electionlineWeekly--June 2, 2011

I. In Focus This Week

Director’s Note: As the announcement below indicates, I will be leaving Pew shortly to start a new adventure among my friends and colleagues in the elections world. I’ll have more details on the transition in the coming weeks – as well as lots (and lots!) of words of gratitude and reflection on 10 years at Pew – but for now I want to thank each and every one of you for your support through the years. Stay tuned! Doug Chapin

Chapin to Join Humphrey School

Special to electionline.org

The Humphrey School of Public Affairs at the University of Minnesota announced today that Doug Chapin, a leading national voice on election policy, will be the new Director of its Program for Excellence in Election Administration, which is part of the School’s Center for the Study of Policy and Governance (CSPG).

“We are excited to have Doug join us,” said Larry Jacobs, Walter F. and Joan Mondale Chair for Political Studies and Director of CSPG. “He has always been a valued advisor to Humphrey in our efforts to professionalize the practice of election administration, and I look forward to working with him as we seek to realize that vision.”

Chapin comes to the Humphrey School after 10 years at The Pew Charitable Trusts, where he served as Director of Election Initiatives for the Pew Center on the States. Under his leadership, Pew’s elections team successfully lobbied for enactment of military and overseas voting reform in Congress and state legislatures, enlisted dozens of states and technology partners like Google, Microsoft and Facebook to provide official voting information online and via mobile technology, and worked with election officials, academics and technical experts to design and implement efforts to upgrade the nation’s voter registration systems.

“I look forward to working with states and localities across the nation on programs that identify and share the best and most innovative approaches to election administration,” said Chapin. “I have long advocated for a more formal approach to recruiting and developing the next generation of election officials, and the Humphrey School is the perfect place to make those ideas into reality.”

Prior to serving at Pew, Chapin was an attorney in private practice specializing in election and ethics law. He also served as Elections Counsel to the Democrats on the U.S. Senate Rules Committee from 1997 to 2000, where he focused on federal election legislation and participated in the review of the disputed 1996 Senate election in Louisiana.

Chapin is a frequent speaker on voting technology, voter registration, election law issues and the status of election reform efforts nationwide, and has taught courses on election administration and the law as an adjunct professor at American University, Georgetown University Law Center and William and Mary’s Marshall-Wythe School of Law. He holds a law degree from Georgetown University, a master’s degree in public administration from Harvard’s John F. Kennedy School of Government and a bachelor’s degree in politics from Princeton University.