OHIO LEGISLATIVE SERVICE COMMISSION
Office of Research Legislative Budget
www.lsc.ohio.gov and Drafting Office
H.B. 74 Bill Analysis
135th General Assembly
Click here for H.B. 74’s Fiscal Note
Version: As Reported by Senate Financial Institutions and Technology
Primary Sponsors: Reps. Hall and Lightbody
Effective Date:
Logan Briggs and Emily E. Wendel, Attorneys
SUMMARY
Cybersecurity and Fraud Advisory Board
▪ Creates the Cybersecurity and Fraud Advisory Board, which must examine and develop
recommendations with regard to best practices in, shared experiences regarding, and
future efforts to improve cybersecurity and fraud prevention with respect to the
information technology (IT) systems and shared services used across state agencies.
Prefilled elections forms
▪ Prohibits a person from preprinting or filling out any portion of a voter registration form
or an application for absent voter’s ballots on behalf of an applicant.
▪ Includes exceptions for applicants who require assistance by reason of blindness,
disability, or illiteracy.
▪ Allows election officials to continue preprinting names and addresses on absentee ballot
applications.
▪ Allows a uniformed services or overseas absent voter’s relative to complete a form on
the voter’s behalf, as under current law.
Voter registration through the Bureau of Motor Vehicles
▪ Requires all voter registrations and updates completed at the Bureau of Motor Vehicles
(BMV) as part of a customer’s transaction to be sent electronically to the Secretary of
State within 24 hours, with no paper form sent to a board of elections.
▪ Clarifies that when a customer submits a notice of change of address to the BMV, the
BMV must offer the applicant the opportunity to submit a change of address for voter
registration purposes electronically in conjunction with the BMV transaction.
▪ Requires BMV deputy registrars to continue to send any paper voter registration forms
that are returned to a deputy registrar to the local board of elections within five days.
December 11, 2024
Office of Research and Drafting LSC Legislative Budget Office
Statewide election petitions
▪ Requires the Attorney General to certify the title of any statewide initiative or
referendum petition, in addition to its summary, as a fair and truthful statement of the
proposal before the petitioners may begin collecting signatures.
▪ Applies certain requirements related to paid petition circulators to the circulators of a
political party formation petition.
Audits of election results
▪ Requires the boards of elections to conduct post-election audits after every election,
instead of only a general election or a primary election held in an even-numbered year.
Approval of voting systems
▪ Renames the Board of Voting Machine Examiners as the Board of Voting Systems
Examiners.
▪ Adds a cybersecurity expert appointed by the Secretary of State as a nonvoting member
of the Board.
▪ Requires the Board to examine, test, and approve voter registration systems and ballots
on demand voting systems, and requires the Secretary to certify those systems, in the
same manner as the Board and the Secretary currently do for voting equipment.
▪ Requires the Secretary to adopt standards for the security and integrity of voter
registration systems and ballots on demand voting systems.
▪ Requires those systems to meet any applicable standards adopted by the federal
Election Assistance Commission in order to be certified.
▪ Prohibits the Secretary or a board of elections from acquiring a voter registration system
or a ballots on demand voting system that has not been certified under the bill.
▪ Allows a board of elections that is using a system before the bill takes effect to continue
using that system until the county acquires a new system.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Cybersecurity and Fraud Advisory Board ....................................................................................... 3
Report .......................................................................................................................................... 3
Membership and meetings ......................................................................................................... 3
Prefilled elections forms ................................................................................................................. 4
Voter registration forms .............................................................................................................. 4
Absentee ballot applications ....................................................................................................... 4
Voter registration through the Bureau of Motor Vehicles ............................................................. 5
Electronic registrations and updates .......................................................................................... 5
Paper forms ................................................................................................................................. 6
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Statewide election petitions ........................................................................................................... 6
Title and summary of initiative and referendum petitions ......................................................... 6
Political party formation petitions .............................................................................................. 6
Audits of election results ................................................................................................................ 7
Approval of voting systems ............................................................................................................. 7
Board of Voting Systems Examiners............................................................................................ 7
Voter registration systems .......................................................................................................... 8
Ballots on demand voting systems.............................................................................................. 8
Voting system approval and certification under continuing law ................................................ 9
Vendor submission ............................................................................................................... 10
Board examination and report ............................................................................................. 10
Certification by Secretary of State ....................................................................................... 11
Continuing certification ........................................................................................................ 11
Withdrawal of certification .................................................................................................. 11
DETAILED ANALYSIS
Cybersecurity and Fraud Advisory Board
Report
The bill creates the Cybersecurity and Fraud Advisory Board. The Board must examine
and develop recommendations with regard to best practices in, shared experiences regarding,
and future efforts to improve cybersecurity and fraud prevention with respect to the
information technology (IT) systems and shared services used across state agencies. The Board
cannot examine open vulnerabilities, security protocols, or legal issues with respect to the
state’s cybersecurity and fraud prevention measures.
The Board must submit a report of its findings and recommendations concerning the
topics the Board examines to the Governor, the President and Minority Leader of the Senate,
and the Speaker and Minority Leader of the House of Representatives not later than 12 months
after the Board’s first meeting. The Board is abolished after it delivers its report.1
Membership and meetings
The Board consists of the Chief Information Security Officer of the Department of
Administrative Services, who serves as the Board’s Chairperson, and one employee of each of
the offices of the Governor, the Attorney General, the Auditor of State, the Secretary of State,
and the Treasurer of State, appointed by the respective officers. Those officers must make their
appointments within 90 days after the bill takes effect.
1 R.C. 126.41(A) and (B).
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To be eligible for appointment, a person must have a background and expertise in
cybersecurity or fraud prevention.
The members serve without compensation and are not reimbursed for expenses. They
serve at the pleasure of the appointing authority. Vacancies are filled in the same manner as
original appointments.
The Board meets at the Chairperson’s call and must meet at least twice, with the first
meeting occurring within 90 days after the final appointment to the Board has been made. The
Board cannot hold an executive session pursuant to the Open Meetings Law, meaning that all
meetings of the Board must be open to the public.2
Prefilled elections forms
With certain exceptions, the bill prohibits a person from preprinting or filling out any
portion of a voter registration form or an application for absent voter’s ballots on behalf of an
applicant. If a form or application is completed by any person other than the applicant in
violation of the bill, the form or application is invalid. For example, the bill would prohibit an
organization from mailing prefilled voter registration forms to eligible but unregistered
individuals or mailing prefilled absentee ballot applications to electors.
Voter registration forms
The bill allows a person to preprint or fill out a voter registration or update form on
behalf of an applicant only if the applicant declares that the applicant needs that assistance by
reason of blindness, disability, or illiteracy. In that case, the assistant may be any person of the
applicant’s choice, other than the applicant’s employer, an agent of the applicant’s employer,
or an officer or agent of the applicant’s union. The assistant must check a box on the
registration form to indicate that the applicant declares that the applicant needs assistance by
reason of blindness, disability, or illiteracy.3
Absentee ballot applications
Regarding an application for absent voter’s ballots, the bill allows a person other than
the applicant to preprint or fill out the application form only under the following circumstances:
▪ The Secretary of State or a board of elections may preprint the applicant’s name and
address on the application, as permitted under continuing law, provided that the
Secretary or a board must not preprint the address on an application sent to a
participant in the Address Confidentiality Program.
▪ If the applicant declares that the applicant requires assistance by reason of blindness,
disability, or illiteracy, the applicant may be assisted by any person of the applicant’s
choice, other than the applicant’s employer, an agent of the applicant’s employer, an
2 R.C. 126.441(C) to (G), by reference to R.C. 121.22, not in the bill.
3 R.C. 3503.14 and 3505.24.
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officer or agent of the applicant’s union, or a candidate whose name appears on the
ballot. (This is the same as the list of persons who, under continuing law, may not assist
an elector in the voting booth.)
▪ A bipartisan team of election officials may assist a disabled or confined elector in casting
absent voter’s ballots, as permitted under continuing law.
▪ If the applicant is a uniformed services or overseas absent voter, the applicant’s relative
may complete and submit the form on the applicant’s behalf, as permitted under
continuing law.
Current law prohibits an election official from filling out an absentee ballot application
on an elector’s behalf, except in the circumstances described above. But, the law does not
prohibit any other person from doing so.4
Voter registration through the Bureau of Motor Vehicles
The bill changes the internal procedures the Bureau of Motor Vehicles (BMV) and its
deputy registrars must follow when processing voter registrations and updates as part of
customer transactions.
Electronic registrations and updates
First, the bill eliminates a requirement that when a BMV customer registers to vote as
part of a transaction with the BMV, the deputy registrar must generate both an electronic and a
paper voter registration form and send them both to the board of elections of the county
where the deputy registrar is located. Instead, under the bill, the deputy registrar must send an
electronic record of the voter registration, along with an electronic copy of the customer’s
signature, to the Secretary of State within 24 hours. No paper form is required. This procedure
is similar to the current procedure for updating an elector’s name or address in voter
registration records. Under the bill, the deputy registrar likewise must transmit electronic voter
registration updates to the Secretary of State within 24 hours instead of within five days.
The bill also clarifies that when a customer submits a notice of change of address to the
BMV, the BMV must offer the applicant the opportunity to submit a change of address for voter
registration purposes electronically in conjunction with the BMV transaction, in a manner
prescribed by the Secretary of State. The BMV currently does so, but the Revised Code does not
explicitly require it.
Finally, the bill relocates, but does not substantively change, language requiring the
Secretary to adopt rules governing the electronic transmission of voter registration information
from the BMV. Under continuing law, those rules must do all of the following:5
4 R.C. 3505.24, 3509.03, and 3511.02. See also R.C. 111.44 and 3509.08, not in the bill.
5 R.C. 3503.11 and 4507.09 and conforming changes in R.C. 3501.05, 3503.09, 3503.14, and 3503.19.
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▪ Prohibit any direct electronic connection between the BMV and the Statewide Voter
Registration Database;
▪ Require any voter registration information to be verified by the Secretary or a board of
elections before the information is added to the Statewide Voter Registration Database;
▪ Require the BMV to electronically date stamp each electronic record in a manner that
does not disclose the identity of the office that receives the voter registration or update.
Paper forms
Under continuing law, deputy registrars also must make paper voter registration and
update forms available to any person. The bill retains the existing requirement that, if a person
fills out a paper form and turns it in to a deputy registrar, separate from a customer
transaction, the deputy registrar must send the form to the board of elections within five days. 6
Statewide election petitions
Title and summary of initiative and referendum petitions
The bill requires the Attorney General to certify the title of any statewide initiative or
referendum petition, in addition to its summary, as a fair and truthful statement of the
proposal before the petitioners may begin collecting signatures.
Continuing law requires a statewide initiative petition to include a title, which must be
“briefly expressed,” and requires a statewide referendum petition to include a title that
contains “a brief legislative history of the law, section, or item of law to be referred.” However,
the law currently does not allow the Attorney General to evaluate the title along with the
summary.7
Political party formation petitions
The bill modifies the requirements for a petition to form a new minor political party.
Under continuing law, to be recognized as a political party in Ohio and have its candidates
appear on the ballot with the party’s name, a party must eith