Reply #17: One more out of Jefferson

[sonias]

Beaumont Enterprise article
03/27/2006

Voting machine issues heat up
BEAUMONT - Problems with the provider of Jefferson County's electronic voting machines could lead to paper ballots and a manual count for the April 11 runoff, in violation of federal law.

Election Systems & Software, the Nebraska-based company that provided the county's machines, has refused to program equipment for the runoff until the county pays the $1.95 million bill.

The county has refused to pay before resolving problems that plagued the March 7 primary and culminated in a full recount of Election Day ballots after some votes were counted twice.

County Clerk Carolyn Guidry has listed 10 specific deficiencies, including ill-informed ES&S personnel, equipment failures and inadequate training.

After a closed session Monday, Commissioners Court voted to contact ES&S immediately to demand action by the company to correct problems. The court also decided to have Guidry investigate ways to conduct the runoff without using ES&S equipment and authorized the District Attorney's office to "take any appropriate action" against ES&S.

Early voting for the April 11 runoff starts Monday. Ballots in some form will include one statewide judicial race for Republicans. Democrats will decide statewide races for U.S. senator and lieutenant governor and a county-wide race for Criminal District Court judge.

Now that's a county court taking the appropriate action. Just withhold payment. Pull those optical scan ballots out of your storage and tell the Feds to shove it.

Sonia