Designing restoration of rights information

Registering to vote after a felony conviction is not as simple as completing a voter registration form. The right to vote varies state by state, and in many states, a criminal conviction has serious consequences for a citizen’s ability to participate on Election Day. But a lack of clear, easy-to-find, accurate information can also be a barrier.

Only Maine, Vermont and  (as of July 7, 2020) Washington, D.C.  never bar citizens from voting—even those who are in prison are eligible to vote. In the remaining forty-eight states, someone convicted of a felony loses the right to vote at some point during the justice process.

Getting voting rights has been getting easier, with new laws and executive orders, but the process can still be difficult to navigate. The point at which a returning citizen can register to vote might be on release from prison, completion of parole or probation. It might be automatic, or might require an additional action. Even when voting rights are restored, there is the final step of registering to vote.

“No one gave any guidance….a long time ago when convicted felons, point blank, were not allowed to vote, (government officials) never made it public until afterwards that (people with) certain types of convictions were allowed to vote. It had never been publicized.”

Jed Blackerby, quoted in Mississippi Today, November 2018

This summer, Mark D’Ostilio spent two months with Center for Civic Design as a Nevins Fellow. Unlike most of our team members, he came with a degree in criminology and history, not design or research. His background, however, was perfect for his project: to explore how easy it is for people leaving prison to determine whether they are eligible to vote, and how to register.

What he found, after a review of the information on all of the state election web sites, was that missing or hard to understand information can also be a barrier to voting.

“Information that is not explicitly clear jeopardizes citizens’ voting rights, and also their freedom, by leaving important questions unasked or unanswered.”

Mark’s report includes:

• A deep dive into the information available in 4 states – California, Illinois, Maine, and Mississippi – with a range of policies and geographic locations.
• Sample pages for an elections website with suggestions for the type of information needed.
• A list of the web pages for voters with felony convictions in all of the states and the District of Columbia.

Read the report

Voting rights after prison: The information barriers to voting after a felony by Mark D’Ostilio, July 2020