Daily Brew: October 23, 2018

October 23, 2018

Plus, here are our highlights from our 2018 ballot language readability report Welcome to the Tuesday, October 23 Brew. Here’s what’s in store for you as you start your day: Hawaii state spotlight Louisiana state spotlight Here are our highlights from our 2018 ballot language readability report Hawaii: The Islands of Aloha Hawaii is holding elections for one U.S. Senate seat, two U.S. House seats, governor and lieutenant governor, 13 of the 25 state Senate seats, and all 51 state House seats. Two statewide ballot measures are also on the ballot. What is the partisan balance in the state? Congress: Democrats hold both U.S. Senate seats and both U.S. House seats. Governor: Democrat. Lt. Governor: Democrat. Attorney General: Nonpartisan. State Senate: 25-0 Democratic majority. State House: 46-5 Democratic majority. What you need to know if you’re a Hawaii voter Early voting dates: October 22 to November 2. Polls open/close: 8 a.m. to 8 p.m. Voter ID: All voters in Idaho must present photo identification at the polls or sign an affidavit. Approved forms of photo identification include the following: Idaho driver’s license or ID card, a U.S. passport or federal ID card, a tribal photo ID card, or a student ID card, as long as the ID includes a photo and is issued by an institution in Idaho. If a voter is unable to present a valid ID, the voter is given the option to sign a Personal Identification Affidavit. On the affidavit, the voter swears to his or her identity under penalty of perjury. After signing the affidavit, the voter will be issued a regular ballot. Bookmark your sample ballot. Learn more         Louisiana: Fall in love with Louisiana all over again Louisiana is holding elections for six U.S. House seats, public service commissioner, two state Supreme Court seats, and six appellate court seats. There are also special elections for Secretary of State, one state Senate seat, and three state House seats. Six statewide ballot measures are on the ballot. Ballotpedia is also covering school board elections in five public school districts. In Louisiana, all candidates, regardless of party affiliation, run in the general election. If a candidate receives at least 50 percent of the vote in the general election, he or she wins outright. If no candidate reaches that threshold, a runoff election is held between the top two vote-getters. What is the partisan balance in the state? Congress: Republicans hold both U.S. Senate seats and five U.S. House seats. Democrats hold one U.S. House seat. Governor: Democrat. Lt. Governor: Republican. Attorney General: Republican. State Senate: 25-14 Republican majority. State House: 60-39 Republican majority with three independent members and three vacancies. Ballot measure to watch Louisiana Amendment 2, Unanimous Jury Verdict for Felony Trials Amendment: Amendment 2 would require the unanimous agreement of jurors to convict people charged with felonies. As of 2018, Louisiana requires the agreement of 10 of 12, or 83 percent, jurors to convict people charged with felonies. Amendment 2 would not affect juries for offenses that were committed before January 1, 2019. Currently, Louisiana is one of two states—the other being Oregon—that does not require the unanimous agreement of jurors to convict people charged with felonies. Oregon does, however, require unanimous convictions in murder trials. What you need to know if you’re a Louisiana voter Early voting dates: October 23 to October 30. Polls open/close: 6 a.m. to 8 p.m. Voter ID: A Louisiana voter must present one of the following forms of identification at the polls: a driver's license, a Louisiana special ID, or another generally recognized photo ID that contains the voter's name and signature. If a photo ID is not presented, a utility bill, a payroll check, or another government document that includes the voter's name and address can be presented. However, such voters must also sign affidavits. Bookmark your sample ballot. Learn more→   Our 2018 ballot language readability report shows graduate reading levels required on average for ballot titles or questions, and high school senior reading levels required on average for ballot summaries or explanations. I was at a restaurant the other evening. German food. I was so excited to sit down to break my fast from carbs with some spaetzle. Then I realized that I knew what spaetzle was, but nothing else. Of course, my mind immediately went to ballot measures. Doesn’t yours? What happens when you want to be an informed citizen but you can hardly even understand what you’re reading? When voters prepare to cast their ballot, knowing how to understand the choices they face is as much of a battle at times as anything else. For the past two years, we have taken ballot measure language and run it through industry-standard assessment tools to assign a readability rating. We ran the 2018 ballot titles or questions and the ballot summaries or explanations for all of the 169 statewide ballot measures through formulas designed to measure the readability of text. Our ballot measures team used two formulas, the Flesch Reading Ease (FRE) and Flesch-Kincaid Grade Level (FKGL), to compute scores for the titles and summaries of ballot measures. The FKGL formula produces a score equivalent to the estimated number of years of U.S. education required to understand a text. The FRE formula produces a score between a negative number and 100, with the highest score (100) representing a 5th-grade equivalent reading level and scores at or below zero representing college graduate-equivalent reading level. Therefore, the higher the score, the easier the text is to read. Measurements used in calculating readability scores include the number of syllables, words, and sentences in a text. Other factors, such as the complexity of an idea in a text, are not reflected in readability scores. Here are some highlights from Ballotpedia’s 2018 ballot language readability report: The average Flesch-Kincaid Grade Level for the ballot titles or questions of all 2018 statewide ballot measures is 19.5. State averages ranged from 8 to 42. The average Flesch Reading Ease score for the ballot titles or questions of all 2018 statewide ballot measures is 16. The average Flesch-Kincaid Grade Level for the ballot summaries or explanations of all the 2018 statewide ballot measures that were given a summary or explanation is 12. State averages ranged from 7 to 43. The states with the lowest average Flesch-Kincaid Grade Level for ballot titles or questions are Alaska, Rhode Island, and Massachusetts with 8, 9, and 11, respectively. The states with the lowest average Flesch-Kincaid Grade Level for ballot summaries or explanations are Alaska, Wisconsin, and North Carolina with 7, 8, and 9. The states with the highest average Flesch-Kincaid Grade Level for ballot summaries or explanations are Connecticut, West Virginia, and Georgia with 42, 34, and 32. For summaries the highest average grade level are in Idaho, Arizona, and New Mexico with 43, 28, and 23. Average ballot title grades were lowest for language written by the Florida Constitution Revision Commission (10), initiative petitioners (15), and attorneys general (16). Average ballot title grades were highest for language written by special state boards and state legislatures. Legislative research offices and counsels were responsible for the lowest average summary grades at 14; special state boards game in second at 15, and secretary of states third at 16. The states with the longest ballot titles or questions on average are Arkansas, Oklahoma, Ohio, North Dakota, South Carolina, and New Hampshire, all of which did not feature additional ballot summaries or explanations. How does this compare to prior years? In 2017, there were 27 statewide measures in nine states. The average Flesch-Kincaid Grade Level was 20. A 2011 study calculated the mean Flesch-Kincaid Grade Level score for each state, except Arkansas, Illinois, and West Virginia, with at least one ballot measure during the 10-year period from 1997 to 2007. The average of the state grade level means in that decade was 17.6. In that time period, the state with the highest mean score was New Mexico, which had a mean FKGL score of 28 years of education. The state with the lowest mean score was Oklahoma, which had a mean FKGL score of nine years of education. Learn more→ It's clear, Americans are preparing to vote! We are honored that you have chosen Ballotpedia to be one of your trusted resources. You're in great company! Yesterday, our sample ballot lookup tool was used 71,965 times. Readers shared 648 posts about our encyclopedic content on social media. A total of 4,449,760 pages were viewed.  Averaged out over the last 30 days, Ballotpedia has had more traffic than Asana, the application our staff uses to plan out all of our projects. - - -