Election Reform Daily News Thread for March 24, 2006

[FogerRox]

Welcome to the "ERD"

Please post Election Reform, Fraud, & Related News on this thread.




1. Post stories and announcements you find on the web.

2. Post stories using the "Election Fraud and Reform News Sources" listed here:
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=203x397093

3. Re-post stories and announcements you find on DU, providing a link to the original thread with thanks to the Original Poster, too.

4. Start a discussion thread by re-posting a story you see on this thread.


If you want to know how post "News Banners" or other images, go here:
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=203&topic_id=371233#371391

for MAC users-- IIRC its hold down control- and click on the image to view its source.

[rumpel]

1. IN: Voter registration test limping to conclusion

Kevin Rader/Eyewitness News

Indianapolis, March 23 - Indiana's week long test of it's first ever voter registration system will come to an end on Friday. Marion County is one of a majority of the state's counties participating.

A worker describes how the system is supposed to work. "I'm looking up this person to see if they are a registered voter in Indiana...If they are, it should come up. And if they are not, then I will add the voter."

That sounds easy enough, but Kyle Walker, GOP member of the election board, says the new system has experienced some technical glitches.

"There would be no reason to do a mock election if you weren't going to learn anything from it."

But Democrat Joel Miller says the update designed to comply with federal law compromises other areas.

"We seem to have sputtered through the test. We joke in the office that we feel like we've taken a step backwards. What took us a year ago less than one minute to process now takes us three and a half to five minutes."

http://www.wthr.com/Global/story.asp?S=4676136&nav=9Tai

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4. IN: State working out voter registration kinks

March 24, 2006

Test of new system is nearly complete, but Democrat says there are still problems

By Bill Ruthhart
[email protected]
Officials will wrap up a test for Indiana's new statewide voter registration system today.


How well the system worked depends on whom you ask.
The company that administers the program, Secretary of State Todd Rokita and the Republican representative on Marion County's Board of Voter Registration said they have confidence that the new system will perform well for the May 2 primary.
But after the system crashed March 17 and presented some snags earlier this week, the Democratic member of the board said he still has concerns.
The new system is mandated under the Help America Vote Act of 2002. Voting officials in 84 counties across Indiana signed up to take part in a mock election.
Much of the test already has been completed, with a few post-election details to be simulated today.
On Thursday, counties across the state simulated Election Day activities, looking up thousands of voter entries in the new system. Statewide, 9,394 of those searches were conducted, and only 16 were problematic, according to the secretary of state's office.
While Thursday's searches went smoothly, a hardware upgrade to the new system March 17 caused it to crash. Officials with Quest Information Systems, which created the Indiana system, said they don't anticipate that happening again because they wouldn't upgrade the system right before an election.
Joel Miller, the Democrat on the Board of Voter Registration, said that while looking up registrations went smoothly Thursday, entering new ones into the system earlier this week presented problems. Miller said entering the registrations took too long -- three to five minutes for some voters, when that process used to take one minute.
Sarah Taylor, a former Marion County clerk and representative with Quest, said the test did exactly what it was intended to do -- help election officials iron out problems.
But Miller says there's too many of them.

http://www.indystar.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20060324/NEWS01/603240457

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2. PA: Bradford County now looking at switching its choice for voting machine

The Daily & Sunday Review, Towanda PA

By: James Loewenstein 03/24/2006


TOWANDA -- Bradford County might not end up with its first-choice model for its new voting machines.

The county might cancel its contract to purchase 165 WINvote touch-screen voting machines from Advanced Voting Solutions Inc. and instead purchase the same number of voting machines from Diebold Election Systems of McKinney, Texas, Bradford County Elections Director Marie Zbyszinski said.
The WINvote machine was the county's first choice, and Diebold's AccuVote-TS model, which the county is now looking at purchasing, was its second choice, she said.
Advanced Voting Solutions said earlier this week that it cannot guarantee that any of the WINvote voting machines would arrive in Bradford County by the May 16 primary, which would cause the county to be out of compliance with the federal Help America Vote Act (HAVA), said Nancy Schrader, chairman of the Bradford County commissioners.
If the county has none of the voting machines in place by the May 16 primary, it might have to forfeit the $567,000 state grant that has been awarded to Bradford County to purchase new voting machines, Schrader said.
"There's a pretty good potential that we would lose the $567,000" if none of the WINvote machines were in place by the May primary, Zbyszinski said.
If none of the WINvote machines arrive, causing the county to be in non-compliance with HAVA, the county would also risk being sued by the U.S. Department of Justice, Schrader said.
There is only a small difference between the WINvote machine and the Diebold AccuVote-TS voting machine, which the county is now looking at purchasing, Zbyszinski said.
The Diebold AccuVote-TS machine is also a touch-screen voting machine, she said.
"We're in negotiations at this point" on possibly purchasing 165 Diebold AccuVote-TS machines for Bradford County, she said.
"We're hoping to finalize those negotiations tomorrow" and purchase the machines from Diebold, she said on Thursday afternoon.
Like the WINvote machine, the Diebold AccuVote-TS machine complies with HAVA and has been certified by the state, she said.

http://www.thedailyreview.com/site/news.cfm?newsid=16365027&BRD=2276&PAG=461&dept_id=465049&rfi=6

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14. PA: County executive urges use of old voting machines

Deadline too tight. Federally mandated machines likely won't arrive in time.
Friday, March 24, 206
By PETER HALL
The Express-Times
EASTON | Willing to risk $1.5 million in federal funding to ensure a fair election, Northampton County Executive John Stoffa said he favors the use of the county's old voting machines in the May 16 primary.

Advanced Voting Solutions, of Frisco, Texas, has told county officials they can't guarantee new voting machines, required by federal law, will be delivered in time. And although the company says it is continuing efforts to deliver them, Stoffa said the county has to make a decision.

"At this late stage, if we were to get the electronic machines, the time to train, become familiar with these new machines, I don't think we have the time to do this," he said Thursday.

The county's options are to seek another supplier or use the old machines. In either case the county will run afoul of a federal law intended to prevent polling problems like those that plagued Florida in the 2000 presidential election.

The federal Help America Vote Act requires counties across the nation to have non-mechanical voting machines accessible to the disabled in place for the first federal election of 2006. That means Northampton County must replace its old lever-style voting machines.

http://www.nj.com/news/expresstimes/pa/index.ssf?/base/news-5/1143177313229540.xml&coll=2

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3. UT: Rolly: A real shock for voters?

Salt Lake Tribune

Article Last Updated: 03/24/2006 1:49 AM MST

Rolly: A real shock for voters?
By Paul Rolly
Tribune Columnist

A national voting rights group claims the touch screen voting system Utah purchased for about $27 million has serious flaws and is vulnerable to voter fraud by easy manipulation of the software.
The preliminary report, placed last week on the Web site of Black Box Voting, a nonprofit organization devoted to ensuring fair and impartial elections, was based on tests performed recently by software scientists that Black Box brought to Utah at the request of Emery County Clerk Bruce Funk.
Funk has been questioning the system of Diebold Election Systems for about a year. But he has been a lone voice in Utah and has operated outside legal bounds, according to Utah Lt. Gov. Gary Herbert, who reiterated his confidence in the Diebold system.
According to Black Box, the tests found that the electrical socket easily falls out of the voting machine, exposing live wires and raising the possibility of voters getting shocked. The scientists also found "security holes" in the system, which could lead to software manipulation to change the outcome of voting, and some voting machines had less memory than others, leading to speculation that some of the machines purchased as new were actually used.
"It would be like buying a new car that actually had 100,000 miles on it," said Funk.

http://www.sltrib.com/utah/ci_3634490

[mod mom]

5. OH: Blackwell Refuses to Debate

Why discuss issues when you count your own vote?:

Blackwell refuses to debate, says focus is on GOP voters
Friday, March 24, 2006
Joe Hallett
THE COLUMBUS DISPATCH


Ohioans apparently will see no public debates before the May 2 primary election in the hotly contested Republican race for governor.

Secretary of State J. Kenneth Blackwell has declined several invitations to debate his GOP rival, Attorney General Jim Petro, including one extended by three newspapers.

Public television stations across the state were set to air an April 10 debate between Blackwell and Petro sponsored by The Dispatch, The (Cleveland) Plain Dealer and the Dayton Daily News. Petro accepted in writing March 3, but Blackwell’s campaign notified the sponsors Wednesday that he would not participate.

Carlo LoParo, Blackwell’s campaign spokesman, said the campaign has turned down several debate requests from nonpartisan organizations, including the City Club of Cleveland, because Blackwell is concentrating on conveying his message to GOP voters rather than the broader electorate.



http://www.ohioelects.com/?story=dispatch/2006/03/24/20060324-E5-02.html

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6. CA: Politicians bid to alter state initiative process

Insidebayarea


Article Last Updated: 03/24/2006 3:15 AM PST
Bipartisan reform package to hit Legislature
By Steve Geissinger, SACRAMENTO BUREAU

SACRAMENTO — California's top election official Thursday said he has a remedy for voters who say they are sick of being propositioned endlessly by everyone from governors to masked interests, using everything from twisted advertisements to flurries of fliers.
Secretary of State Bruce McPherson and lawmakers, backed by the League of Women Voters, pitched a bipartisan package of initiative revamp bills that would even let the Legislature just adopt a proposition, avoiding a nasty, costly campaign.
McPherson said at a Capitol news conference that the legislation would "provide greater access for all Californians,strengthen the integrity of the initiative process and result in less reliance on special-interest money."
There was immediate reaction on the emotionally charged and politically sensitive topic of altering the legacy of Hiram Johnson — the governor credited with breaking Southern Pacific's grip on California a century ago with direct democracy initiatives.
Responding to McPherson, state Sen. Debra Bowen, D-Redondo Beach, issued a statement calling his legislation "significantly weaker" than her own.
The myriad issues surrounding California's freewheeling initiative process have been studied for decades by everyone from think tanks to pollsters. It has yielded many calls for major overhauls that have resulted in a few tweaks.
But lawmakers said Thursday that in the wake of the gubernatorial recall of 2003 and Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's subsequent special elections, this might be the year for change.
McPherson's package of bills was authored by Assemblyman Joe Nation, D-San Rafael; Assemblywoman Noreen Evans, D-Santa Rosa; and Sen. Bob Margett, R-Arcadia.

http://www.insidebayarea.com/dailyreview/localnews/ci_3635153

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19. CA: Touchscreen election system expected soon (Mendocino)

The Ukiah Daily Journal
Mendocino County's Local Newspaper

Article Last Updated: Friday, March 24, 2006 - 8:58:24 AM PST

By SETH FREEDLAND/The Daily Journal
With only a week left before Mendocino County expects to receive 50 electronic voting machines -- and with only three already here -- County Clerk-Recorder Marsha Wharff isn't too worried.

Despite assurances from the state that the touchscreen equipment would arrive by the end of March, Wharff is taking a "no news is good news" view of the quickly approaching deadline.

"We might not get all that we ordered," Wharff said. "But I haven't heard of any delay."

The three machines in the county arrived early so staff could learn to operate them before the June election. Wharff recently returned from training sessions and is in the process of testing and programming the e-voting devices.

http://www.ukiahdailyjournal.com/Stories/0,1413,91~3089~3275321,00.html

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7. MD: Nonresident voting rights measure has tough time before committee

Scott King
Staff Writer
Fredrick County Delegate Galen Clagett’s bill to give voting rights to Ocean City’s nonresident property owners appeared headed for trouble Wednesday, as his testimony in support of HB 1508 seemed more off-the-cuff than factual.
Testifying before the House Ways and Means Committee in Annapolis, Clagett asserted that the average Ocean City tax bill increased by 300 percent in the past year and therefore nonresident property owners deserved a voice in the local governmental process.

As could be seen in the livid expressions on the faces of Ocean City officials, who weren’t allowed to give oral testimony, Clagett’s declaration was far off the mark.

Ocean City’s tax statistics show that assessments increased on average by 20 percent a year over the last three years, for a 60 percent average gain for the period. What’s more, these are assessments, or what state assessors say a property is worth, not taxes.

“Assessments and taxes are different,” Ocean City Council President Rick Meehan said after the hearing. “Assessments mean nothing until we set the tax rate and we haven’t done that yet.”

Clagett’s bill does not mention Ocean City specifically, but would require any municipality in the state with more than 75 percent of its property owned by nonresidents to give those nonresidents the right to vote and run for office in municipal elections. Still, the only municipality it would affect is Ocean City.

Because the bill was submitted so late in the legislative session, Clagett was the only person allowed to speak at the bill’s first hearing. Ocean City officials did submit written testimony.

Clagett went on to say that more than 91 percent of Ocean City is owned by nonresidents, while research by the city and the General Assembly’s legal counsel has found that 76.69 percent of property owners are nonresidents.

Also in dispute is whether the measure is even constitutional. City Solicitor Guy Ayres cited case law in his written testimony arguing that it is not. Clagett insisted that it is and said he had done research and had consulted with legal counsel before drafting it. But when asked by committee members to present documents with a supporting legal opinion, Clagett replied that he had none.

http://www.oceancity.md/octoday/headline.cfm?PubID=3378

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8. Sections of the Voting Rights Act Will Soon Need Reauthorization

March 24, 2006

David Melmer
Indian Country Today

The Voting Rights Act, enacted in 1965, will celebrate its 41st anniversary on Aug. 7; yet some provisions of the act, which supporters argue have brought American Indians into the political arena, are due to expire in 2007.

American Indian and non-Indian organizations are in the midst of compiling and reporting research that shows the VRA - with some permanent provisions and some temporary - has made a difference to many minorities and furthers the argument that the VRA is still needed in its entirety.

Section 5 of the act, renewed several times, requires nine states and portion of seven states to submit changes that affect voting in any way to the U.S. Department of Justice for approval, or pre-clearance, as it is referred. That section is due to expire in 2007. Section 5 was last renewed by Congress for a term of 25 years, and that is the recommendation again.

Section 203, which requires assistance for limited-English speakers at the polls, and Sections 6 - 9, which authorize the federal government to monitor elections, are all set to expire.

The American Civil Liberties Union submitted a comprehensive report on how the VRA affects Indian country. The states that benefited the most from the VRA were Montana, Nebraska, Wyoming, Colorado and South Dakota. In each state, litigation or the threat of litigation mitigated state voting legislation that would have adversely impacted American Indian residents.

''By tearing down the barriers to equal opportunity for racial and language minorities in voting, the Act removed the political mechanism that was essential to maintaining the legal structure of segregation. As the Supreme Court has said, the equal right to vote is fundamental because it is preservative of all rights,'' the report stated.

http://www.civilrights.org/issues/voting/details.cfm?id=41607

[Algorem]

9. Kerry to visit crime scene

http://www.cleveland.com/weblogs/openers/index.ssf?/mtlogs/cleve_openers/archives/2006_03.html#124334


It’s that time of year when colleges jockey to line up big-names to give their commencement addresses. On the political front, Kenyon College has landed the most prominent so far: former Democratic presidential candidate and Massachusetts Senator John Kerry. He speaks May 20.

The senior class invited Kerry to speak as a way of highlighting problems students faced on Election Day in the village of Gambier. Their experience made national news because some students had to wait nine hours to cast their ballots. The polls in Gambier didn't close until nearly 4:00 a.m., making the village community center the last voting precinct in the Eastern time zone to shut its doors.

--Mark Naymik






http://blog.thedemocraticdaily.com/?p=1966

http://www.kenyon.edu/x30859.xml

http://kenyondemocrats.blogspot.com/

http://www.kenyoncollegian.com/media/paper821/news/2006/03/02/News/Serendipity.Brings.Kerry.To.Kenyon-1652855.shtml?norewrite200603241219&sourcedomain=www.kenyoncollegian.com

http://kerry.senate.gov/v3/cfm/record.cfm?id=251697






Sen. Kerry comes calling

By Tony Cook
Post staff reporter

http://news.cincypost.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20060314/NEWS01/603140353


U.S. Sen. John Kerry stopped in Cincinnati Monday for the first time since southwest Ohio helped swing the election for President Bush in 2004.

Kerry denied that his first trip to the battleground state might be related to another run for president in 2008, but refused to rule out the possibility.

"It's way too early" to decide, the Massachusetts Democrat said.

He initiated the trip to meet with supporters and his Cincinnati steering committee from the 2004 election, said spokeswoman April Boyd...

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10. LA: Sen. Jay Dardenne seeks secretary of state position

By MARSHA SHULER
Capitol news bureau
Published: Mar 24, 2006

Veteran Baton Rouge state Sen. Jay Dardenne entered the race for secretary of state Thursday, stressing his “proven integrity” and a legislative background that he said would prepare him to be Louisiana’s top elections official.

As Dardenne jumped in the race, the campaign of former state Republican Party chairman Mike Francis announced his endorsement by former Republican Govs. Mike Foster and Buddy Roemer.

Dardenne, 52, became the second Republican to announce his candidacy in this fall’s special election for the job held by the late Secretary of State Fox McKeithen. McKeithen, a Republican, died in July as a result of complications from a fall that left him paralyzed.

“I believe there is no greater freedom in America than the right to vote. As the next secretary of state. I promise I will always safeguard that right for everyone,” Dardenne said.

About two dozen relatives and supporters surrounded Dardenne during a midmorning news conference in front of the Baton Rouge Center for Visual & Performing Arts — the former Walnut Hills Elementary school, which Dardenne attended as a child and where he first voted at age 18.

Dardenne pointed to his experience on a legislative committee charged with elections oversight and “working closely” with McKeithen and now interim Secretary of State Al Ater.

Dardenne said the secretary of state’s job is “a very undervalued position,” noting it is the third-highest ranking position in state government with important functions — the chief one preservation of fair and honest elections.

http://www.2theadvocate.com/news/politics/2516726.html

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11. TN: County approves new voting machines

The Dickson Herald

Friday, 03/24/06

By Patricia Lynch Kimbro
The Dickson Herald

CHARLOTTE — The Dickson County Commission unanimously approved the purchase Monday night of new voting machines for the August general election.

Dickson County Administrator of Elections Luanne Greer said she would now send the contract to the state for approval of 54 machines, which will be purchased with a $212,500 state grant.

The machines for the county’s 18 precincts will include those that meet the new federal guidelines of the Help America Vote Act of 2002 for handicapped voters.

The machines will make it easier for the deaf, blind and other disabled voters to cast their ballots, officials said.

Greer said she did not know how long it would take the state to approve the contract because it also has to approve contracts for each county in the state.

After the state approves the contract, the order will be sent to the company. It can take up to 30 days for shipment, she said.

Greer said she now has two demos of the machines, which are called eSlate devices, and she will be setting a schedule for voters to view and try out the machines. The announcement of that schedule will come at a later date.

http://www.dicksonherald.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20060324/MTCN0201/303240054/1298/MTCN02

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12. CA: New CA Lawsuit Against Diebold's Electronic Voting Machines (not new

for DU'ers)

Government Technology

March 24, 2006 By Kim Alexander
Reprinted from Kim Alexander's Weblog.

On Tuesday, the nonprofit group Voter Action filed a lawsuit against California's Secretary of State Bruce McPherson as well as eighteen counties for certifying and using voting equipment made by Diebold. The lead attorney on the lawsuit is Lowell Finley, who previously brought a successful case against Diebold on behalf of Bev Harris and Jim March of Black Box Voting. That case was joined by California Attorney General Bill Lockyer and Alameda County, and settled out of court for $2.6 million. (See my November 11, 2004 blog entry for details on the settlement).


Given Mr. Finley's track record, it's worthwhile to pay attention to his claims, which include that the equipment in question, the Diebold TSX electronic voting machine (with voter-verified paper audit trail printer) does not adequately meet the needs of disabled voters, nor does it meet the current, 2002 federal voting system standards, which prohibit the use of interpreted code in voting equipment software.

Other compelling claims include one that the voter-verified paper record produced by the the TSx cannot fulfill the demands of California's one percent manual count law, which is designed to publicly verify the accuracy of software vote counts, and another that counties are circumventing the one percent rule by omitting absentee and early-voting ballots in the manual count. Voter Action has provided the legal documents filed today on its web site. See this AP story by David Kravets for more details.

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13. Link to voteraction lawsuit docs page:

http://www.voteraction.org/States/California/CA_legal.html

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18. CA: Registrar: Grand Jury Report Unfounded

Gilroy Dispatch

Friday, March 24, 2006
By Matt King

Gilroy - The major findings and recommendations of a civil grand jury report on county voting procedures are unfounded and impractical, Santa Clara County Registrar Jesse Durazo said Thursday.

The report, released Wednesday, urges Durazo and county supervisors to lobby state and federal legislators for new laws making it harder for non-citizens to vote and to play a larger role in special tax assessment elections. But Durazo said there was no evidence that non-citizen voting is a problem in the county and that the special elections, known as Proposition 218 elections, should not be in the registrar's purview.

"I have heard no report of that nature," Durazo said of non-citizen voting. "There is no empirical data to support that. When people sign , they do so under perjury, under oath. They're supposed to be truthful when they sign that and that's the way our society works."

Prop. 218 was a 1996 voter initiative that makes it harder to raise taxes through elections. A Prop. 218 election is when a special district, such as the county vector control department, holds a mail-ballot election to raise property taxes to fund operations. The ballots are sent only to property owners and votes are weighted according to the assessed value of property. The more a property is worth, the more weight the owner's vote carries.

Such elections are typically managed by consultants. The grand jury report recommends that the registrar's office either manage the elections or act as a "center of competency" to help ensure the elections are properly executed. Durazo said his office should not be involved with Prop. 218 elections because they don't adhere to the principle of one vote for each citizen.

"Their database is totally different than mine," Durazo said. "I want the whole world to know that only one vote is counted. We have one election with all registered voters and only one vote counts."

http://www.gilroydispatch.com/news/contentview.asp?c=182121

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15. OH: Voting machines need room

Friday, March 24, 2006
— Time: 1:33:33 AM EST

By Kendall S. Cable, [email protected]

The Seneca County Board of Commissioners may be closer to making a decision on where the new voting machines are to be housed.

After several discussions to move the new voting machines under Hoperoy's Hallmark Shoppe and into the commissioner's building, the commissioners are toying with the idea to move the machines into the basement of the Community Services Building, but beside the Seneca County General Health District's conference room. This area is located beneath the Seneca County Board of Elections Office.
"We are modifying the one that is currently storage for public defenders' records since we no longer have a Public Defenders Office," Seneca County Commissioner Ben Nutter said. "We still have to keep those records. But I think that we are going to move things around a little bit and keep that room and put all of that equipment in there so they have ready access to it and we can easily transport it to all of the places."

Seneca County Commissioner Joseph Schock said judges have to be consulted on the matter prior to the move.

Janet Leahy, executive director of the board, requested $3,000 be moved from a precinct salary line into an employee account to pay for two employees to increase their hours by five each.

Leahy said new state directives, work created by the new machines and absentee ballot changes, make it necessary for the employees' hours to be increased.

"So these new voting machines did not make our process easier, they made it more complicated and more expensive?" Nutter asked.

"It is easier for the voter," Mitch Larson of Tri-Governmental Systems said. "Because of the new federal law - HAVA (Help America Vote Act)- it required that we no longer do punch card ballots and that by the first primary in 2006 that we do away with the punch card."

http://www.advertiser-tribune.com/news/story/0324202006_new01voting0324.asp

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16. PA: Carbon makes switch for voting machines

The Morning Call Online
March 24, 2006

Contractor is replaced to assure new devices for May 16 primary.
By Bob Laylo
Of The Morning Call

Carbon County commissioners on Thursday voided a contract with a company that could not guarantee delivery of touch-screen voting machines for the May 16 primary election and ordered them from another company that promises to have them on time.

The commissioners voted unanimously to buy the machines from Diebold of McKinney, Texas, for $406,000. Carbon expects to get about $470,000 in federal grants to pay for the machines.

''I believe it is time to move in a different direction,'' commissioners Chairman William O'Gurek said.

The county was concerned that if the touch-screen machines from the company it originally planned to buy from, Advanced Voting Solutions, were unavailable and the county was not in compliance with the Help America Vote Act, it would lose the federal grant money.

The Help America Vote Act banned lever machines and requires systems that meet the law's standards to be in place for the primary election.

Election Director Kenneth Leffler said Advanced Voting Solutions suggested that Carbon use Diebold if the county wanted guaranteed delivery. Diebold also is supplying machines to Lehigh and Schuylkill counties.

Leffler said the county is hoping Diebold delivers the 115 machines by the third week in April.

Carbon was among 10 counties across the state, including Northampton, that planned to buy from Advanced Voting Solutions. Northampton Chief Registrar Deborah DePaul said she and county officials are still deciding what to do.

http://www.mcall.com/news/local/poconos/all-b1_1carbonmar24,0,4079620.story?coll=all-newslocalpoconos-hed

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17. PA: Vendor reneges on promise to fill voting-machine order

LD News, Lebanon PA

By JOHN LATIMER
Staff Writer
Lebanon Daily News

A company hired to supply 267 electronic voting machines to the county by May’s primary election now says it will deliver less than half that amount.
This is the second time in two months a voting-machine company has not been able to deliver what the Lebanon County commissioners thought it had promised.

In January, the commissioners approved the purchase of 267 iVotronic touch-screen voting machines at a cost of $2,700 each from Nebraska-based Election Systems and Software.

The county was among the first in Pennsylvania to place an order with ES&S and were told the machines would be delivered on a first-come, first-served basis.

That promise was crucial to the commissioners’ decision to go with ES&S, Commissioner Jo Ellen Litz said yesterday, because the electronic machines must be in place by the primary to comply with the federal Help America Vote Act of 2002. The act, passed in the wake of Florida’s hanging-chad debacle of 2000, mandates that all punch-card and lever-voting machines — like those the county has used for the past 50 years — be replaced with electronic machines.

The commissioners were anxious to strike a deal with ES&S because they had already been burned by AccuPoll, the company they had contracted with in December that unexpectedly backed out of the deal.

http://www.ldnews.com/news/ci_3636309

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20. NY: State told to act on vote devices

Buffalo News

By MARC HUMBERT
Associated Press
3/24/2006

ALBANY - A federal judge on Thursday ordered New York to come up with a plan by April 10 to comply with provisions of the Help America Vote Act requiring new voting machines the disabled can use this fall.
New York, which has lagged behind all other states in complying with the act adopted after the disputed 2000 presidential election, was sued March 1 by the U.S. Justice Department. It was the first such lawsuit filed by the federal government against a state over non-HAVA compliance.

Thursday's order, from U.S. District Judge Gary Sharpe, also requires the state to show him a plan to ensure a centralized, statewide voter registration system.

Lee Daghlian, a spokesman for the state Board of Elections, said the plan to be presented to the judge likely will be an updated version of one the board had been working on with Justice Department officials when the lawsuit was filed.

The judge refused to allow several interest groups, including the state League of Women Voters, to intervene in the case. They are worried the state will be forced to move too quickly and be stuck with new voting machines that aren't satisfactory over the long term.

Under HAVA, state officials are looking to replace all of New York's approximately 20,000 lever-action voting machines with high-tech devices. But the state board has said it is not feasible to have new machinery in place everywhere until the 2007 elections.

[Bill Bored]

42. Yo! Yiz can discuss hea:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=203x418507

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21. On IL in UK: Sequoia / Smartmatic e-voting fiasco in Chicago

By Aleksander Boyd
London 24.03.06 | Somewhat I feel vindicated. In August last year I posted an extremely thorough piece of investigative blogging regarding Smartmatic; the e-voting machines vendor, which owns Sequoia, that has proven so useful to Venezuela's wannabe dictator Hugo Chavez. The recent e-voting fiasco in Chicago comes to prove the hypothesis that one thing is to observe how rigged electoral processes in far away lands, which do not affect Americans, are overlooked, or simply ignored, by the mainstream media and an entirely different matter when similar problems corrode the transparency and outcome of elections in US soil.

As readers of this site know, Sequoia was acquired by Smartmatic in 2005:

Sequoia Voting Systems was the e-voting branch of De La Rue PLC, the "world 's largest commercial security printer and papermaker" (sic) <7>. De La Rue's 2005 preliminary statement reports the sale to Smartmatic thusly:

"following the strategic review in December 2004, we announced our intention to exit the business (added: of voting systems) by the year end and this was done through the sale of the business to Smartmatic Corporation, a US based device networking and election systems company. The business had revenues of £23.1m (2003/2004 : £44.2m) and made an operating loss of £0.2m in the year (2003/2004 : £(1.9)m)" <8, page 8>.

It now seems, as reported by the Chicago Tribune, that Cook County and Chicago Board of Election officials will withheld payments to Sequoia due to its appalling performance, saying that the company "did not perform adequately." What a wonderful development, isn't it? Of course it did not perform adequately, what were these people in Chicago expecting, transparency, performance, from a company linked to Hugo Chavez? Just like Venezuelan elections conducted with Smartmatic machines, it never had "performed adequately" it never will. That is precisely the point. Furthermore, European and OAS electoral observers witnessed how utterly unreliable those machines are, as demonstrated in Venezuela on November 23 2005 by Leopoldo Gonzalez.

http://www.vcrisis.com/index.php?content=letters/200603240714

[rumpel]

22. IL: Voting-system maker blasted

Chicago Tribune

County, city might withhold payments over count problems

By John McCormick and David Kidwell, Tribune staff reporters. Tribune staff reporters Mickey Ciokajlo and Josh Noel contributed to this report
Published March 24, 2006

With ballot counting not expected to be done in Cook County until this weekend, election officials said Thursday they may withhold payments to Sequoia Voting Systems until the equipment manufacturer has fixed any problems.

Election officials have acknowledged a lack of training for election judges facing the daunting task of using a new and complex system in Tuesday's primary. But they increased their public criticism of Sequoia, saying it "did not perform adequately."

Scott Burnham, a spokesman for Cook County Clerk David Orr, said the county has paid California-based Sequoia about $7.8 million so far. "We will not make additional payments until we are satisfied with the system," he said.

"There will be contract ramifications from their performance," said Langdon Neal, chairman of the Chicago Board of Election Commissioners, noting that about $15 million of the city's portion of the Sequoia contract remains unpaid.As the counting continues, the lack of final totals has left several area communities uncertain about referendum outcomes for libraries and other projects. With 96 percent in, a tight race also remains for the Republican nomination in the 15th District for the Cook County Board between Carl Hansen and Timothy Schneider.

Chicago commissioners in June approved a contract worth about $28 million for a dual voting system that includes optical scanners for paper ballots and touch-screen voting machines. A few days earlier, Orr had recommended Sequoia for a county contract worth $23.8 million.

As the election board prepares for November's general election, when there will be a much heavier turnout, Neal said "immediate steps" are needed to resolve the problems, including the hiring of an independent expert to review Sequoia's software and hardware.

http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/local/west/chi-0603240240mar24,1,858735.story?coll=chi-newslocalwest-hed

[rumpel]

23. TX: State asked to investigate Ector County Commissioner race (wow)

ODESSA, Texas The Ector County elections administrator has asked the state to investigate possible voting irregularities during the West Texas county's March primary.

County Elections Administrator Robert Mendoza says the questions center on the race for Precinct Four county commissioner.
He's concerned about mail-in ballots from the precinct bearing no signatures from those who helped fill out the ballot. Other ballots bore similar handwriting or similar marks, while some envelopes bore identical postage.
The Texas Secretary of State's office sent a letter to Attorney General Greg Abbott's office to request an investigation. A spokesman for the attorney general says the office doesn't publicly acknowledge investigations.
Precinct Four County Commissioner Bob Bryant, who wasn't seeking re-election, challenged the returns in the election to replace him, saying mail-in ballots were missing.

http://www.team4news.com/Global/story.asp?S=4677845&nav=0w0v

[rumpel]

24. Belarus: Twenty-two independent journalists rounded up in post-election

crack-down

Reporters Without Borders

24 March 2006

Reporters Without Borders said it was appalled at an unprecedented crackdown against independent journalists after the overnight arrest of nine more, bringing to 22 the number rounded up since the start of the week, 13 of whom are still in prison.

Five days after the contested re-election of President Alexander Lukashenko the nine journalists were arrested on 23-24 March and detained at an unknown location.

The crackdown intensified overnight on 23-24 March, during which anti-riot police arrested hundreds of opposition demonstrators.

“These arrests are intended to gag dissent and to sow a climate of terror in the country. The independent journalists should be immediately released,” said Reporters Without Borders, calling on representatives of foreign countries in Belarus and on neighbouring countries to intervene on behalf of the jailed journalists.

Among the nine journalists arrested are four members of the Belarus Association of Journalists (BAJ), a partner organisation of Reporters Without Borders. Freelance Vadim Kaznacheyeu, Tatsiana Snitko and Artsiom Liava, respectively freelance correspondent and photographer on Nasha Niva, as well as Tatiana Vanina, were arrested at 3am and taken to an unknown place of detention.

Also picked up were non-accredited Canadian freelance, Frederic Levoi, Andrey Rasinski, of the weekly Nasha Niva, Nino Giorgabiani and Georgiy Lagidze, of the Georgian public broadcast group OGT and Alexander Podrabinek, of the Russian news agency Prima-News.

Thirteen other journalists remain behind bars, most of them sentenced to several days in prison for alleged “hooliganism”, “taking part in an unauthorised gathering” or for “offering obscenities”.

http://www.rsf.org/article.php3?id_article=16849

[rumpel]

25. AR: Election panel member resigns

The Baxter Bulletin

CHANDRA HUSTON
Bulletin Staff Writer

The Baxter County Election Commission is in need of a new member.

Nancy Reed has resigned from the three-member commission citing lack of time to devote to the commission.

"Due to serious time constraints, it is with regret that I must resign my position on the Baxter County Election Commission," she said in her resignation letter.

Reed's resignation was effective Wednesday. Her replacement will be chosen by the Arkansas Election Commission.

Commission Chairman Bob Bodenhamer said candidates' names will be sent to the state soon. He said he expects to have the vacancy filled in one month.

The commission is gearing up for an election season with new voting machines.

"When the voters get used to them, I think they'll like them," Bodenhamer said of the electronic voting machines.

He said more training and equipment is needed to get everything in order before voting begins.

The commission is planning a mock election so voters can get used to the machines. No dates have been set for the mock election.

"There will probably be some glitches," Bodenhamer said. "We just hope the public will have patience with us."

[email protected]


Originally published March 24, 2006
http://www.baxterbulletin.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20060324/NEWS01/603240313/1002

[rumpel]

26. FL:Voting Reform Editorial

Sun Sentinel

South Florida Sun-Sentinel Editorial Board
Posted March 24 2006

ISSUE: Touch-screen machines perform well, but talk of a paper trail still persists.

It's funny how some politicians sing a different tune once they move from candidate to public official and become part of the establishment they so freely criticized on the campaign trail.

Arthur Anderson is a good example. It took him all of five minutes to start back-pedaling on promises for a paper trail after he ousted longtime Palm Beach County Elections Supervisor Theresa LePore.

Anderson was swept into office in 2004, riding the outrage over LePore's butterfly ballot design and shrewdly tapping into suspicions of the electronic machines that replaced the problematic punch cards.

With U.S. Rep. Robert Wexler, D-Boca Raton, urging him on, Anderson's main platform was getting a paper trail in place, even though LePore and other election experts said it was an unnecessary expense and the state hadn't even certified such equipment.

Today, the printers still aren't certified, and voters are getting increasingly comfortable with the touch-screens anyway. Anderson now says he is confident the technology works and works well.

Unwilling to do a complete about-face and risk Wexler's wrath, though, he says he continues to support a paper trail, but only to boost voter confidence.

http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/opinion/editorial/sfl-editnbpapertrailmar24,0,6816297.story?coll=sfla-news-editorial

[kpete]

27. Programmer who alleged plot to steal Florida election runs for Congress

Programmer who alleged plot to steal Florida election runs for Congress


Carlos Miller

Published: Friday March 24, 2006


To Republicans, Clint Curtis is a traitor; a back-stabbing liar with an imagination that rivaled Jack Abramoff's influence over Congress.

To liberal Democrats, Curtis is a hero; a stand up guy who blew the whistle on computer voting fraud, testifying before a group of U.S. House Committee Judiciary Democrats after the 2004 presidential election.

And to the man himself, the Republican-turned-Democrat is nothing but a computer geek who purports to have found himself smack in the middle of a brazen political plot to tamper with elections in Florida, where fact can be stranger than fiction and politics as shady as swampy underbrush.

After all, since the software programmer accused Florida Congressman Tom Feeney of asking him to create a computer program to steal an election, the plot has unraveled quirkier than a Carl Hiaasen novel

..........

Now Curtis is preparing to square off against Feeney for the state's 24th Congressional District this November, a solidly conservative area in central Florida carved out by Feeney himself.

more at:
http://www.rawstory.com/news/2006/Programmer_who_allege...

[FogerRox]

28. MD - Delegate accuses state official of blocking VVPB

Delegate accuses state official

Elections chief trying to undercut voter machine bill, Bobo says
03/23/06
By Luke Broadwater


Email this story to a friend


Del. Elizabeth Bobo said this week that Linda Lamone, the state administrator of elections, is trying her best to block a General Assembly bill that would require Maryland to use voting machines that leave a paper trail.

"I've held off saying this for a while," Bobo, a Columbia Democrat, said this week. "But (Lamone) is trying anything she can to sabotage this bill."

Lamone's deputy denied that charge this week.

Bobo's comments came in response to the State Board of Elections' announcement last week that leasing voting machines that use paper ballots would cost significantly more than the amount lawmakers have budgeted for the rental.

At issue is the state's use of computerized touch-screen machines produced by Diebold Election Systems, which Maryland used for the first time statewide in the March 2, 2004 primary election.

Opponents of the Diebold machines, such as Bobo, say the machines have questionable security and lack paper records that can be audited.

>snip<

(WTF? No voter verified paper ballots? OMG, but read on .. . . .)



The House of Delegates voted unanimously March 9 to abandon the Diebold machines in favor of machines that use paper ballots.

>snip<


full story--

http://news.mywebpal.com/news_tool_v2.cfm?pnpID=573&NewsID=705800&CategoryID=742&show=localnews&om=1

[rumpel]

38. MD: Maryland rebuffs Diebold

Insidebayarea.com
Opinion
Article Last Updated: 03/24/2006 9:45 AM PST

DIEBOLD, the electronic voting machine maker, suffered another sharp setback recently, when Maryland's House of Delegates voted 137-0 to drop its machines and switch to paper ballots. The vote came in the same week that Texas held elections marred by electronic voting troubles. Maryland's state Senate should join the House in voting to discontinue the use of the Diebold machines, and other states should follow Maryland's lead.
Maryland was one of the first states to embrace Diebold. But Maryland voters and elected officials have grown increasingly disenchanted as evidence has mounted that the machines cannot be trusted. In 2004, security experts from RABA Technologies told the state legislature that they had been able to hack into the machines in a way that would make it possible to steal an election. Sen. Barbara Mikulski, a Democrat, informed the state Board of Elections in 2004 that voters had complained to her that machines had mysteriously omitted the Senate race.

http://www.insidebayarea.com/argus/oped/ci_3635172

[FogerRox]

29. Louisiana voters urged to send in absentee ballots

Louisiana voters urged to send in absentee ballots

Louisiana voters urged to send in absentee ballots


Associated Press

WASHINGTON — Louisiana residents scattered around the country after Hurricane Katrina may still be eligible to vote at home, but they need to act promptly.

Displaced residents who are registered to vote in Louisiana and have not registered to vote in the state where they are living temporarily can check with the Louisiana Secretary of State's Office to learn about voting by absentee ballot, the U.S. Postal Service said Friday.

They can call the secretary of state's office at 1-800-883-2805 or find information on its Web site, www.sos.louisiana.gov.

For parishes other than Orleans, primary elections are April 1, which means absentee ballots need to arrive by March 31, the post office said. It urged voters to mail those ballots by Monday.

For the April 22 New Orleans municipal election, absentee ballots must be received by the Orleans registrars office or the secretary of state's office by April 21. These ballots should be mailed by April 17, postal officials said.

full story --

http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/nation/3746047.html

[rumpel]

36. LA: Prominent Blacks Want N.O. Satellite Voting

ABC News

POLITICAL NOTEBOOK: Prominent Blacks Call for Satellite Voting for Displaced New Orleans Residents

By WILL LESTER

WASHINGTON Mar 24, 2006 (AP)— Displaced New Orleans residents deserve the same voting privileges as the people of war-torn Iraq, several black leaders argued Friday in pushing for satellite voting from locations outside Louisiana.

"We are seeing people from Iraq being treated better than people from New Orleans," said Al Sharpton, who joined Jesse Jackson, NAACP President Bruce Gordon, Urban League President Marc Morial and several other influential black leaders in calling for steps to improve participation in New Orleans' April 22 elections.

Hurricane Katrina displaced more than 200,000 New Orleans residents of voting age, many of them black voters, and the black leaders contend that city elections could violate the 1965 Voting Rights Act.

"This is a Florida in the making," said Morial, a former New Orleans mayor, referring to Florida's extensive voting problems in the 2000 elections. "If you see an election train wreck coming, why not do something to prevent it before the wreck occurs?"

http://www.abcnews.go.com/Politics/wireStory?id=1765517

[FogerRox]

30. Congress should speed ballots to military

MEMBERS of the military are far more likely to cast ballots in this year's election, despite absentee voting processes that fail to utilize modern technology. Senators Inouye and Akaka and 10 other senators are asking that the Pentagon allow the Internet to be used to put absentee ballots into the hands of service members. Federal legislation requiring states to accept such a system is more appropriate.
Overseas voters, including military members, must contact local officials by regular mail and ask for ballots, which are then mailed to them. Post-election surveys indicate the process takes a minimum of 45 days. Actual absentee voting by mail is needed because of lingering security concerns; states also require postmarking to determine when the ballot was cast.

"Military absentee voting is still conducted in the same way it was conducted during World War II and the Korean War," the senators wrote.

The Defense Department asked five years ago that states and territories allow electronic transmission of applications for voter registration, requests for ballots from military members and then transmission of blank ballots back to service members by local election officials.

That is essentially what the seven Republican and five Democratic senators propose in a letter this month to Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld. They ask that the Pentagon create a system that would allow members of the military to use e-mail to "request, receive, download and print" absentee ballots regardless of their location.

However, voting systems are a function of . . . >snip< . . . to implement such a system.

Full Story--

http://starbulletin.com/2006/03/24/editorial/editorial02.html

[FogerRox]

31. 500k Absentee ballots for NOLA ?

Absentee Voting in New Orleans Elections

Posted: 3/21/2006 9:29:26 PM


Video: http://www.myeyewitnessnews.com/mediacenter/?videoId=141317


Evacuees say they’re worried that their votes might not count in April’s election in New Orleans.

The people of New Orleans will vote on key positions like city mayor, all while 500,000 of them are scattered across 44 states.

On Tuesday in Memphis, the Rainbow Push Coalition led by Rev. Jesse Jackson talked about what evacuees here can do to make sure their votes count.

Karen Woods and her mother have been living in Memphis since Katrina chased them out of New Orleans. They want their votes to count in the upcoming election there. They feel they should be able to vote here in Memphis at a satellite center.

They family just received an absentee ballot which lists the date, times and deadlines to register to vote and request a ballot. Both women are registered to vote in New Orleans, but they only received one ballot. They even fear that if they cast the ballot, it won’t be counted.

>snip<

Full Story--

http://www.myeyewitnessnews.com/news/local/story.aspx?content_id=1ABA8F7D-264F-4825-9D34-1966C99C4B5A

[FogerRox]

32. Nevada election official promises new voter registration system

Nevada election official promises new voter registration system

ASSOCIATED PRESS

CARSON CITY, Nev. (AP) - Despite problems that halted a deal for a statewide computer registration system, Secretary of State Dean Heller said Thursday that Nevada will have an backup system in place for the 2006 elections.

Heller said his office has been "working diligently for several months" with registrars and county clerks on the alternate system "that will soon be operational" and will comply with requirements imposed by the federal Help America Vote Act of 2002 in efforts to prevent voter fraud.

"We're shooting for late April, early May," said Renee Parker, chief deputy secretary of state. Nevada's primary is scheduled for Aug. 15, and the general election is Nov. 7.

Heller in February had to suspend a $4.6 million contract with Covansys Inc., of Farmington Hills, Mich., after the company missed various deadlines for building a statewide computer registration system.


FUll Story--

http://www.lasvegassun.com/sunbin/stories/nevada/2006/mar/16/031610275.html

[FogerRox]

33. FL.: Complaint prompts election official to pull face from site

Complaint prompts election official to pull face from site
By Jason Schultz

Palm Beach Post Staff Writer

Thursday, March 23, 2006

STUART — The face of a Martin County election official will no longer grace ads encouraging voter registration after an e-mail complaint from a resident.

Vicki Davis, supervisor of elections for Martin County, said the county started running ads on the Web site of a local newspaper in late February as part of the "Get Out the Vote" campaign, a state-funded campaign to promote voter registration.

County e-mail records show that a resident who identified himself only as "R. Sweeney, full-time Stuart resident and taxpayer" e-mailed Davis and complained that the picture amounted to advertising for Davis, an elected official.

"I find it highly offensive, perhaps unethical and certainly in bad taste, whether a Democrat, Republican or Independent, to have an elected official's photo advertised, at taxpayer's expense, on public service announcements, or even the office's home page," Sweeney's e-mail said.

A message sent to Sweeney's e-mail address was not returned Wednesday.

Davis, who was elected in 2004 and is not up for reelection until 2008, said the picture in the ad was not meant to be campaign advertising. She said the designer of the ad simply took Davis' photo from the county elections Web site, www.martinvotes.com.

Full story==

http://www.palmbeachpost.com/politics/content/local_news/epaper/2006/03/23/m3b_mcdavis_0323.html

[FogerRox]

34. thanks rumple, you rock---- thanks too: Algorem Kpete, Modmom

I had some web problems, when I got them solved, I came back to this huge ERD. you folks ROCK.




Todays ERD, here:

[rumpel]

35. nt

:hi:

[Wilms]

43. .

:thumbsup:

[rumpel]

37. WI: Statewide Voter List Might Not Be Ready For Nov. Election

WISCTV Channel 3000

Federal Law Stipulates New Requirements

UPDATED: 5:15 pm CST March 24, 2006
MADISON, Wis. -- A statewide voter database whose installation has been plagued by delays most likely will not be ready in time for the November gubernatorial election, according to a state elections official.
State Elections Board executive director Kevin Kennedy said that the expected delay means the state would have to retain about 50 people on the payroll for longer than anticipated.

http://www.channel3000.com/news/8238526/detail.html

[rumpel]

39. MO: City Election Brd completes new-machine tests (St Louis)

By Jo Mannies
03/24/2006 3:27 pm
Scott Leiendecker, Republican elections director for the St. Louis Election Board, reported today that workers conducted “logic and accuracy tests'’ on the new voting machines that will get their first citywide tryout on April 4.

“It went flawlessly,'’ Leiendecker said.

The “L&A” test is required by state law before every election to veriify that the voting equipment is working properly, and properly recording votes.

“All systems are a go for the April election,” said Board Chairman Ed Martin, a Republican. “The Board is pleased that not a single problem was reported. We are ready to send the equipment into the field for the April 4 election.”

Martin said Friday’s test “was also observed by several members of the Board’s new Citizen Audit Panel whose mission is to review Election Board policies and procedures as they relate to the new voting equipment to help insure voter confidence in the integrity of the voting process. ‘’

The chairman of that panel is city License Collector Gregory F.X. Daley, a Democrat

The city began using the new optical-scan and touchscreen machines, made by Diebold, when absentee balloting began a month ago.

http://www.stltoday.com/blogs/news-politicalfix/2006/03/city-election-brd-completes-new-machine-tests/

[rumpel]

40. KY: Training set for Casey precinct officers (Danville)

The Advocate-Messenger, Danville KY

Friday March 24, 2006

By BRENDA S. EDWARDS
[email protected]

LIBERTY - Casey County election officers need to attend two training sessions before the May Primary.


Additional training is needed because of changes in the Handicap Accessibility Act, said county Clerk Eva S. Miller.


The county has purchased 16 new voting machines for voters who are handicapped and financed the purchase with funds appropriated by the federal government.


Miller said the new machines will be located in each of the 15 precincts and one will be in her office for people who cast absentee votes.


The first training workshop concerning the new voting machines will be 4 p.m. Tuesday at Gateway Park community center. The second training will be April 18.

Fiscal Court approved Monday paying each election officer $10 for the first training and $15 for the regular training in April. Miller urges precinct workers to attend each training session.


Election officers get $85 per day for working a 14-hour shift on election day.


Additional election officers also are needed, said Miller. People interested may call Miller at the clerk's office at [phone] for more information.

http://www.amnews.com/public_html/?module=displaystory&story_id=20488&format=html

[nicknameless]

41. New Hampshire E-Voting Mess

http://www.cvspectator.com/main.asp?SectionID=2&SubSectionID=8&ArticleID=387

Attorney General seizes Grafton ballots; results all in question after many counted twice

GRAFTON — The New Hampshire Attorney General’s office came to Grafton Wednesday and seized the 369 ballots cast during voting Tuesday and the machine used to count them, after an unknown number of ballots were counted multiple times, according to Town Clerk Mary McDow.

The president of the company that makes the voting machines said operator error, not mechanical problems, put the results of all the town’s elections and warrant articles in question.

But Town Moderator Bonnie Haubrich said readings from the machine never indicated there was a problem.

<snip>

“There’s not much I can tell you except that the counts are way off. They all could be switched for all we know,” McDow said. “I had no knowledge of this (Tuesday) night. It’s all the moderator that deals with the machine.”

<snip>

Haubrich said she did read the machine’s printouts, but they didn’t indicate that the machine had counted those ballots. It wasn’t until after the results were recorded and reported to the media that she realized the tallies didn’t match up with the number of ballots cast.

Hmmm... NH Attorney General claims that there's no problem with the vote count, but confiscates the ballots.

[Wilms]

44. Discussion

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=203x418458

[KaryninMiami]

45. Thanks for the link.

Did this get posted here yet? I didn't see it but wasn't sure if I was looking in the correct place. Thanks!