Make sure you’re really registered to vote

Millions of Floridians are energized and eager to vote in the November election.

But the possibility of errors could prevent any of us from successfully casting votes.

For that reason, I have four pieces of time-sensitive advice:

1. If registering to vote for the first time, do it at least a couple weeks before Oct. 9, and go through your county Election Supervisor’s office.

2. If you registered years ago, double-check your status with your county election office.

3. Check your polling place before Election Day if you plan to vote on that day.

4. If you vote by mail, do it early and update your signature with the county election office.

Voter registration:

Per Florida law, you must be registered by Oct. 9 to vote in November’s election. Register well enough ahead of that time so that if there’s a glitch, you’ll have time to correct it.

If already registered, double-check your status early enough so that if you were mistakenly removed (“purged”) from the voter rolls, you would have time to re-register.

I suggest dealing with your county election office (instead of the state office) because county offices deal more directly with county voter rolls.

Find your election supervisor online by searching for “election supervisor” plus your county plus Florida.

If you don’t easily find answers online, try emailing, calling, or visiting your election supervisor’s office.

Why the need to be proactive? Because Florida’s process for removing ineligible people from the voter rolls has caused errors. Since the 2000 election, thousands of truly eligible voters have been removed from the state’s voter rolls, and many didn’t find out until Election Day.

Too late, they were no longer registered, and the deadline to re-register was 29 days before the election.

That probably won’t happen to you, but it could. Someone whose name is similar to yours might be a non-citizen, might have moved to a different state, or might otherwise be ineligible to vote.

Because your name is similar, you might be flagged as possibly ineligible to vote.

Polling location: Try checking your polling place location through your county election supervisor’s website. If you don’t find answers online, try emailing, calling, or going to the election office.

Why the need to check? Because the place where you voted last time might not host a polling place for the November election, and you would be assigned to a new place.

If you go to the wrong polling place, you could drive to the right one and wait in line again. But why risk wasting time, when it’s so easy to check the location in advance?

Voting by mail: When you vote by mail (absentee ballot), your ballot signature is checked against your signature on file. Signatures can change over the years.

If someone determines that the signatures don’t match, your ballot could be invalidated. The election office might send a notice if your absentee ballot is challenged, but what if the notice gets thrown out with junk mail?

If you are forced to vote by mail, I suggest that you update your signature in advance with your local election office, submit the absentee ballot a couple weeks before the election, so there’s time for you to be notified if your ballot is challenged and watch for notices from the election office.

DEBORAH CUPPLES,

GAINESVILLE

Editor’s note: Cupples is a professor at the University of Florida Levin College of Law.