Roger Williams, Texas Secretary of State, will be on campus today as part of the year-long VOTEXAS voter education program.

Williams will hold a press conference at 9:30 a.m. and afterwards be on hand to help demonstrate the electronic voting booths that are being introduced statewide.

The VOTEXAS initiative goes throughout 2006, and its goal is to inform the public about changes to the voting process. It will also encourage voter turnout by educating citizens to find out when they will vote, where they’ll vote and how to register and participate in this year’s statewide elections.

This campaign is in response to the roll-out of the Help America Vote Act, which was signed into law after the voting problems in the 2000 presidential election by President Bush. Some counties, like Dallas County, already have electronic voting machines. However, most counties across the state are in the process of replacing punch cards and optical scan voting systems.

VOTEXAS is already airing television commercials on local stations and will expand to radio and other forms of media as the March primary elections near. The initiative’s Web site is up and can be accessed at www.votexas.org.