Allen Introduces Bills to Make Government ‘More User-Friendly and Transparent’

Councilman Charles Allen of Ward 6 is working to enhance local lobbying transparency and make voting and ballot access easier, he announced today.

Allen this morning offered a trio of bills intended to bring more reports about lobbyists’ activities and remove barriers to voter registration and ballot access.

The Lobbyist Activity Reporting Transparency Amendment Act would require lobbyists to file monthly reports on their activities, instead of submitting paperwork every six months as they do now.

The Automatic Voter Registration Amendment Act would allow the D.C. Department of Motor Vehicles to automatically register residents to vote when they get an identification card at the DMV.

The Ballot Access Modernization Amendment Act would let campaigns use tablets and other electronic devices to gather the signatures they need to get on a ballot.

The measures will help the D.C. government become “more user-friendly and transparent,” Allen said.

“These bills are an important step toward modernizing and improving the District’s ballot access procedures, voter registration process, and availability of lobbyist disclosure data,” he said in a statement.

“They require some simple modernizations and updates that will remove barriers to voter participation, improve the accuracy of our voter rolls, and make lobbyist reports more timely and accessible.”

Photo via Twitter/CharlesAllenW6