Harris County Universal Services successfully finished migrating the last of 21 total voter registration and election management applications into a single portfolio for the Harris County Elections Administrator in mid-April. In time for the May 1 local elections, the consolidation will help the elections office run more efficiently.

In July 2020, the Harris County Commissioner's Court decided to combine voter registration and election management under one new department: Harris County Elections Administrator. Prior to HCEA, voter registration was managed by the Harris County Tax Office while election management was managed by the Harris County Clerk's Office. Because both offices had their own IT departments, HCEA opted to use HCUS as its IT partner.

According to Christina Linderholm, program manager for HCUS-Program Delivery & Analytics, in December HCUS began its first major project to successfully move the applications from the separate departments under one umbrella.

“It has been a great four-way collaboration between the Tax Office, Clerk’s Office, Elections Administrator and Universal Services to migrate the complex portfolios to one central support function,” Linderholm said. "The timeline was tight, but thanks to great teamwork from all the departments we were able to achieve this major milestone for the Elections Administrator before the May elections."