Some 60,000 newly registered voters in New York City recently received notices misleadingly stating that the primary election is in September. The mailers read:

You have recently received an Approval Notice. The date on the notice for the Primary Election was incorrect. The correct date is September 13, 2016. Polls will be open from 6 AM to 9PM. We apologize for any inconvenience.

There is a primary election on September 13th, but it is a state and local election, and the primary on everyone's mind at the moment, the presidential one, is still on April 19th. The mailer makes no mention of which primary it is referring to.

Three people whom we spoke to were also alarmed by the fact that the mailers were near their mailboxes, but not in them.

"It was weird to me in a lot of ways, but also because I had mail inside my mailbox," said Morgan, who lives in Greenpoint and asked that her last name not be used. "But this was outside of it, perched on top the mailboxes."

She wasn't the only person to raise an eyebrow at the mailer.

Received a very misleading letter from the #Nyc Board of Elections saying Primary Elections are in ... - pic.twitter.com/IEz3sZl20X — ev0 (@EvoHans) March 21, 2016

NYC: anyone else receive this? It says the NY Primary has changed to 9/13/16? fake? @BushwickBerners @NYCforBernie pic.twitter.com/NEv7QOapk8 — Hannah Guerrero (@hammyguerrero) March 15, 2016

Board of Elections executive director Michael Ryan confirmed that his agency sent out the postcards. He explained that the earlier notices recently registered voters had received listed a primary date of September 28th, which is incorrect. He was unapologetic about any confusion the mailers caused, saying that the BOE is required by law to inform new registrants of state and local primary dates, but because "there is no such requirement about the federal presidential primaries," the agency typically doesn't specify the nature of primaries in public notices.

"There is no need for a correction," he said. "We sent out the proper notice as required by law."

Asked why the agency doesn't clarify which primary it's referring to, Ryan said that an annual August mailer his office sends out covers all the election dates for the coming year, and the agency takes out full-page ads in newspapers to publicize election dates in the interim. To add election dates to the approval notice, or to specify that the September primary is for state and local offices, would further confuse matters, he said. Ryan explained that only Democrats and Republicans can vote in the presidential primary, and also that three special elections for Assembly seats are taking place on the same day.

In other words, the $110-million-a-year arm of government would have to do a more elaborate mail merge to make sure people got the right information.

"It's not just add water and stir," Ryan said. "There are a lot of moving parts to the process."

The risk of adding just a few words to include the date of the presidential primary is having people who aren't eligible to vote in it, i.e. independents, show up at the polls and confuse and delay other voters, he said. There's also the risk of angering would-be voters and internet denizens.

"People take this election of the president of the United States very personally, as well they should," he said. "Now, if they show up to vote at their polling place on election day and they're being turned away, a) they're going to be very upset, and b) you know how active the Twitter universe is: the story on election day is going to be 'The New York City Board of Elections is turning people away from poll sites.'"

Jillian Schwedler, a political science professor at Hunter College, apparently thought the mailer itself was intended to turn people away from poll sites.

Do not fall for #ElectionFraud The New York primary is April 19, not September 13 as this card says on the back pic.twitter.com/ltB7AL5Gxd — Jillian Schwedler (@DrJSchwedler) March 11, 2016

We asked Ryan: How could ordinary people be expected to parse the mailer if a professor of political science found it fishy and confusing? Ryan scolded Schwedler and those who shared her skeptical reaction.

"Often people post things on Twitter that do not comport with reality, and I would hope that a professor of political science would endeavor to be more educated and less reactionary than this particular professor has shown in this particular circumstance," he said. "Our phone number is listed right on the mailer. If there’s any source of confusion, someone can pick up the phone and get an answer right away. You can bother to educate yourself."

(After this story was published, Schedler wrote that she called the BOE upon receiving the card, but no one picked up.)

Ryan encouraged voters to visit New York's Poll Site Locator website, and said that the Board's website is in the process of a redesign to make it less "utilitarian" and "more user-friendly." Currently, finding election dates on the site is less than intuitive (particularly when compared to the state Board of Elections' site).

As for the suspicion, among the people we talked to and others who have written about the mailer online, that the note was intended to keep people from the polls for the presidential primary, Ryan rejected it in emphatic terms.

I find it the height of irresponsibility to use inflammatory language without facts. I can state unequivocally that the Board of Elections has been successfully putting on elections in New York City since its inception. I was a commissioner back in 2010, [and] since I’ve been associated with the Board of Elections there has never been one scintilla of evidence that there are people attempting to put their thumb on the scale one way or the other.

What about our report documenting numerous attempts at allegedly orchestrated voter fraud in southern Williamsburg throughout the day during the 2013 primary?

"I respectfully yet forcefully disagree with the characterization that there was widespread voter fraud in 2013," Ryan said. "We run a clean operation here. We have procedures in place."

Ryan explained that if fraud is suspected, the BOE hands off the information to the appropriate law enforcement agencies to investigate. He said that, to his knowledge, there was no investigation of the 2013 fraud reports.

If anything, Ryan said that he regrets the primary date error on the initial forms. "Perhaps if that had not happened, we wouldn't be having this conversation," he said.