March 02, 2006

E-voting machines spark concerns

"As state officials race to evaluate voting machines for the June elections, critics complained Wednesday that the state was short-circuiting its own rules and putting substandard tools in the hands of voters.

The latest crop of machines are more accessible for disabled voters than ever before but still show significant errors in "volume testing" that simulates an election.

Testing 50 to 100 machines at a time has revealed problems — some minor, some major — with virtually every kind of voting system that vendors want to sell in the state, from common ballot jams and too-touchy touchscreen errors to system crashes and the rare lost ballot.

In all but one case, in which 59 total errors arose on 100 Hart optical scanners, state elections staff is recommending Secretary of State Bruce McPherson approve the machines for voters, with detailed instructions for recalibrating and rebooting if problems occur on Election Day.

Still, it's unclear that the California rush before June's primary to approve new systems will dramatically change the state's voting landscape, except for one class of voters. In apparently every county, voters with disabilities will be able to cast ballots more or less without assistance — many for the first time. "Thanks for giving us an accessible vote," Dan Kaiser of the California Council for the Blind told elections officials here Wednesday.

Congress made disabled access part of voting reforms passed under the Help America Vote Act following the 2000 presidential election. State legislatures in California and a dozen other states set the hurdle higher still by requiring printers on the ATM-like voting machines so voters could verify their choices and elections officials could have a paper record to recount.

Even though deadlines for both were Jan. 1, 2006, the nation's dozen voting-machine firms managed to get only one machine meeting both requirements by that date. McPherson ordered makers into a tight schedule of applications and testing, culminating in Wednesday's hearing before his staff on three firms' systems. Decisions on each are expected within the next two weeks.

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Posted by Randy Riddle at March 2, 2006 11:11 AM