NPR -Officials in the Dark About Voti...

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Author Message   Frank Heindel Voting Rights Forum Participant Username: Frankh Post Number: 4 Registered: 8-2010 Best of Black Box?  Votes: 1 (A keeper?) Posted on Thursday, September 16, 2010 - 6:26 am:        http://www.wbur.org/npr/129866551/officials-in-the-dark-about-voting-machine-gli tches Officials In The Dark About Voting Machine Glitches by Pam Fessler - September 15, 2010 Problems with voting machines are still popping up 10 years after the controversial presidential vote in Florida. One reason is that election officials are often unaware of previous problems with the equipment they use, according to a new report from the Brennan Center for Justice at the New York University School of Law. One example is something that happened earlier this year in Cuyahoga County, Ohio. Election officials there were testing optical scan machines shortly before the state's primary when, for no apparent reason, some of the machines froze up and even shut down right in the middle of counting ballots. Searching For Help Election director Jane Platten says she turned to technicians from the machine vendor for help. "And they looked at us with the blank face that I've seen so often when we've encountered problems with voting systems," Platten says. They were as perplexed as she was. So, Platten did what she has done before. "I had my staff hurry up and get on the phone with every other jurisdiction in the country who uses the DS200 system. We called California, we called Wisconsin, we called Florida, and we found several counties in Florida where they had experienced this problem," Platten says. The company, Election Systems and Software, came up with a temporary fix. But Platten says it would have been a lot easier -- and far less nerve-wracking -- if she'd known ahead of time that another state had had similar troubles and that no votes had been lost. She says the vendor knew about the Florida problems but believed they were unrelated. A Pattern Of Problems Lawrence Norden, the author of the Brennan Center report, says that what happened in Cuyahoga County is not uncommon -- election officials often learn after the fact that others have had difficulties with the same equipment they're using. He says that is what happened in 2008 in Humboldt County, Calif., when officials discovered a problem with their Diebold voting machines, only to learn that the company had known about it four years earlier. "We should be keeping track of the kinds of problems that we have with these systems so that we can ensure that they're minimized and that we're catching them as early as possible," Norden says, adding that voting machines are not regulated like many other consumer products. The Case For A Federal Database The Brennan Center is recommending that there be a federally run, searchable database where voting system failures can be compiled. The center says vendors should also be required to report quickly, and alert customers to any flaws and potential solutions. Rokey Suleman, election director for Washington, D.C., welcomes such a change. He says it wasn't easy finding out which machines had the best track record when the city was recently in the market to buy new ones. "Vendors typically tell election officials what they feel they need to know," Suleman says. "They don't always want to disclose flaws in their equipment." Washington required companies competing for the city's business to identify any issues that had been raised about their machines. Suleman says some did, but others didn't until he brought up some things he'd heard about independently. "And they went, 'Oh, those kinds of issues!' And then they came forth with ... 'These are some of the issues and these are some of the solutions we have to mitigate these problems,' " he says. For their part, vendors say they agree with the Brennan Center recommendations -- at least in theory. They say they already try to alert customers about potential problems as soon as they can. "It's our responsibility, and we take it seriously," says Howard Cramer, vice president of Dominion Voting Systems Corp., now one of the largest voting machine companies in the United States. "I think where that ball gets dropped is exactly that -- just in the line of communications. People are busy." Cramer says his company is building its own website source for customers to report and find information about Dominion's voting equipment. He notes that the U.S. Election Assistance Commission has also started requiring such reporting on the voting machines it certifies for use around the country. In fact, the commission this summer issued an advisory about the problems encountered in Cuyahoga County. The federal commission noted the temporary fix recommended by the manufacturer: Make sure the machine is completely off and then restart it. [Copyright 2010 National Public Radio]   Catherine Ansbro Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant Username: Catherine_a Post Number: 5670 Registered: 12-2004 Best of Black Box? N/A Votes: 0 (A keeper?) Posted on Thursday, September 16, 2010 - 9:31 am:        Great article, thanks for posting it. Has this journalist covered this topic before?   Bev Harris Board Administrator Username: Admin Post Number: 11150 Registered: 12-2004 Best of Black Box? N/A Votes: 0 (A keeper?) Posted on Friday, September 17, 2010 - 7:06 am:        Thanks for posting this, Frank. Actually, there are two problems. One is election officials not knowing of previous problems with the machines, but the other is election officials pretending they are unaware of problems with the machines.   V. Kurt Bellman Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant Username: Formerelecdir Post Number: 3647 Registered: 4-2006 Best of Black Box? N/A Votes: 0 (A keeper?) Posted on Friday, September 17, 2010 - 11:34 am:        Bev, There is NO official method of sharing such information with local election officials. Either they lurk here on BBV, or they never hear. Vendors "dummy up" about problems, even when you ASK THEM DIRECTLY ABOUT THEM (my experience), and any other method CAN BE unsubstantialted rumor. ========================================== "Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence." - Carl Sagan "Public sentiment is everything. With it, nothing can fail. Without it, nothing can succeed". --Abraham Lincoln   Roy Lipscomb Voting Rights Forum Participant Username: Lipscomb Post Number: 32 Registered: 8-2005 Best of Black Box? N/A Votes: 0 (A keeper?) Posted on Friday, September 17, 2010 - 11:15 pm:        Instant, unfiltered reports of equipment problems will never come from vendors or from the government. Instead of waiting for those stakeholders to shape up, election officials should take on the job themselves. After all, they're the ones with a strong interest in having the job done right. All this should take no more than a modicum of time and energy. The customers of each vendor need only set up and maintain their own blog or listserve, at little or no cost. The most laborious part of the entire task would probably be notifying other potential users about the blog's existence. A blog much like this has already been in service for over four years. It differs in that it solicits problem reports from voters, rather than from voting-equipment customers. More about the blog, including its link, is contained in the initial message of this thread, at http://www.bbvforums.org/forums/messages/72/81145.html?1284748462 If county clerks hesitate to take on this job, then election-integrity groups might step up and offer to help. The offer might be declined, but imagine the surprise and delight of officials who find us offering them honey instead of vinegar.   Catherine Ansbro Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant Username: Catherine_a Post Number: 5671 Registered: 12-2004 Best of Black Box? N/A Votes: 0 (A keeper?) Posted on Saturday, September 18, 2010 - 5:34 pm:        Election officials might be interested in such a blog if it were not publicly viewable.   V. Kurt Bellman Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant Username: Formerelecdir Post Number: 3648 Registered: 4-2006 Best of Black Box? N/A Votes: 0 (A keeper?) Posted on Saturday, September 18, 2010 - 5:44 pm:        It needs to be anonymous, too. An election official can be FIRED for even typing a WORD on a site like BBV. I was reprimanded for even READING it. ========================================== "Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence." - Carl Sagan "Public sentiment is everything. With it, nothing can fail. Without it, nothing can succeed". --Abraham Lincoln   Roy Lipscomb Voting Rights Forum Participant Username: Lipscomb Post Number: 33 Registered: 8-2005 Best of Black Box? N/A Votes: 0 (A keeper?) Posted on Sunday, September 19, 2010 - 10:32 pm:        Kurt, I don't envision the blog as sponsored by an activist group. The blog should be launched and controlled by election officials, on their own network. The role of election-integrity activists would be to provide inspiration, to inspire officials with a vision of the benefits and feasibility of a self-managed blog, versus any blog likely to arise from elsewhere in government or from the vendor. Catherine, Kurt, It's not a problem technically to establish a private, anonymous blog. The problem is human nature. We hardly need mention that-- * Privacy might be compromised at any time by an activist election official, or by the accidental misposting of a message. The greater the number of participants, the more likely this is to happen. * Anonymity likewise can easily be compromised, by a user's letting certain details slip--perhaps even by the user's style of writing. But none of that will daunt our more intrepid county clerks. If they exist in sufficient number, their postings should suffice to yield the desired, timely compendium of problems. The compendium, of course, will be of benefit to bystander officials as well, those who choose not to post, but do choose to read along.

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