Jefferson County Clerk David Yates, center, faces questions from state lawmakers in Frankfort on Tuesday, Aug. 18.(Roberto Roldan / LPM News )Louisville’s top election official was questioned by state lawmakers Tuesday about how hundreds of voters may have been assigned to the wrong precincts for years, with some even assigned to the wrong county.The meeting of the Interim Joint Committee on State Government was spurred by an LPM News investigation that found the Jefferson County Clerk’s office may have misassigned as many as 1,800 households. In some cases, this led to voters being prevented from voting for their representatives, potentially impacting the outcome of one state House race.During the meeting, Jefferson County Clerk David Yates gave a rundown of the issue and what he’s doing to address it. He told state lawmakers about a recent request for proposals from his office, seeking a third party to audit voter precinct assignments.Yates also said he had notified about 290 people living in Oldham and Bullitt County that they are actually supposed to be voting in Jefferson County. He said another 35 voters were moved out of Jefferson County.“As you get into precinct-specific, there are some people who would be voting in the wrong precinct,” Yates said. “Some of that has been going since, we don’t know, since before the Census. ”Yates previously told reporters the issue with voters being assigned to the wrong precinct was the result of human error during the last post-Census redistricting in 2022, when some boundaries were redrawn.The problem affecting voters living along state lines was created by the state, Yates said Tuesday.He said the Kentucky Board of Elections recently published a statewide precinct map that is supposed to serve as a “master map.” That conflicted with the information local elections officials had.“For years, and probably decades, there’s been a lot of agreements, handshake deals [between county officials] about where people would vote” when residents’ houses were on the line, Yates said.Franklin County Clerk Jeff Hancock, who sat beside Yates during the hearing, warned state lawmakers that these issues are likely not limited to Jefferson County. Hancock is currently the vice president of the Kentucky County Clerk’s Association.“This election database issue is not Jefferson County-specific,” he said. “This is in all 120, this is in all of your counties.”Hancock said the new, more precise map put together by the state Board of Elections “isn’t just guessing.”Currently, clerks have to match individual voter registration and precinct assignments with the new maps, a manual process that’s susceptible to human error. He called on state lawmakers to come up with the funding to combine the voter registration database and precinct maps to automate the process.“You have a rainy day account. Well, we all need some umbrellas at this point,” Hancock said.State Rep. Beverly Chester-Burton of Louisville, whose May primary may have been impacted by these issues, attended Tuesday’s meeting.Chester-Burton lost the Democratic primary to newcomer Kenya Wade by just five votes. LPM News found residents of an entire neighborhood had been prevented from voting in that race because they were assigned to the wrong precinct. The Clerk’s office later confirmed that five Democrats cast ballots during the primary that did not include that race, but should have.Chester-Burton asked Yates how the candidates and voters impacted by his office’s errors could rectify them, and if there could potentially be another special election held.Yates said he couldn’t give legal advice and that those questions would need to be answered by a judge through a lawsuit.Lawmakers zero in on county border changesMuch of Tuesday’s hearing focused on the voter precinct assignment errors along county lines, mainly because of the potential knock-on effects.The Jefferson County Clerk’s notification to nearly 300 people in the surrounding counties that they should now vote in Louisville Metro elections raised a number of other questions: Where do they pay taxes? Which schools can their kids attend? Which county’s first responders will show up in an emergency?Sen. Lindsey Tichenor, a Republican representing parts of Jefferson, Oldham and Trimble Counties, called it “a big, hot mess” and “a cluster.”“I have constituents that live in Oldham County, who pay Oldham County taxes, whose kids go to Oldham County schools, who are now being represented by someone who doesn’t live in that district or represent that district,” she said.Tichenor noted the changes will also impact local elections. The residents were allowed to vote in the primary election in Oldham and Bullitt Counties, and will not be prevented from voting in the general election.“This is a mess, it’s a huge mess,” she said.Another committee member, Republican state Rep. James Tipton of Taylorsville, said a similar issue happened with Shelby and Spencer Counties two years ago.In that case, Tipton said some residents were required to pay nonresident tuition to keep their kids in their current school district.“I’ve had people who have actually sold their home to rectify the situation,” he said. “It’s caused a lot of heartburn and chaos, is the point.”Republican Rep. DJ Johnson of Owensboro, who heads the House elections committee, said these changes also potentially raise an issue of “taxation without representation,” if residents vote in one county but pay property taxes to another.Johnson said the General Assembly’s job in January will be to ensure these issues are resolved and that the voter precinct misassignments that happened in Jefferson County never happen again.“We will hopefully come up with language that will give guidance [to local officials], so they can address it in a more coherent manner,” Johnson said.Committee leaders said they may call on state Board of Elections officials to come back to a future meeting for a detailed discussion on these problems.Correction: This story has been updated to reflect the committee meeting occurred Tuesday, Aug. 18. ...read more read less