Month: July 2026

COLUMBIA MO. (KMIZ)

After a national address from President Donald Trump at the White House, in which the president claimed declassified documents revealed vulnerabilities in the country’s election systems, some election officials in Missouri are reassuring the systems are secure.

In his speech, President Trump claimed there were more than a quarter of a million non-citizens on voter rolls, but did not provide specific evidence that any votes or election outcomes in 2020 had been altered.

Trump used his speech to also urge Congress to pass the SAVE America Act, which would include new voter I-D requirements. The act has stalled in the Senate, and Republicans said they don’t have the votes.

Boone County Election Clerk Brianna Lennon said that she did not pay much attention to the President’s speech, but expressed confidence in election laws in Missouri.

“You know, I think given that elections are so decentralized and how little role the federal government has to play in our local elections, I don’t think very much of what the federal government is doing in terms of, like, elections administration has an impact on Boone County,” Lennon said.

Lennon added that in past legislative sessions, the state has actually strengthened election laws.

That includes House Bill 1871, a newly-signed law that will specifically target election scheduling, voter access rules, and candidate requirements.

The bill will also allow people who show up to vote in-person absentee without an I-D to cast a provisional ballot.

Lennon said that while the average voter might not notice the effects, the bill has very positive election administrator changes.

“It allows us to make sure that people can access provisional ballots during absentee voting. It allows us to make sure we’re serving military and overseas voters in a more consistent way,” Lennon said.

Additionally, Lennon adds that the Boone County Clerk’s Office has been hard at work ensuring the upcoming August 4th election goes smoothly.

Lennon said they just finished logic and accuracy testing of voting equipment. She added that every voter uses a paper ballot—marked either by hand or via an accessible touchscreen—which is then processed by a tabulator that bipartisan teams thoroughly test before each election.

Lennon said the clerk’s office is also in the process of training election judges ahead of the election.

When it comes to voter registration in the state, Missouri does not require voters to show proof of citizenship when registering to vote.

Clinton Jenkins, the President of the Missouri Association of County Clerks and Election Authorities, said that the state only requires voters to check “yes” to indicate that they are a citizen.

“The only thing that’s on there for an application for registration is it just asks, are you a citizen of the United States, yes or no? So right now, we really don’t have the authority to ask for proof of citizenship when somebody registers to vote,” Jenkins said.

Lennon said she believes the process is a great way to ensure voters are attesting their citizenship.

“I think checking yes or no is a great way to ensure that people are doing what they are supposed to do, because they’re testing under penalty of perjury,” she said.

Lennon said that despite national rhetoric, illegal voting is practically nonexistent in local elections.

“I have not experienced, nor do I think any of my colleagues have experienced a vast number of people who are not eligible to cast ballots in the state of Missouri,” she said.

Both officials agree that if any changes are made to existing voter registration regulations, they would want to ensure it does not make the election process harder for citizens or clerks.

“I think if we’re going to talk about doing verification or additional requirements on voters or additional requirements and elections administrators, we need to make sure that what we’re doing doesn’t make the voting process harder,” Lennon said.

“We don’t want to add any hurdles to, you know, American citizens applying and registering for their right to vote,” Jenkins said.

COLUMBIA, Mo. (KMIZ) 

The Columbia Police and Fire departments held their final scheduled Public Safety Sales Tax meeting Friday, making one last push to convince voters to approve a 1% public safety sales tax during the Aug. 4 election.

The meeting at Daniel Boone Regional Library marked the sixth and final public session held across Columbia’s wards between July 9 and 17, as city officials continued efforts to educate voters about the proposed tax.

If approved, the additional 1% sales tax is expected to generate an estimated $38 million annually, with the revenue dedicated exclusively to the Columbia Police and Fire departments. City officials estimate about one-third of that funding would come from sales made in the downtown area.

CPD says it plans to use the extra funding to help hire an additional 50 police officers, build a new headquarters and modernize its public safety tools. 

The push to upgrade the department’s technology is designed to help bring new tools to officers in the field. On Friday, CPD officials said they are considering updated body-worn cameras that could reduce reliance on written reports, along with translation technology already used by larger cities to help officers communicate more effectively with residents who speak different languages.

This comes after Columbia Police Chief Jill Schlude told ABC 17 News in May that technology investments the department has already made, including Flock cameras, have helped improve the department’s clearance rate.

“I don’t think the leveraging of the technology can be understated. The expansion we’ve done with everything from the body-worn camera program to in-car cameras to the Flock system has just really increased our I think, our efficiency and our accuracy in our investigations,” Schulde said. “The folks that are boots on the ground doing the work tend to have the best ideas about what they need and what the scope is of what they need. And so we would definitely have that conversation as a department again.”

If the sales tax is approved, Schlude said another tool the department is exploring is the use of first responder drones.

“That’s something we’re definitely interested in here. The officer safety aspect of that is very compelling, as well as getting eyes up early to see whether or not someone really has a gun or do they have a stick or a cell phone. I mean, all those things are really helpful to officers responding to a call,” Schlude told ABC 17 News in May. 

Police and fire agencies across the United States are rapidly adopting “drone as first responder” programs, with dozens of departments now launching drones to 911 calls before officers arrive. 

The small unmanned aircraft are equipped with zoom and thermal cameras, lights and real-time communications that launch from stations or rooftop docks to stream live video to dispatchers within minutes of a call.  

Seth Fallik, chair of the University of Missouri-Kansas City’s Department of Criminology, said while drones may not solve every crime, they can provide valuable information during active situations.

“These are traditional drones as we know them, but they have the ability to, in the first responder program, get to the scene earlier. Now, there’s a bit of a background here. We know that most crimes won’t be solved if law enforcement response time was even zero. But that doesn’t mean that we still can’t glean something from responding to traffic or other types of incidents that are ongoing,” Fallik told ABC 17 News. 

The concept grew out of public safety drone use that began in the early 2010s, but formal Drone as First Responder programs took off in the late 2010s and early 2020s and have since spread to cities in Missouri, including Blue Springs, St. Charles County and O’Fallon, with St. Louis police also pursuing a citywide program. 

Fallik says the Kansas City Police Department has already seen early returns in helping improve officer safety. 

“I think they’re big fans of it in terms of the officer safety component. It basically just provides an understanding of the landscape prior to arrival, which offers this sort of big question for law enforcement in their responses. I think we’re still early on in terms of how it could be used for a whole host of things,” Fallik said. “Think about large events. We just hosted the World Cup here. Being able to have drones in the sky can help with crowd control as well.”

While the concept of using the first responder drones is still relatively new, Fallik believes it will continue expanding in larger communities.  

“I think it’s an adapt-or-die situation for folks that are in urban spaces. But if you’re policing in rural America, which is the bulk of law enforcement agencies, it’s not necessarily something that you’ve got, one, the resources to support or the crime to sort of respond to it. So I think certainly our larger cities are going to have to move into these spaces,” Fallik said.

Columbia falls into the category of communities where officials believe additional technology could help keep up with growth. Since 2000, the city has added roughly 49,000 residents and more than 15 square miles of land, increasing the area officers are responsible for covering. As the city continues to grow, so has the demand for emergency responses.

However, Fallik said departments need to make sure residents are part of the conversation before implementing technology that increases surveillance. CPD faced some pushback when it first introduced Flock cameras, with some residents arguing that the technology could compromise privacy. Fallik said those concerns highlight why departments need community support before adopting new tools.

“I always sort of caution anytime you’re putting up a camera or you’re sort of providing some sort of surveillance, you get the approval of the community before you do that,” Fallik said. “You want it to be a welcome technology as opposed to one that’s being imposed. I think, for what it’s worth, these are often reactive as opposed to proactive. So people are calling 911 and asking for law enforcement assistance. This is a tool at their disposal.”