San Diego County to buy 'touch-screen' voting machines

[bubba_fett]

Despite objections from a dozen public speakers who said electronic voting machines put democracy at risk, San Diego County supervisors ended an 18-month process Tuesday by agreeing to spend $30 million to buy 10,200 computerized, "touch screen" voting machines.

Officials said about 90 percent of the money needed to pay for the machines will come from state or federal grants.

County election officers said that the new touch-screen system, created by Ohio-based Diebold Systems Inc., is secure and more accurate than the old punch-card ballot system it is scheduled to replace in March 2004. The machines have been certified by the state's chief elections officer, California Secretary of State Kevin Shelley.

But a dozen speakers at Tuesday's board meeting said they don't trust electronic voting machines in general ---- especially when they do not offer voters "paper trails," printouts of their ballots that give voters tangible proof of how they voted.

County Registrar Sally McPherson said that the Diebold machines will eventually include printout features, but that the state won't require them until July 2006.

http://www.nctimes.com/articles/2003/12/10/news/top_stories/12_9_0323_07_01.txt

Get your pens ready, and start writing some letters.

I'm worried about California, part of me thinks that a big reason the recall election happened was because the GOP wanted some dumb buffoon in the governors office to look the other way while their buddies at Diebold plugged these machines in.

[La_Serpiente]

1. San Diego doesn't have the Republican populations

to counterbalance the cities of San Fran and L.A. However, we should stop them at every city possible, even if it is a Republican stronghold.

[rustydog]

2. California Secretary of State Shelley

had already proclaimed that no electronic voting machine will be used in California that does not provide a voter-verified paper trail.
This is the first Secretary of State in America who has made this decision and is working with others in other stated to do so as well.

Let's see if it works.

[dusty64]

3. Once again election

officials are making it obvious who they work for and it ain't the People.

[RedEagle]

4. Here's what you do

You hold their feet to the fire and demand to know who is going to have to pay for the upgrade to voter-verified paper ballots later, since the law will demand it?

Will there be federal and state money then?

Are the local officials banking on the possibility that it will be a money issue in 2006, when federal and state funds will probably not be available?

It is fiscally irresponsible to not get the paper ballots on these machines NOW.

It is fiscally irresponsible to contract with a company whose equipment has proven to be a security risk time after time.

It is fiscally irresponsible to contract with a company that might go out of business over the voting machine fiasco it created.

Here's where we need the lawyers to file injunctins and stop this.

Citizens need to file complaints, whatever they can, to stop this.

Get in the media and tell people what's happening, have them flood the elections office and city council, whoever OK'd this attrocity.

[RedEagle]

5. OK, I see by a post on another forum...

...that Diebold offered the printers to San Diego for free by 2006.

What, as long as they don't use printers in the 2004 election?

What was the deal that went down here.

Maybe Greg D. can weigh in on this one.

However, everything else is fair game. Diebold has not played honestly in California and should be booted out of the state.

[Jack_Dawson]

6. That's my county!

Doesn't surprise me...San Diego's crawling w/ freepers. Here's our radio lineup:

6-10 local conservative hack
10-12 O'Reilly
12-3 Hannity
3-4 Re-run of morning hack
4-7 Michael Savage
7-10 alan colmes

[pstokely]

7. what station is that?

KFRP

[mrgorth]

8. I like the non-capping

of colmes.