Damakant Jayshi
The Marathon County Board of Supervisors on Tuesday approved a budget transfer, accepting a grant of more than $4,000 from the Wisconsin Elections Commission to offset the cost of new absentee envelope.
The purpose of the absentee ballot envelope subgrant from WEC “is to help improve overall election security of federal elections statewide” by providing funds to towns, villages and cities to safeguard and secure the absentee voting process.
On March 3, the bipartisan WEC approved allocating federal funds for the absentee ballot envelope subgrant program “to partially offset the costs jurisdictions incur purchasing the redesigned absentee ballot envelopes.” The new envelope could be approved as early as Aug. 4.
According to WEC, the old envelope designs do not conform with guidance from recent court orders and do not fully comply with all statutory requirements. Additionally, the old envelope designs were not compatible with requirements that would make them easily identifiable to the U.S. Postal Service.
Supervisors this week also approved other items on the agenda, including naming members to the newly-created Tax Increment Task Force, creating a new position of deputy sheriff in the Marathon County Sheriff’s Office to provide contracted services to Rib Mountain, buying private property adjacent to county-owned properties, accepting 2024 county budget assumptions and sending a letter to the Wisconsin governor and Legislature seeking a return of local government control over mining, wind energy project and farm runoff.
