Sec. 4. (a) The election division shall develop a filing and coding system consistent with the purposes of this article. The election division and each county election board shall use the filing and coding system. The coding system must provide:

(1) not more than ten (10) codes to account for various campaign expenditure items; and

(2) a clear explanation of the kinds of expenditure items that must be accounted for under each code.

     (b) The election division shall develop and use a computer system to store campaign finance reports required to be filed under IC 3-9-5-6, IC 3-9-5-10, and IC 3-9-5-20.1. The computer system must enable the election division to do the following:

(1) Identify all candidates or committees that received contributions from a contributor over the past three (3) years.

(2) Identify all contributors to a candidate or committee over the past three (3) years.

(3) Provide for electronic submission, retrieval, storage, and disclosure of campaign finance reports of candidates for the following:

(A) Legislative office.

(B) State office.

The election division shall provide training at no cost to candidates to enable candidates described in this subdivision to file campaign finance reports electronically.

     (c) The election division shall notify each candidate’s committee that the election division will provide at the committee’s request at no cost a standardized software program to permit the committee to install the software on a computer and generate an electronic version of the reports and statements required to be filed with the election division under this article. However, the election division is not required to provide or alter the software program to make the program compatible for installation or operation on a specific computer.

     (d) This subsection applies to the following committees:

(1) A committee for a candidate seeking election to a state office.

(2) A committee for a candidate seeking election to a legislative office.

(3) A political action committee that has received more than fifty thousand dollars ($50,000) in contributions since the close of the previous reporting period.

The committee must file electronically the report or statement required under this article with the election division using a standardized software program supplied to the committee without charge under subsection (c) or another format approved by the election division. An electronic filing approved by the election division under this subsection may not require manual reentry into a computer system of the data contained in the report or statement in order to make the data available to the general public under subsection (g).

     (e) This subsection applies to an electronic submission under subsection (b)(3). An electronic submission must be in a format previously approved by the election division that permits the election division to print out a hard copy of the report after the receipt of the electronic submission from the candidate. Filing of a report occurs under IC 3-5-2-24.5 on the date and at the time electronically recorded by the election division’s computer system. If a discrepancy exists between the text of the electronic submission and the printed report, the text of the printed report prevails until an amendment is filed under this article to correct the discrepancy.

     (f) The election division is not required to accept an electronic submission unless the submission complies with subsection (b)(3). Upon receiving approval from the commission, the election division may accept an electronic submission from candidates, committees, or persons described in subsection (b)(3).

     (g) The election division shall make campaign finance reports stored on the computer system under subsection (b) available to the general public through an on-line service.

[Pre-1986 Recodification Citation: 3-4-5-3.]

As added by P.L.5-1986, SEC.5. Amended by P.L.2-1996, SEC.99; P.L.4-1996, SEC.33; P.L.3-1997, SEC.186; P.L.176-1999, SEC.43; P.L.126-2002, SEC.34; P.L.45-2003, SEC.1; P.L.221-2005, SEC.19; P.L.164-2006, SEC.61; P.L.169-2015, SEC.73; P.L.91-2019, SEC.1.