Deceased registrants can be removed from the voter registration database only if it has been confirmed through legal means that the voter is deceased. This is to ensure that no one acts to remove someone from active or inactive registration, by design or by accident, who is actually still alive. From a legal perspective it is considered a graver error for a voter to be accidentally disenfranchised because it was believed they were dead than it is to leave them registered and risk someone voting under their registration (a scenario that is unlikely and has rarely occurred in North Carolina).
The primary legally defined way in which a deceased voter can be removed is by their name appearing on a list of everyone who died in the state of North Carolina sent weekly from the State DHHS (Department of Health and Human Services) to the State Board of Elections. When the State Board of Elections receives this list, they run it against the statewide voter registration database and send each individual county matches of registrants who have died. Each individual county confirms that the names sent are in fact those of the people in their individual databases then removes them themselves. There is also a county level version of this list sent directly from DHHS to each county which is compared against the state one to improve matching at a state level, as well as a ‘DHHS search’ which allows counties to search death records going back years to continually verify as few as possible are missed.
The DHHS list is the most definitive means of confirming a voter is in fact dead, but sometimes the names that show up on those lists only show up months after they died, depending on the exact circumstances and location of death (for example, someone who died outside the state or during travel abroad unbeknownst to family/friends).
Faster removals are permitted for individual counties using lists of deceased people in the county from the local Register of Deeds. This is not required by law, but most counties do leverage this, including Alamance County. It is also worth noting that this method only covers county residents who died within their home county. As a result, county offices communicate between themselves to notify each other early of deaths of residents outside of their home county when time permits.
The final official way of receiving death notice is when a near relative or primary estate representative (for definition of ‘near relative’ see question “What are my explicitly defined legal rights as a voter?” in our page on general voting questions) fills out and returns a Notification of Deceased Voter Form. Any near relative or primary estate representative can also accomplish the same purpose by filling out ‘voter is deceased’ information on a NCOA mailing (for more information on official mailings, see question “I received a card from my county Board of Elections, what is it and why was it sent to me?” in the general registration questions section above).
Some counties also look through local obituaries for registered voters, but that method cannot be legally used alone for removing someone from the voter registration database. Obituaries are not subject to any official, statewide, and consistent form of accuracy verification and contain limited information on the deceased, therefore they cannot serve as official notice of death. Obituaries only serve as a starting point to provide a list of people who could be dead prior to receiving official confirmation.
