The director shall prepare all official ballots to facilitate fairness, simplicity, and clarity in the voting procedure, to reflect most accurately the intent of the voter, and to expedite the administration of elections. The following directives shall be followed when applicable:

(1) The director shall determine the size of the ballot, the type of print, necessary additional instruction notes to voters, and other similar matters of form not provided by law.

Terms Used In Alaska Statutes 15.15.030

  • Amendment: A proposal to alter the text of a pending bill or other measure by striking out some of it, by inserting new language, or both. Before an amendment becomes part of the measure, thelegislature must agree to it.
  • ballot: means any document provided by the director on which votes may be cast for candidates, propositions, or questions. See Alaska Statutes 15.80.010
  • Contract: A legal written agreement that becomes binding when signed.
  • director: means the director of elections who is the chief elections officer of the state appointed in accordance with Alaska Stat. See Alaska Statutes 15.80.010
  • Fraud: Intentional deception resulting in injury to another.
  • general election: means the election held on the Tuesday after the first Monday in November of even-numbered years. See Alaska Statutes 15.80.010
  • house district: means one of the districts described in art. See Alaska Statutes 15.80.010
  • judicial district: means one of the districts defined in Alaska Stat. See Alaska Statutes 15.80.010
  • lieutenant governor: includes an appointed lieutenant governor, governor, or acting governor if a vacancy has occurred in the office of lieutenant governor or governor. See Alaska Statutes 15.80.010
  • political group: means a group of organized voters which represents a political program and which does not qualify as a political party. See Alaska Statutes 15.80.010
  • political party: means an organized group of voters that represents a political program and has at least 5,000 registered voters in the state. See Alaska Statutes 15.80.010
  • proposition: means an initiative, referendum, or constitutional amendment submitted at an election to the public for vote. See Alaska Statutes 15.80.010
  • question: means an issue placed on the ballot to determine whether a judge or justice shall be accepted or rejected, whether a constitutional convention shall be called, whether a state debt shall be contracted, or whether a state official shall be recalled. See Alaska Statutes 15.80.010
  • ranked-choice voting: means , in a general election, the method of casting and tabulating votes in which voters rank candidates in order of preference and in which tabulation proceeds in sequential rounds in which (a) a candidate with a majority in the first round wins outright, or (b) last-place candidates are defeated until there are two candidates remaining, at which point the candidate with the greatest number of votes is declared the winner of the election. See Alaska Statutes 15.80.010
  • special election: means an election held at a time other than when the general or primary election is held and an election called to be held with, and at the time of, the general or primary election. See Alaska Statutes 15.80.010
  • state: means the State of Alaska unless applied to the different parts of the United States and in the latter case it includes the District of Columbia and the territories. See Alaska Statutes 01.10.060
  • voter: means a person who presents oneself for the purpose of voting either in person or by absentee ballot. See Alaska Statutes 15.80.010
(2) The director shall number ballots in series to ensure simplicity and secrecy and to prevent fraud.
(3) The director shall contract for the preparation of ballots under Alaska Stat. Chapter 36.30 (State Procurement Code).
(4) The director may not include on the ballot, as a part of a candidate’s name, any honorary or assumed title or prefix but may include in the candidate’s name any nickname or familiar form of a proper name of the candidate.
(5) The names of the candidates shall be placed in separate sections on the state general election ballot under the office designation to which they were nominated. If a candidate is registered as affiliated with a political party or political group, the party affiliation, if any, may be designated after the name of the candidate, upon request of the candidate. If a candidate has requested designation as nonpartisan or undeclared, that designation shall be placed after the name of the candidate. If a candidate is not registered as affiliated with a political party or political group and has not requested to be designated as nonpartisan or undeclared, the candidate shall be designated as undeclared. The lieutenant governor and the governor shall be included under the same section. Provision shall be made for voting for write-in candidates within each section. Paper ballots for the state general election shall be printed on white paper.
(6) The names of the candidates for each office shall be set out in the same order on ballots printed for use in each house district. The director shall randomly determine the order of the names of the candidates for state representative for each house district. The director shall rotate the order of placement of the names of candidates for governor, lieutenant governor, United States senator, United States representative, and state senator on the ballot for each house district.
(7) The general election ballot shall be designed with the names of candidates of each political party, and of any independent candidates qualified under Alaska Stat. § 15.30.026, for the office of President and Vice-President of the United States placed in the same section on the ballot rather than the names of electors of President and Vice-President.
(8) The general or special election ballot shall be designed with the title and proposition for any initiative, referendum, or constitutional amendment formulated as prescribed by law and placed on the ballot in the manner prescribed by the director. When placed on the ballot, a state ballot proposition or ballot question shall carry the number that was assigned to the petition for the proposition or question. Provision shall be made for marking the proposition “Yes” or “No.”
(9) The general or special election ballot shall be designed with the question of whether a constitutional convention shall be called placed on the ballot in the following manner: “Shall there be a constitutional convention?” Provision shall be made for marking the question “Yes” or “No.”
(10) A nonpartisan ballot shall be designed for each judicial district in which a justice or judge is seeking retention in office. The ballot shall be divided into four parts. Each part must bear a heading indicating the court to which the candidate is seeking approval, and provision shall be made for marking each question “Yes” or “No.” Within each part, the question of whether the justice or judge shall be approved or rejected shall be set out in substantially the following manner:

(A) “Shall . . . . . . . be retained as justice of the supreme court for 10 years?”;
(B) “Shall . . . . . . . be retained as judge of the court of appeals for eight years?”;
(C) “Shall . . . . . . . be retained as judge of the superior court for six years?”; or
(D) “Shall . . . . . . . be retained as judge of the district court for four years?”
(11) When the legislature by law authorizes a state debt for capital improvements, the director shall place the question of whether the specific authorization shall be ratified by placing the ballot title and question on the next general election ballot, or on the special election ballot if a special election is held for the purpose of ratifying the state debt for capital improvements before the time of the next general election. Unless specifically provided otherwise in the Act authorizing the debt, the ballot title shall, by the use of a few words in a succinct manner, indicate the general subject of the Act. The question shall, by the use of a few sentences in a succinct manner, give a true and impartial summary of the Act authorizing the state debt. The question of whether state debt shall be contracted shall be assigned a letter of the alphabet on the ballot. Provision shall be made for marking the question substantially as follows:

“Bonds. . . . . . . Yes” or “Bonds. . . . . . . No,”

followed by an appropriate oval.

(12) The director may provide for the optical scanning of ballots where the requisite equipment is available.
(13) The director may provide for voting by use of electronically generated ballots by a voter who requests to use a machine that produces electronically generated ballots.
(14) The director shall include the following statement on the ballot:

A candidate’s designated affiliation does not imply that the candidate is nominated or endorsed by the political party or group or that the party or group approves of or associates with that candidate, but only that the candidate is registered as affiliated with the political party or political group.

(15) Instead of the statement provided by (14) of this section, when candidates for President and Vice-President of the United States appear on a general election ballot, the director shall include the following statement on the ballot:

A candidate’s designated affiliation does not imply that the candidate is nominated or endorsed by the political party or political group or that the political party or political group approves of or associates with that candidate, but only that the candidate is registered as affiliated with the party or group. The election for President and Vice-President of the United States is different. Some candidates for President and Vice-President are the official nominees of their political party.

(16) The director shall design the general election ballots so that the candidates are selected by ranked-choice voting.
(17) The director shall design the general election ballot to direct the voter to mark candidates in order of preference and to mark as many choices as the voter wishes, but not to assign the same ranking to more than one candidate for the same office.
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