DOVER-FOXCROFT (AP) – The secretary of state’s office is working with municipal officials to develop a statewide centralized voter registration list with the names and registration information of every registered voter in Maine.

The list, which is scheduled to be online next January, aims to improve the accuracy and integrity of the existing system.

The new system will allow the state to cross-check its voter list with state motor vehicle records and vital records to remove the names of the deceased and avoid duplication when people move from one community to another.

“It will help to ensure cleaner, more accurate voter registration lists,” said Assistant Secretary of State Doug Dunbar.

The new system is one of several changes required of all states under the federal Help America Vote Act of 2002. The act also mandates that all polling places in 2006 have a voting device accessible to people with disabilities, including blindness.

Clerks and registrars in each community will be equipped with a computer and software to be used exclusively for the voter registration system. The majority of the cost will be federally funded, according to Dunbar.

Dover-Foxcroft Town Clerk Barbara Moore said the new voter registration system is a positive step toward ensuring more accurate voter lists statewide and eliminating duplicity.

“It should help streamline petition certifications as we will have access to online viewing of voter signatures, and I am anticipating a reduction in maintenance-type reporting and notices due to automation and technology,” Moore said. “I truly think that once this system is completely converted, it will be a tremendous benefit to voters and registrars alike.”

Patti Dubois, Bangor city clerk, said implementing the new system is a massive project involving 503 municipalities that use different types of software or maintain paper records.

For state officials “to take all those systems and processes and melt them into one system is an enormous undertaking,” she said.