January 19, 2006

"California legislators evaluate e-voting"

"As virtually every county in California scrambles for new voting machinery to use in the June elections, the last thing elections officials want to talk about are flaws.

But the warts were on parade Wednesday:

- Sequoia Voting Systems' computers don't reliably add in certain rare primary votes.

- Election Systems & Software's computers sometimes count more ballots than voters and can record the wrong choice for voters with long fingernails.

- Optical scanners made by Diebold Election Systems can be hacked (and so possibly can scanners sold by other vendors).

Unlike in years past, the difference is that lawmakers and state elections officials are airing those problems, if grudgingly and with some protests from local elections officials.

"These meetings are tearing the (voters') confidence apart. They're saying every system is bad,"complained Debbie Hench, San Joaquin County registrar of voters, in a legislative hearing.

"I'm sorry you feel scrutiny and transparency is bad," said Debra Bowen, D-Marina del Rey, chairwoman of the Senate Elections and Reapportionment Committee. But, she said, making a clean breast of voting problems is essential for fixing them and regaining the voter trust that has been in decline since the 2000 presidential elections.

"If you just tell people, 'Trust us, we'll make it all go away,' that's not the way you establish confidence," said Bowen, a Democratic contender for secretary of state.

California's chief elections officer, Secretary of State Bruce McPherson, opened his administration last year with promises of transparency. His office has posted a broad array of reports on voting systems on the Internet, and he has spoken openly about some of the more serious problems.

But Bowen and others were annoyed last month to learn through news reports that McPherson's staff had written a leading vendor, Election Systems & Software, threatening to withdraw approval of its equipment after problems cropped up in three counties in the 2004 and 2005 elections.

McPherson's chief counsel, Bill Wood, said the letter wasn't publicized because state officials first wanted to hear what the firm had to say.

"I don't think it serves the public to put a letter out when we don't have answers so we can go forward," he said.

You can read the story .

Posted by Randy Riddle at January 19, 2006 08:06 AM