The Kansas secretary of state said Tuesday overdue reports covering three years of expenditures from a federal grant for upgrading voting systems across Kansas and the correction of a $400,000 accounting error in another annual report had been submitted to a federal commission as required.

Secretary of State Scott Schwab, who took office in January, said a major discrepancy was discovered in the 2015 report outlining use of grant money sent to Kansas under the Help America Vote Act for the period of October 2014 through September 2015. In addition, expenditure reports due each Dec. 31 covering the 2016, 2017 and 2018 federal fiscal years of the grant have been submitted to the Election Assistance Commission.

Neglect of the mandate to document spending of HAVA assistance could have placed in jeopardy millions of dollars needed by Kansas to make voting safer and more accessible.

"As part of our ongoing efforts to ensure transparency in our office, we felt it was imperative to disclose this information to the public," said Schwab, who replaced fellow Republican Kris Kobach in the secretary of state's office.

In May, the federal commission notified Schwab's staff of the accounting problem in the last report filed by Kobach and gave notice the 2016, 2017 and 2018 reports required of Kansas' secretary of state hadn't been completed. The four filings by Schwab are under review by the federal commission.

It isn't clear who in the Kobach administration neglected to submit the HAVA reports, said Katie Koupal, spokeswoman for the secretary of state.

In terms of the 2015 report, Koupal said, someone mistakenly claimed the state spent about $400,000 more than was appropriated under HAVA, which wasn't the case.

The current grant cycle for HAVA allocated $4.4 million to Kansas for investment in election security. County clerks and county election officials have sought greater support for information-technology systems relied upon to prevent interference in elections, as well as additional training on voting equipment, Koupal said.

She said the new appropriation required a 5 percent match from the state, which was approved by the 2019 Legislature and would allow for distribution of the new financial aid.