January 09, 2007

"E-voting critic earns state post"

"A Berkeley lawyer who has fought electronic voting in California and a half-dozen other states has been tapped by Secretary of State Debra Bowen as her deputy in charge of voting machinery.

Lowell Finley, co-founder and co-director of the election-integrity group Voter Action, has pulled out of lawsuits against elections officials in California, Florida, Ohio and other states in order to accept the post of deputy secretary of state.

Bowen, who was sworn in Monday, still is figuring out the management structure for her office, but she expects Finley to have a lead role in her promised "top-to-bottom review" of voting systems used in the state, according to chief deputy secretary Evan Goldberg.

"She thinks Mr. Finley is an excellent person to help her do that top-to-bottom review," Goldberg said. "He will be the lead person dealing with voting-system technology issues."

Finley, 54, could not be reached Monday night, but Holly Jacobson, co-director of Voter Action, cheered his new job in an open Internet letter to supporters.

"Lowell's appointment to one of the nation's most important state positions, overseeing election standards and voting machine certification for approximately one-fifth of the nation's voters, is a victory for Voter Action, election integrity advocates and voters across the United States," she wrote.

Finley is a longtime elections lawyer who co-founded the California Political Attorneys Association 15 years ago and handled several redistricting and minority voter access cases before he saw the spread of touchscreen voting machines in his home county and elsewhere in California. Working with Bev Harris of BlackBoxVoting.org, Finley sued Diebold Election Systems Inc., alleging that the firm made misrepresentations to Alameda County and California to sell its voting machines. Diebold settled the case for $2.6 million."

The story is here.

Posted by Randy Riddle at January 9, 2007 09:49 AM