How to

Create an Election in the Database

An election record is an entity in your Voter Focus database that holds information about an election, such as the election date, the election type (primary or general), and dates when early voting is held. Voter Focus assigns each election a unique 3-digit number. The election is also assigned a longer number by FVRS, but it is the 3-digit election number that you will see on dialogs and reports.

For the purpose of creating an election, there are two kinds of elections in Voter Focus:  statewide and local.

• Statewide elections include all state and federal elections and U.S. House of Representative races involving precincts in multiple counties. Statewide elections must be set up on FVRS by the Division of Elections. Once the statewide election record has been created on FVRS, you can then create a record for it on your county system. Voter Focus will copy the state's election data—such as the election, book-closing, and party-freeze dates—to your local record so your county will be in sync with other Florida counties as well as the state system. Should any dates change, the Division of Elections will notify Supervisors, and you should then follow these instructions to change the dates.

• Local elections, including city elections are defined entirely by your county. FVRS assigns your local election an FVRS system number, but you set the pertinent dates and other parameters.

To create a statewide election:

1. Go to ELECTIONS > Maintain Election Settings > New. The Create New Election dialog appears.

2. In FVRS Election Number, select the election from the drop-down list. If the election does not appear and you believe it should, contact VR Systems.

3. When you select an FVRS election, the fields under Election Details from FVRS are filled with the state's information. Click OK to bring up the Election Maintenance dialog and fill in the fields using the dialog's help as your guide.

To create a local or city election:

1. Go to ELECTIONS > Maintain Election Settings > New.

2. On the Create New Elections dialog, click New Local Election.

3. On the Election Maintenance dialog, fill in the fields according to the instructions in the dialog's help. Note that the Set Districts button is disabled for now.

4. Click Save. You will see a message that the election has been created. Click OK. The new election is automatically selected as the focused election.

5. Click Election Maintenance. On the Election Maintenance dialog, click Set Districts.

6. On the Election District Selection dialog:

1. In the Type field, select the district type. If you are creating a city election, select the district type code for city districts; typically this is CTY.

2. In the District field, select the district or city.

3. Click Add Districts to add the district or city to the Selected Districts list.

4. Repeat steps a-c to add other districts as appropriate for this election.

5. Click Save and Close and then click Yes in response to the warning that ballot style assignments will be lost. This is not important because you have not assigned ballot styles yet.

7. Click Close on the Election Maintenance dialog.