Absentee voting; processing of absentee ballots before election day.

Absentee voting; processing of absentee ballotsbefore election day; reporting of absentee ballot vote totals; centralabsentee voter precincts. Requires certain actions to be takento process absentee ballots returned before the day of the election,including opening sealed ballot envelopes and inserting the ballotinto a ballot container or counting machine. The bill requires theestablishment of a central absentee voter precinct in each locality;currently, establishment is optional. On the day of the election,officers of election are required to begin processing absentee ballotsin the central absentee voter precincts prior to the close of thepolls but that no ballot vote counts are permitted to be transmittedoutside of the central absentee voter precinct before the close ofthe polls; a violation of such prohibition is a Class 1 misdemeanor.When reporting election results to the Department of Elections, thegeneral registrars are required to report absentee ballots cast earlyin person separately from all other absentee ballots. The bill containstechnical amendments for organizational and readability purposes.