Secretary of State Wayne Williams praises project that will aid voter registration accuracy

DENVER, Aug. 17, 2015 – Colorado Secretary of State Wayne Williams helped cut the ribbon Monday for a project aimed at providing a modern, user-friendly system for handling driver’s licenses and vehicle registrations.

Colorado DRIVES will replace computer systems that are 20 years and older.

“Many people register to vote for the first time when they obtain their driver’s license,” Williams said. “This allows us to improve the process of updating someone’s voter registration when that person updates his or her driver’s license.”

Colorado DRIVES will allow the Secretary of State’s elections division to electronically receive information about voter registrations and address changes as they happen.

Gov. John Hickenlooper’s goal is that Colorado DRIVES will reduce the wait times in state driver’s license offices to an average of 15 minutes.

Colorado DRIVES is short for Drivers License, Record, Identification and Vehicle Enterprise Solution.

The legislature provided money to the Colorado Department of Revenue and the Governor’s Office of Information Technology in the 2014 and 2015 sessions. Sen. Tim Neville, R-Littleton, and Reps. Jack Tate, R-Centennial, and Tracy Kraft-Tharp, D-Arvada, were present for the ribbon cutting in Jefferson County. Also present were two former county clerks, Pam Anderson of Jefferson County and Jack Arrowsmith of Douglas County.

Williams previously served as the elected clerk of El Paso County, which handled elections, driver’s licenses and vehicle registrations. During his tenure, the wait for a driver’s license was less than 15 minutes. Williams took over in January as Colorado’s 38th secretary of state.