Question: This past year I have lost friends and my husband. It had not occurred to me until now: Whom do we contact about the death of a voter? Is there an integrated system with, say, the Department of Taxation regarding a person’s death? We voted by mail. If the Elections Office is not notified and ballots are mailed, what assurance is there that someone else did not vote on the deceased’s ballot? Are signatures really carefully verified?
Answer: There are various ways deceased voters are removed from the voter rolls, according to Glen Takahashi, Honolulu County elections administrator.
The state Department of Health, by law, reports deaths to county clerks each month, while family members also can notify the appropriate clerk’s office of a death.
Election officials also remove names from voter rolls based on returned election mail and outdated postal information, Takahashi said. “If a person is reported as deceased, absentee ballots and other election materials would not be mailed from that point.”
If a ballot is mailed, every signature on a returned absentee ballot envelope is verified against a reference signature on file.
“While no system, whether it be the process of voting, a commercial or financial transaction, or otherwise, can be guaranteed fraud-proof, we have no reason to believe that people are voting by mail in the name of other, deceased voters,” Takahashi said.
Meanwhile, he said, “People are continuously moving in, out and throughout Hawaii, which in turn affects the voter rolls.”
He encourages all registered voters to keep addresses current by re-registering to vote (forms found at www.honoluluelections.us) each time there is a change.
Question: Our phone in Hawaii Kai stopped working Aug. 5. We thought it was temporary, but it was still not working the next day. We accessed our account on Hawaiian Telcom’s website, where it said our phone would be out until Aug. 14. No reason was given.
That seems like a long time. If we want an explanation, our phone doesn’t work! We don’t use the phone a lot, but with an elderly family member, you never know when you may need a phone. None of us has a cellphone. It’s Aug. 8. Can you find out what is happening?
Answer: We were told your service was restored the next day, Aug. 9.
About 30 customers in your neighborhood lost service after moisture seeped into cables, causing them to short-circuit, said Hawaiian Telcom spokeswoman Ann Nishida Fry. Everyone was back up by Aug. 10.
“Sometimes thoroughly drying the cables will fix the problem, but in this case a section of cable had to be cut out, replaced, and then all individual lines (had to) be painstakingly spliced at both ends,” she said. Because this takes time, you were given the Aug. 14 repair date.
“Hawaiian Telcom generally provides an extended commitment date in case complications or other issues arise during the repair process,” Nishida Fry said.
Customers with problems are advised to call Hawaiian Telcom’s 24-hour service center at 611 or email via its website, hawaiiantel.com, to find out what’s happening and get updates.
Service representatives can also offer options, including forwarding calls to an alternate number, such as a cellphone, or to a nearby relative or friend’s home, she said.
MAHALO
To the kind person who found my husband’s wallet at Ala Moana Center and turned it in completely intact. You only left “a customer” as your name. Our deepest gratitude and respect for your integrity and aloha. Mahalo also to Ala Moana security for keeping the wallet safe until we arrived. Bless all of you! — Peggy Sucher
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Write to “Kokua Line” at Honolulu Star-Advertiser, 7 Waterfront Plaza, Suite 210, 500 Ala Moana Blvd., Honolulu 96813; call 529-4773; fax 529-4750; or email kokualine@staradvertiser.com.
