Florida Senate bill replaces touchscreen DREs with opscan paper ballots & creates audit requirements

[eomer]

Here is the text of the bill just approved by the Florida Senate Committee on Ethics and Elections:
http://www.flsenate.gov/cgi-bin/view_page.pl?Tab=session&Submenu=1&FT=D&File=session/2007/Senate/bills/amendments_com/html/sb0960am322622.html

The bill has to go through more Senate committees, and then there's the House to reconcile with (the House is working on a bill, HB213, that has some major differences), with the House Speaker being one of the obstacles for enactment. However, the Senate bill reflects Gov. Crist's latest proposals and therefore seems to be in a stronger position than the House alternative.

Highlights:

• Requires replacement of touchscreen DREs with optical scan paper ballots.
  
• Permits counties to use ballot-on-demand technology to solve the problems that stem from combining optical scan paper ballots with early voting.
  
• Provides state funding for both the optical scanners and the ballot-on-demand systems and gives the state the authority to negotiate and purchase those systems on behalf of the affected counties.
  
• Requires counties to perform an audit of from 1 to 2 percent of the precincts.
  
• Specifies that the audit must be a public manual count of the paper ballots.
  
• Includes election-day, absentee, early voting, provisional, and overseas ballots in the audit.

Lowlights:

• Retains touchscreen DREs for disability access.
  
• Attaches no consequences or next steps for a failed audit, other than reports and recommendations for correction in future elections.
  
• Audits only the top race on the ballot.
  
• Uses a fixed (1 to 2) percentage for the audit rather than a percentage that varies to deliver statistical significance.
  
• Leaves in place the rules saying that recounts are machine counts and prohibiting counties from doing manual recounts.
  
• Reduces the number of forms of ID that can be used to vote.
  
• Requires that complaints "must be based upon personal information or information other than hearsay" in order for the Florida Election Commission to investigate them.

The last two lowlights are steps backward. Other than those, the provisions of the bill are all steps that are beneficial to election reform but still leave major problems yet to be solved. Given those facts, I am in favor of its passage -- even as is -- but would rather see the ID and complaint changes taken out (unlikely to happen IMO) and, especially, something be done about the lack of consequences upon a failed audit and the fact that existing recount provisions use machine counts and prohibit manual counts.

I'm not sure whether Florida law still says that recounts shall include only undervotes and overvotes. If so then that is another thing that remains to be fixed.

Bonus: here's a Miami Herald article about the bill and related developments:
http://www.miamiherald.com/775/v-print/story/77384.html#

[William769]

1. This is great news|!

Hope it passes.

[BeFree]

2. Pulling the wool

Did anybody think a republican governor would really go all the way and really do the right thing? Ha!

They are making it look like they are correcting the way votes are counted, but really, they are *fixing*!

What they are doing is sticking a pacifier in our mouths and pulling the wool over our eyes.

We ain't done yet!

[eomer]

3. The audit would alternate between President and Governor; Senate and House races never audited.

The term for Florida Governor is 4 years and the election cycle is off two years from that of the Presidential elections. Biennial elections alternate between President and Governor at the top and therefore these are the only two races that would be audited in the biennials. Senate and Congressional races would never be audited.

[Stevepol]

4. Here's Rec #5. But what a crazy patchwork FL law is on voting!

How can there be such a crazy law that all recounts can only be machine recounts, that hand counting is outlawed?

[eridani]

5. Why can't they just use the touchscreens--

--to print regular PAPER ballots?

[w4rma]

6. Extremely good. (nt)

[Pacifist Patriot]

7. I'm not fond of the ID lowlight, but as for complaints...

could this possibly be a good thing? Direct complaints are likely to be more concrete, provide better context and be easier to verify. I can see why an investigative body would be more effective with non-hearsay related complaints. Chasing down hearsay claims could waste time better spent on specific charges.

I definitely acknowledge the need to hear another perspective on this. I know full well I could be missing the full implications of the provision.

As a Floridian I'm grateful to see some progress in this area. Thanks for the post!