Los Angeles County Registrar Recorder Department

Even after he records the final results from Tuesday's historic presidential election, Los Angeles County's election czar isn't likely to get any rest. When he's done counting roughly 16% of the ballots left over from Nov. 4, Dean Logan, the county's registrar-recorder, will turn his attention toward improving the democratic process for the next generation.

Two weeks after election day, Kenneth Bennett and Paul Drugan were standing together at the Los Angeles County registrar-recorder's office in Norwalk, gazing through a window that looks into the ballot-counting room. Inside, under pale fluorescent light, workers moved like zombies, feeding ballot after ballot into machines with endless appetites. To Bennett and Drugan, this was a happy sight.

As if getting married weren't expensive enough, the registrar-recorder will raise fees for marriage certificates and other records to help pay for the automation of vital records, officials said. Copies of birth, death and marriage certificates will go up by $1 next month to $16, $11 and $13, respectively. The increase was mandated statewide by AB 430, passed in August.

Even after he records the final results from Tuesday's historic presidential election, Los Angeles County's election czar isn't likely to get any rest. When he's done counting roughly 16% of the ballots left over from Nov. 4, Dean Logan, the county's registrar-recorder, will turn his attention toward improving the democratic process for the next generation.

A voter with two last names might confound most precinct officials, but for seasoned poll pros like Frank and Shirley Bruno, it's just a matter of remembering the regulars. It has been years since the woman with two last names first walked into the Brunos' family room-turned-polling place, first giving one half of her hyphenated last name, then the other. The Brunos couldn't find her. Had she come to the wrong location--or failed to register?

The registrar-recorder's office will be open over the next two weekends to help people who want to cast absentee ballots for the Nov. 3 election. The office will be open from 8 a.m. to 3:30 p.m. The office is in Room 3002, 12400 Imperial Highway, Norwalk. Absentee ballot applications must be received by the Registrar's Office by Tuesday.

Monday is the last day to register to vote for the March 7 primary election. Who can register: Under California law, people entitled to vote must be U.S. citizens, at least 18 years old at the time of election and California residents for 29 days before the election. If you move within 28 days of the election, you can vote by returning to your former precinct or by obtaining an absentee ballot for that precinct.

Los Angeles County's election agency has punched a hole in its overtime budget every year for the last six years, racking up nearly $8.3 million in extra costs, according to a county audit made public Tuesday. The Registrar-Recorder/County Clerk's Office spent nearly $27.3 million on overtime during the six years beginning July 2001 -- 43% more than the $19 million that was budgeted, the audit's figures show.

Feb. 3 is the deadline to register to vote in March 4 elections, the Los Angeles County registrar-recorder announced. Three Valley cities--San Fernando, Calabasas and Hidden Hills--will be among 53 Los Angeles County municipalities holding elections on that date. Residents of Palmdale will also vote on a school bond measure on March 4. The city of Los Angeles will hold its election on April 8.

Upgrading Los Angeles County's outdated vote-counting equipment to avoid the kind of failures that slowed election results last week could cost $5 million to $6 million. But it could cost approximately $50 million to completely replace the county's centralized vote tabulation equipment with a state-of-the-art system that counts ballots at the precincts, Registrar-Recorder Conny McCormack told the Board of Supervisors on Tuesday.

County supervisors this week unanimously appointed Dean C. Logan as permanent registrar-recorder/county clerk. The registrar/recorder oversees elections for more than 4 million voters and keeps track of thousands of official documents. Logan, who was chosen from 24 candidates from across the country, had been filling the post on an interim basis since Conny McCormack retired earlier this year. He will be paid $195,000 a year. Logan's short tenure has already been busy. Last month, the office was in charge of implementing the state Supreme Court's order allowing for same-sex marriages in California.

Ask a Republican in Washington state about Dean C. Logan, Los Angeles County's interim elections chief, and this might be the answer: "I'm really shocked that anyone would consider hiring Dean Logan to run an elections department," former state party leader Chris Vance said. Ask a Democrat there, and the answer might be like this: "He was marvelous. I have nothing but high praise for Dean," King County Executive Ron Sims said.

Los Angeles County's election agency has punched a hole in its overtime budget every year for the last six years, racking up nearly $8.3 million in extra costs, according to a county audit made public Tuesday. The Registrar-Recorder/County Clerk's Office spent nearly $27.3 million on overtime during the six years beginning July 2001 -- 43% more than the $19 million that was budgeted, the audit's figures show.

Los Angeles County Registrar-Recorder Conny McCormack announced Tuesday that she would retire at the end of the year, saying she was tired of battling state officials over the future of electronic voting machines. McCormack, who has served 12 years as the top election official in the largest election jurisdiction in the country, said that Secretary of State Debra Bowen's move this month to pull the plug on the machines used in L.A. County and most of the state clinched her decision.

The state Legislature voted Friday to have Los Angeles County election officials take over the recall election targeting four City Council members in Lynwood. The unanimous vote by the Senate and Assembly comes on the heels of a Superior Court judge's ruling that the election will take place Sept. 25. The unusual step was taken because the Lynwood City Council had resisted allowing the recall election to go forward.

The day the ice storm hit Dallas, glazing the roads and sending government workers home early, Austin McCormack had a hunch where to find the young woman named Conny whom he'd been wanting to ask out. He carefully threaded his way across town, down to the county government building and through darkened halls to the county clerk's office. The light was on. He popped his head in and there she was, the 32-year-old chief of elections, plugging away at her desk. "I knew you'd still be here," he said.

Los Angeles County workers won a temporary restraining order Friday preventing widespread layoffs at the registrar-recorder's office until a court hearing next week, when a judge will also consider a similar plea by county health care workers facing dismissal. Last month, the county announced it planned to lay off employees to help cut its $1-billion budget deficit, and on Friday pink slips were sent to 107 Health Services Department employees.

Governor-elect Pete Wilson is appointing his transition team. Dianne Feinstein is licking her wounds. And political pundits are already looking ahead to the 1992 presidential election, in which both of California's U.S. Senate seats will be up for grabs.

The laminated wall calendar in Conny McCormack's office says today is July 26. In McCormack's head, though, this is E minus 73, and every day that goes by between now and Oct. 7 is one day less that she has to organize the special election for the recall of Gov. Gray Davis for Los Angeles County. So while many Californians are bracing for the political pyrotechnics of a truncated gubernatorial campaign, McCormack, the Los Angeles County registrar, is getting to work.

As homeowners scurry to lock in record-low mortgage rates, the refinancing boom is paying off handsomely for an unlikely player: Los Angeles County. The cash-hungry county has raked in millions of dollars performing one of its most mundane tasks: the recording of each property deed onto its books. Thanks to the refinancing numbers that took off in 2001, documents have been flying fast and furious into the registrar-recorder's office.