Adjusts compensation schedule for Registrar of Voters. (7/1/26) (EG +$660,428 GF EX See Note)

Senate Bill 25 amends Louisiana Revised Statutes 18:55 and 18:59 to revise the compensation schedules for parish registrars of voters, their chief deputies, and confidential assistants. The bill consolidates the population-based salary classifications from five tiers to three tiers, specifically combining the former 40,001-60,000 and 60,001-100,000 ranges into a new 50,001-200,000 range, while maintaining the 0-50,000 and 200,001-1,000,000 ranges. Concurrently, the bill increases the salary amounts across all twelve experience steps within each population tier for all three positions. Additionally, the bill modifies the methodology for determining parish population by removing references to Louisiana Tech University population estimates and instead mandating reliance on the United States Bureau of the Census Federal State Cooperative Program for Population Estimates, the latest federal decennial census, or population determinations made by the parish governing authority.

Parish registrars of voters, chief deputy registrars, and confidential assistants will experience immediate salary increases upon the bill's July 1, 2026 effective date. For example, a registrar in a 0-50,000 population parish at Step 1 will see their salary increase from $57,769 to $82,811, while a registrar in the 200,001-1,000,000 population range at Step 12 will increase from $115,507 to $148,221. The consolidation of population tiers may affect how some parishes classify their registrars, potentially resulting in reclassification of certain parishes into different compensation brackets. These changes apply across all Louisiana parishes based on their respective population classifications.

The bill operates within the existing statutory framework of Louisiana Revised Statutes 18, which governs the offices and operations of parish registrars of voters. The compensation schedules have historically been tied to population estimates for purposes of establishing salary differentials based on the complexity and demands of larger versus smaller parish voter registration operations. The removal of Louisiana Tech University estimates in favor of federal census data represents a shift toward federal demographic data sources as the primary basis for population determination, though the statute preserves the authority of parish governing bodies to determine population figures in accordance with law. This change reflects the legislature's preference for standardized federal population measurement methodologies rather than state institutional estimates.