Yesterday, the New York City Council passed first-of-its-kind legislation in the state to facilitate the implementation of online voter registration. As a result of the bill, the campaign finance board shall provide a secure website and mobile application that allows any individual qualified to vote the ability to register.

Currently, only NYC residents with a DMV driver's license, learner’s permit, or a non-driver ID can register to vote online. Once implemented, this legislation will allow for those who don’t have one of these forms of identification to register via the new platforms. The new platforms will be set up by the city’s Campaign Finance Board, and will be pursuant to NY State Election Law.

The City Council bill was authored by Council Member Ben Kallos, and was made possible through an informal opinion, which Attorney General Eric Schneiderman issued in 2016 to Suffolk County officials. The bill is scheduled to take effect 18 months after enactment.

Tech:NYC and our members care deeply about making it easy to register to vote and we want to do everything we can encourage robust participation in the democratic process. We even recently helped register people on National Voter Registration Day. So we’re excited to see new progress being made on this issue in New York.

We hope other localities throughout New York State will follow NYC’s lead and begin to remove barriers to voter registration.