July 25, 2005

"Disabled advocates fight vote ruling"

"A federal judge misread a state law and incorrectly applied previous court rulings when he refused to order disability-accessible touch-screen voting in Volusia County this fall, attorneys for the National Federation of the Blind and others said Friday.

Attorneys for the NFB, its state affiliate and five blind voters from Volusia filed an appeal with the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit in Atlanta seeking to overturn U.S. District Judge John Antoon II's decision on Thursday.

In their 13-page motion, attorneys for the NFB and other plaintiffs asked the appellate court to force Volusia officials to purchase the paperless touch-screens by Monday.

That would allow delivery of the machines by Friday, the "drop-dead date" to implement touch-screens for Volusia's next election, which is Oct. 11, according to the appeal.

"It's an emergency," said James Gashel, executive director for strategic initiatives for the NFB, a nonprofit with its main offices in Baltimore and more than 50,000 members nationwide.

County leaders have said they support accessible voting but oppose the machines, which allow visually disabled people to vote independently with "audio ballots" and headphones, because they don't use paper ballots.

Paper ballots, such as the ones now used in Volusia's optical-scan voting system, are essential for double-checking results of close elections or recounts, most County Council members say."

The full story is here.

Posted by Randy Riddle at July 25, 2005 09:00 AM