Papers please
From a New York Times story today: (Registration may be required.)
New federal guidelines, along with legislation given a strong chance to pass in Congress next year, will probably combine to make the paperless voting machines obsolete, the officials say. States and counties that bought the machines will have to modify them to hook up printers, at federal expense, while others are planning to scrap the machines and buy new ones.
Dang, but this all sounds familiar. Oh, I remember now.
For all the angst that the legislature when through in deciding whether to require a paper backup, it looks like it may save North Carolina some hassle in the long run.
Update1: From the “great minds think alike” office, Nate over at our sister blog took note of the same story.
Update2: As Nate noted, the folks at NC Voter are probably happy about the paper requirement. Although, that group would like to see us all using optical scan machines. They’ve been circulating this memo, sent after the election by the SBOE, on how to deal with malfunctioning paper roles attached to the touch screen equipment.
Comments (1)
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Thanks for the excellent piece which allows the election integrity advocates in NC to say:
"We told you so".
Your "Oh I remember now" link sent me down memory lane where we began working to get a law passed, and then we had to defend it.
We almost got the touchscreens banned, but
some brilliant person persuaded the lawmakers to ignore us on that.
You have a paper trail in Guilford, and in Mecklenburg, but you have NO guarantee that the touchscreen's paper trail will be there for the audits. The memo issued by the SBOE states that many counties will have machines missing the paper trail or have a paper trail that is illegible or torn.
No such memo had to be issued regarding the optical scanners that MOST counties were wise enough to choose.
Those paper trails are printed on flimsy thermal paper, and that may end up being banned by federal law, and most certainly will not meet newer voting machine standards. I suspect they may be grandfathered in, but hope not.
Guilford taxpayers should not have their hard earned money spent on any more touchscreen machines though. You have already wasted too much money. Oh, if only you had just bought optical scan in the first place, the state grant would have paid for everything.
But, Guilford County's election director, George Gilbert, who opposed the paper trail on the touchscreens, will probably buy another 500-1,000 more touchscreens with your taxpayer money.
Meanwhile, in the past few years, Guilford CO has cut Education funds by about $7 Million, the price tag of all new touchscreen voting machines.
Instead of buying paper ballot based optical scanners which would have been paid for completely by state funding, Gilbert chose the touchscreens with the "paper trail" that he so scorned. He told our lawmakers that the "paper trail" was no good.
His testimony here
http://www.ncvoter.net/downloads/HouseElectLawAug10Gilbert.doc
Our paper ballot law passed on August 13 in spite of George Gilberts vigorous lobbying against it.
Gilbert even proposed Vote Centers, which he claimed could handle more voters with less voting machines.
I suspect this was his way to make touchscreen voting seem less expensive.
Gilbert's plan would mean using 1/3 the number of voting machines the county was using for all other elections.
http://www.ncvoter.net/wallyworldvoting.html
Fortunately for you, none of the county commissioners smiled upon the idea of making voting more difficult for the elderly and the poor.
http://www.blackboxvoting.com/s9/index.php?/archives/82-A-Loss-and-a-win-in-Guilford.html
The vote centers would disenfranchise anyone who -might not be able to drive across town to vote in a "WalMart style" location, not able to get a ride there, not able to stand in line for hours, and or able to miss work for hours.
Less machines, more voters? Crazy idea.
Gilbert missed the mark on this one.
However, I must say that I do approve of Gibert's
ideas on better training for election officials, and also the help desk staffed by League of Women voters in Guilford County.
On those points, my hat is off to him.
Its just the machines that we disagree on.
Meanwhile, we continue to fight bad ideas for elections, because people keep cranking them out.
Much thanks to Mark for clearheaded and timely reporting on this subject and others.
Posted on December 10, 2006 2:04 AM