBAR: I'm glad you
7 said that because we should repeat that to
8 everybody; maybe it will stop a lot of the 69
9 percent or whatever, 61 percent, that think
10 they're gaining some advantage.
11 Thank you.
12 SECRETARY CORTÉS: Thank you.
13 REPRESENTATIVE DUNBAR: How was that for
14 time?
15 MAJORITY CHAIRMAN SAYLOR: Very good.
16 Chairman Metcalfe.
17 REPRESENTATIVE METCALFE. Thank you,
18 Chairman Saylor.
19 Thank you, Mr. Secretary, for being with
20 us today. It took a little longer than normal
21 years to get to you, but I'm glad that we're
22 able to talk for a couple of minutes here. It's
23 interesting the way the discussion has gone
24 today, especially related to the voter fraud
25 issue. 116
1 First, I don't think you're a masochist,
2 to clarify that, because you had mentioned that
3 earlier in a response. But some of the words
4 that you used do concern me. You and I have had
5 a lot of good discussions related to voting and
6 the Election Code --
7 SECRETARY CORTÉS: Sure.
8 REPRESENTATIVE METCALFE: -- and some of
9 the things that have been taking place, prior to
10 last year's election, many years back, and about
11 last year's election.
12 But when you talked about that you would
13 want to see convictions, and that you didn't see
14 any pervasive voter fraud, there was no systemic
15 voter fraud, my concern -- and I believe your
16 concern is, even though those words were used --
17 is that each and every legally cast vote in the
18 Commonwealth is protected from being nullified
19 by an illegally cast vote.
20 I mean, so often, the electorate, you'll
21 hear from some people, well, my vote doesn't
22 count. Well, I think that we have a duty as
23 elected officials, as appointed individuals in
24 this Commonwealth that are executing the laws
25 that this Commonwealth has in place to protect 117
1 the vote, that we ensure that each and every
2 vote is protected. So I believe you do believe,
3 as I do, that each and every vote, each single
4 vote, doesn't have to be massive to actually
5 disenfranchise the electorate. If any vote is
6 cast that nullifies another legally cast vote,
7 that's wrong.
8 That's an injustice, whether it's your
9 vote being nullified, mine, the Chairman's or an
10 older citizen from Philadelphia, Erie, or a mom
11 of two from Butler County. So I think, first,
12 just to set up, because I noticed some of the
13 words, and I wanted to make sure that we were
14 clear on that.
15 And you said that maybe there are some
16 isolated incidents. Well, as much as the other
17 side tried to decry that there aren't any, I
18 mean, I've got an article here from January of
19 last year that the headline reads, three former
20 Philadelphia election officials pled guilty
21 under a plea deal. It goes on to say, felony
22 fraud charges were dropped because of the plea.
23 So in Philadelphia, fraud that took
24 place, a plea deal that was made, a conviction.
25 I also have, as was mentioned, and you testified 118
1 at the hearing in October, about a month before
2 the election last year, where we had
3 J. Christian Adams testifying. And he provided
4 us with information obtained from Philadelphia,
5 several pages of information related to several
6 years' worth of self-reporting foreign nationals
7 in Philadelphia that had self-reported that they
8 were registered to vote, and they shouldn't be.
9 And when you look at the votes cast by
10 those individuals, there were a larger
11 percentage than there certainly should have
12 been. There should have been zero of those
13 individuals voting, if they would have voted
14 inadvertently when they got their driver's -- or
15 registered inadvertently when they got their
16 driver's license.
17 So we have evidence, just from Philly --
18 you've got 66 counties left -- that foreign
19 nationals in this State, over a period of
20 several years, have registered to vote. Some of
21 them have voted, have disenfranchised legally
22 cast votes. And whether it turned an election
23 or not, I'm not sure, most likely not, but it
24 could have. And if it did, even if it didn't,
25 it's still undermining those legally cast votes. 119
1 In light of that, that is why I sent --
2 every vote needs to be protected, each and every
3 single legally cast vote. That's why I sent you
4 a letter recently, which I'm sure you're in
5 receipt of, to ask you to do as other States
6 have done, which was a recommendation out of the
7 hearing last October, and that is utilize the
8 SAVE System, which is the Systematic Alien
9 Verification for Entitlements Program. That is
10 a Federal program that the States can use to
11 verify that when somebody registers or tries to
12 apply to do something within that State, those
13 State agencies, that we can run them through
14 that system. And if they are a foreign national
15 that's identified in that system, it will help
16 us to identify they're a foreign national and
17 shouldn't be in that program, or in this case,
18 registering to vote in our State.
19 Now, it won't catch all of the illegal
20 aliens that are here that might try and register
21 to vote, but it will stop any foreign national
22 that's in the database. Some might be illegal;
23 some may be here legally. The majority in that
24 system will probably be here legally, but once
25 again, I mean, it's fraud that's being 120
1 committed.
2 I've got three pages -- which I'm happy
3 to give to anybody here that tries to say that
4 it's not occurring -- that came from
5 Philadelphia, information in their voter
6 database that we've had foreign nationals voting
7 in Pennsylvania, not one, not two, but many.
8 And we have election officials in Philadelphia
9 convicted of fraud charges, ultimately pled out.
10 They were charged with fraud and pled out, so
11 there's the conviction. There's the evidence.
12 I need your help, Mr. Secretary, in
13 ensuring that our voter rolls are as clean as
14 possible to make sure every vote is protected.
15 SECRETARY CORTÉS: Thank you,
16 Mr. Chairman.
17 REPRESENTATIVE METCALFE: Can you help
18 me?
19 SECRETARY CORTÉS: Yes.
20 REPRESENTATIVE METCALFE: With the SAVE
21 System?
22 SECRETARY CORTÉS: Let me ask you; I
23 will put it back on you.
24 Is it your sense, because you and I go
25 back many, many, many years, is it your sense, 121
1 and I use the words carefully -- I'm not a
2 wordsmith, but when people start talking about
3 1, 2, 3, 5, 100, let me just go back to your
4 point, because we will agree, the sanctity of
5 the vote and voting and democracy ought to be
6 protected. All right?
7 In an ideal world, it happens. We,
8 unfortunately, don't live in an ideal world.
9 That's not an excuse; I'm just talking about
10 reality. I'm talking about facts. That's why I
11 went out of my way to say to you, sir, to say to
12 you, I'm not saying unequivocally, it doesn't
13 happen. Is one too many? Absolutely, I agree.
14 All right?
15 But I want to just make sure that I
16 leave the room here today with at least a sense
17 of whether you believe that over the years I've
18 been a good partner to you, to your Committee,
19 and to the people of Pennsylvania.
20 Do you have any evidence or anything
21 that would suggest to you, that we have ever, in
22 the exercise of our duties -- and I speak for
23 myself, I don't put it on anyone else, although
24 everybody here is super ethical -- when I raise
25 my hand and I say that I will, you know, protect 122
1 and support and defend the Constitution of the
2 United States and the Constitution of this
3 Commonwealth, I do so. And I swear in more
4 people than most around this room.
5 So you know, I hope that, by my actions,
6 not my words, you and others in this Committee
7 are satisfied that I mean it. So the short
8 answer is yes, sir; I will continue to work with
9 you. I will continue to look for ways. The
10 SAVE Program is something that I'm looking at.
11 I want to talk to the other jurisdictions. I
12 haven't because I want to do due diligence.
13 That's just who I am.
14 But you know, and I hope that you have a
15 clear sense that, with me, what I do, I do with
16 a deep sense of integrity. And when I raised my
17 hand and took that oath, I meant it, and I'm
18 going to do it. So we're on the same page
19 there. So your point is well taken.
20 REPRESENTATIVE METCALFE: Thank you,
21 Mr. Chairman.
22 I appreciate you looking into the SAVE
23 System. And from our work together over the
24 years, I have no question, from our relationship
25 of working together on these issues, that you 123
1 have the same intent as I do, and that's to
2 uphold and defend the Constitution and make sure
3 that our laws are being executed, but I wanted
4 to clarify today.
5 And certainly the words that were used,
6 I wanted to make sure that everyone knows that
7 you do believe, just as I do, that every vote
8 counts and that we need to make sure that we
9 protect each and every legally cast vote from
10 being canceled out by any illegally cast votes.
11 I appreciate you looking into the SAVE System to
12 help us do that.
13 Thank you.
14 MAJORITY CHAIRMAN SAYLOR: Chairman
15 Markosek.
16 MINORITY CHAIRMAN MARKOSEK: Thank you,
17 Mr. Secretary, and the folks, the Deputies that
18 you brought along, and Director. Very, very
19 good; very interesting.
20 We got into a lot of different issues,
21 but I'm sure as we move on, we'll be looking
22 forward to working with you. So thank you very
23 much. Very good answers.
24 SECRETARY CORTÉS: Thank you,
25 Mr. Chairman. 124
1 MAJORITY CHAIRMAN SAYLOR: Mr.
2 Secretary, just a couple of comments that I
3 have. One of the things that, as Representative
4 Miccarelli mentioned, about 7,000 applications
5 for voter application showing up the day of the
6 deadline, you know, immediately, I would
7 immediately say fraud. It doesn't mean they
8 are, but it is an appearance that makes it. I
9 mean, you look at what people believe out there,
10 it's about perception; it's not always true.
11 And if people have to believe in our
12 election system, you can't even be showing up
13 the day before our election, any one
14 organization, and saying here's 300 or even 500
15 registrations. So if people don't want to say
16 that there is fraud in a system, they have to
17 work the system in a way that doesn't look like
18 they're committing fraud.
19 So I think that is something that needs
20 to be communicated to organizations, whether
21 it's the Republican Party, Democratic Party or
22 any organizations, as a committee. It's no
23 different if you go to a festival and you
24 register 200 or 300 people at some festival or
25 street fair and you turn them in that following 125
1 week.
2 But when these kinds of things are
3 happening, that we hear, those are the kinds of
4 things that give the public this perception, and
5 politicians, as well, the perception there's
6 something wrong. And I think those are the real
7 key things.
8 And some of the other things that I will
9 mention that, I don't know how you fix these,
10 but I have had a number of voters, Democrats and
11 Republicans, who have talked about their
12 registration being changed when they go in and
13 review their registration on the cards, where
14 they were switched from Democrat to Republican
15 and Republican to Democrat. I come from a
16 Republican county, so I get more of the
17 complaints from Republicans than I do Democrats,
18 but it's happened to both sides, and that's very
19 frustrating to them. They feel there's
20 something shady going on.
21 York County, being a Republican county,
22 they think it's the County's Registration
23 Office, who is a Republican, who is doing it.
24 So those are things that we need to look at,
25 some of these programs, to try and make sure 126
1 those kinds of things don't happen. I don't
2 know what caused it, whether it's a typo or what
3 it is, but those are the kinds of things that I
4 think, again, trouble people.
5 The other thing that I will mention from
6 this election, and it was a very busy election,
7 was people who registered online. I had a lot
8 of young people come in to register -- come in
9 to vote on Election Day who didn't show up on
10 the voters rolls. They, of course, got
11 provisional ballots.
12 That's another thing, I think, that we
13 have to look at, to make sure that the system is
14 working properly. I did not follow up, I will
15 be honest, to see that those individuals, young
16 and old, who had registered online really were
17 registered in a timely fashion. But again, I
18 ask you to look at that system to make sure that
19 people who register on time can vote and are not
20 suspicious of the system, as well. And I'm one
21 of those who say that computers are great, and
22 technology, but it also creates a lot of
23 problems. So, Mr. Secretary, I want to thank
24 you for coming today, and for your answers;
25 also, to your staff for a great job. 127
1 And with that, we're going to adjourn.
2 The Committee will reconvene tomorrow morning at
3 10:00 a.m. to hear from our retirement systems,
4 SERS and PSERS. Thank you. The meeting is
5 adjourned.
6 (Whereupon, the hearing concluded.)
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25 128
1 CERTIFICATE
2
3 I hereby certify that the proceedings
4 are contained fully and accurately in the notes
5 taken by me on the within proceedings and that
6 this is a correct transcript of the same.
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10 Tiffany L. Mast, Reporter
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