Regarding your double barreled question (i.e., two different questions) Terri: In my opinion, it should be no to the former question since it is too easily open to potential abuse as well as voting fraud as well as can be very confusing to some voters depending on what information is or is not provided to them by the parties involved (not to mention being a major conflict of interest for them); and, yes, along with possibly other protections and safe guards needing to be built in as well as, to the latter.
 

Let's do everything we can to make it easy to vote. There is are still security checks when the ballot is mailed in, so what's the harm of making it easy to request one?
 

I favor get out the vote efforts coupled with voter education. I believe democracy works better when more citizens vote. However, I believe the current system needs better controls.

Although both abuse and error are possible, I believe honest mistakes over the phone are the bigger danger. Here's why:

Volunteers make the phone calls. They are trained in the requirements, such as, "You must speak directly to the voter, not to a relative in the same household."

However, there is little testing of volunteers or monitoring of their phone calls to verify that they understand what they should do and do it properly. Confusion is easy if there are two people with the same name of voting age at the same address, for example junior and senior.

Some voters may not remember that, if they change their minds, they must surrender the blank ballot at the polling place before being allowed to vote in person. If they lose the absentee ballot, they lose the right to vote.

I think it would be better if the volunteers sent voters a postcard addressed to the voter's town clerk, along with printed rules. Voters can then reinforce the telephone information they heard by reading the rules. If they decide absentee voting is for them, they can sign the postcard and mail it to the town clerk to request a ballot by mail.

There's no perfect system, but this would mitigate the risk of poorly understood telephone conversations. The purpose of early voting is to increase turnout, not to open more votes to challenges or cost people their franchise.