BALTIMORE — A Baltimore City voter requested a mail-in ballot, then her family received a concerning letter.
“The Baltimore City Board of Elections has received information that the voter listed below is deceased,” according to the letter sent to the family of Delia Faulkner.
“And that's my name,” said Faulkner. “They want the date of birth and the date of death and to sign it. That’s messed up.”
Faulkner estimates she's voted the last 40 years, but when she tried to in this Presidential Primary Election, she received that letter instead of her ballot.
“My son brought it in the house and he said, ‘Mah, this don't look right. This looks like you're dead.’ I said, ‘Boy, stop playing with me.’ Well, he wasn't playing. That's what it said. I went numb. I said, I'm deceased? How did that happen? When and where did it come from?” Faulkner wondered.
Her son didn’t know either, so he contacted WMAR-2 News Mallory Sofastaii and she brought this to the attention of the Baltimore City Board of Elections.
“There was an issue where a person had moved. The post office carrier, at that time, received information from the current resident that the person was deceased,” explained Lisa Stanley the acting deputy director for the Baltimore City Board of Elections.
Faulkner did recently move and when USPS tried to deliver her voter card to her old address, they instead returned it to the Board of Elections with a yellow sticker triggering the Board to send the letter to Faulkner’s family to confirm she had passed.
“It should be more than that. If they're saying you’re deceased, they should have information,” said Faulkner.
Stanley confirmed the process actually takes several weeks and this letter is just one step.
“We have checks and balances. We won't just declare a person deceased just to be declaring them deceased. Not at all,” said Stanley. “That’s where we go to the Department of Health's vital records, and we verify with vital records, we verify with Social Security, we have to go through different entities to make sure that that information is accurate before we actually declare and correct a record with that information.”
Sofastaii asked for the number of yellow stickers the Board received from USPS. Acting Election Director Abigail Goldman confirmed they’ve processed approximately 30 yellow stickers that prompted letters being sent out.
“Two of them were declared deceased. We had the information from the vital records, and the others were in that period where they get the letters and we verify from the information that we receive back from the notification,” said Stanley.
“Have any others come back erroneous?” Sofastaii asked.
“No, not to our knowledge,” Stanley responded.
Sofastaii also asked how often something like this happens.
“Think about the climate right now, it's not uncommon. That's a story that happens nationally, that you have people that, unfortunately, may be getting information that's not accurate. But for us, it's checks and balances. So, we're not just going to, you know, just take it upon one person's word. We have to do checks and balances before we declare,” Stanley said.
And she added that as soon as they heard from WMAR-2 News, the Board issued Faulkner her mail-in ballot. Faulkner immediately mailed it back keeping her and her voting streak very much alive.
“My husband, my deceased husband, he would kill me if I didn't vote, if I wasn't already deceased,” Faulkner joked. “And, you know, people fought for that right. You can't change anything if you don't vote. And you have a lot of people that won't vote. So, if you can vote, vote.”
Stanley stressed they do not believe this incident is widespread and that it happened because of a miscommunication, which is why they have a system that requires additional steps before they would remove a voter from the voter rolls.
Sofastaii also contacted USPS. In an email, Mark Wahl, the Strategic Communications Specialist for the United State Postal Service in Maryland, D.C., and Northern Virginia, wrote:
“Postal Management is aware of a voter registration card returned to the Baltimore City Board of Elections with an address correction notice (yellow sticker) incorrectly referencing a customer. We have reviewed correct processes and procedures with our employees. We regret causing any concern.
As information, Election Mail, including ballots, typically is not forwarded if the intended recipient’s address is out of date or if the mailpiece is not properly addressed. Accurate and updated addresses are necessary to help ensure the timely delivery of Election Mail. In such instances, the ballots will be undeliverable.
The U.S. Postal Service is committed to the secure, timely delivery of the nation’s Election Mail. In 2024, just as we have in previous elections, the Postal Service will fulfill our role in the electoral process when public policy makers choose to utilize the mail as a part of their election system or when voters choose to utilize our services to participate in an election.”
For more information on the voting deadlines in the 2024 Presidential Primary Election in Maryland and how to request a mail-in ballot, click here.
