(TN) 7/12 - HOW REDISTRICTING MISMANA...

Author Message   Bev Harris Board Administrator Username: Admin Post Number: 11711 Registered: 12-2004 Best of Black Box?  Votes: 4 (A keeper?) Posted on Friday, July 27, 2012 - 5:00 pm:        Shelby County is currently enduring yet another botched election -- perhaps the worst one yet. Under Election Administrator Richard Holden's misleadership, this time thousands of voters are being disenfranchised by giving them the wrong ballot, a result of administrative foot-dragging on redistricting-related database updates. Based on tips I have been receiving from several US locations, precinct boundary changes caused by redistricting will be bollixed in multiple jurisdictions across the USA in November. Some -- like Shelby County -- will be of strategic importance. ENTER THE LATEST SHELBY COUNTY SNAFU PIC: RICHARD HOLDEN Administrator Richard Holden gummed up the redistricting process, which was belatedly finalized. Database and mapping updates needed to be expedited to get final changes safely into databases and poll lists in time for the August election. By expedited, I mean Holden needed to make certain this was well under way by March, and completed by May. He didn't. Holden's molasses-like management has put at least 6,000 voters at immediate risk for disenfranchisement. About 3,000 of these are already toast, having participated in Early Voting in the August election, where they were given the wrong ballot. Local campaigns and election consultants have been tracking this carefully. As of this writing, 3,000 voters' rights can still be salvaged, with prompt action, because Election Day voting will not take place until next week. About half of all votes in Shelby County are typically cast on Election Day at the polls. Shelby County needs to provide an option for all voters to cast legitimate votes on the right ballot on Election Day next week. Candidates are also being treated unfairly. Many campaigns still don't have wards or precincts. School board candidates are still asking for information and can't identify their own voters for campaigning. GOTTA BE REPLACED And as I've said several times now, Holden needs to be replaced, and quickly. By my book, he is one of the worst election administrators in the nation. It will take several weeks for a replacement to get up to speed in time for the November election. If Holden isn't replaced within the next two weeks, he's going to find that he himself is the story in Shelby County. And after he is replaced, we'll need to sit on a Holden watch, to see where he turns up next. Election admins who are run out of town usually end up running an even bigger jurisdiction; King County's controversial Dean Logan now runs Los Angeles County elections; Cuyahoga County's Michael Vu now runs San Diego; San Bernardino County's Michael Trout now is Elections Director for the state of Oregon, and San Bernardino's other stinker, Scott Konopasek, ended up in Salt Lake County. Sometimes, like convicted felon John Elder, head of ballot printing for Diebold, these election guys can't land another position. In that case, they become election consultants (like Riverside County's Mischelle Townsend, and Florida's Paul Craft). One really has to wonder what topic they are consulting on. HERE'S HOW REDISTRICTING MISMANAGEMENT ENDS UP DISENFRANCHISING VOTERS: - Redistricting decisions, some bizarre, discriminatory, or overly complicated, are haggled over. For some locations, final decisions aren't made until the last minute, as one political party proposes new boundaries deemed unfair to the other; some fight it out in court; others hit resistance from the U.S. Dept. of Justice. And by bizarre, I mean this: Sometimes you see elaborate proposals for districts that snake around voters in tortured paths, or even finger out in all four directions at once. Sometimes, as in Osceola County (FL), you even get districts carved into polka dots. It can get very odd, and sometimes illegal. - With these changed districts, thousands of voters' precincts change, as does their polling place. Two things must happen before any election takes place. (1) Voters need to be notified of their changed precinct and polling place EVEN MORE IMPORTANT: (2) The voter registration database must be updated, along with street mapping and pollbooks, to make sure every voter is put into the adjusted precinct. Each district has a different ballot. If you live in District 9, you can't vote on District 8 representatives, and vice versa. Therefore, if voters are not correctly programmed into the newly redistricted system, their ballot will offer the wrong ballot choices, giving candidates ineligible votes and failing to allow the voter to choose the correct candidate of his choice. PERMISSION TO REPRINT GRANTED, WITH LINK TO http://www.blackboxvoting.org * * * * * Here's local coverage of the latest election scandal unfolding in Shelby County: The Commercial Appeal - July 27, 2012, by Richard Locker http://www.commercialappeal.com/news/2012/jul/27/no-headline---state_audit/?CID=happeningnow State of Tennessee investigates Shelby County vote problems Audit request from the Secretary of State NASHVILLE — Calling the ballot issues in Shelby County "unacceptable" and a "mess," Secretary of State Tre' Hargett on Friday asked the state comptroller's office for an audit of the Shelby County Election Commission to identify and correct problems in the state's largest county. "I think to say it's unacceptable is not a strong enough statement," Hargett said in a conference call Friday afternoon with Memphis media. Hargett and State Election Coordinator Mark Goins — who works for Hargett — said that while they have not verified the latest estimates of more than 2,300 incorrect ballots being issued to Shelby County voters, they are not disputing it. They say they have verified more than 1,000 instances of voters being issued the incorrect ballot. ... "Shelby County has a reputation of having errors in their elections and it's got to stop. Obviously something is not right," Hargett said. ... Goins said the problems in Shelby County are "a mess." ... For example, if a voter knows they are in a state representative district that includes candidates G.A. Hardaway and Mike Kernell but neither of those names is on their Democratic primary ballot, they should summon a precinct election official and tell them, without casting the ballot. They should also notify the county election commission office and, if they want, they can notify the state election coordinator's office, Hargett said. The public must be able to see and authenticate these four essential steps for an election to be public, democratic, and valid: (1) Who can vote (voter list); (2) Who did vote (3) The original count; (4) Chain of custody.   Lois Charlane Hamilton Voting Rights Forum Participant Username: Vlhamilton Post Number: 1 Registered: 7-2012 Best of Black Box? N/A Votes: 0 (A keeper?) Posted on Wednesday, August 1, 2012 - 9:16 am:        These far right Republicans know that this is the ONLY way that they can beat President Obama. They are such cheaters and liars. They have NO conscience!   Kurt Bellman Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant Username: Realkurtb Post Number: 133 Registered: 6-2011 Best of Black Box?  Votes: 1 (A keeper?) Posted on Wednesday, August 1, 2012 - 9:39 am:        Implementing a redistricting in the election.com/Accenture database program's variants is the proverbial "dog's breakfast". It is counterintuitive to say the least; butt stupid is more like it. In PA, the actual cut-over of district numbers is done by the state's SURE database managers. In our current redistricting, the state DID the redistricting update, only to have to reverse out the State House and State Senate districts when the PA Supreme Court struck them down. They felt they HAD TO jump early due to the quality control work that must inevitably follow.   Bev Harris Board Administrator Username: Admin Post Number: 11724 Registered: 12-2004 Best of Black Box?  Votes: 1 (A keeper?) Posted on Wednesday, August 1, 2012 - 10:44 am:        Hi Lois, Welcome to Black Box Voting. Thanks for your post; just a note, we are a nonpartisan Web site. There are five Election Commissioners in Shelby County, 2 Democrats and three Republicans. Robert D. Meyers - Chairman (R) Norma Lester - Secretary (D) George C. Monger (D) Dee Nollner (R) Steve Stamson (R) In my opinion, four of them are actually pretty excellent, though the Republicans are of course Republican and the Democrats are certainly Democrat, and they fight for their own side. But you can do this with integrity, knowledge and honor or not so much, and what I've seen of them is pretty good, probably better than most places. The only one that I see as a problem is Dee Nollner, who is both uninformed about voting systems and federal law, and slightly wacky. I'm not sure anyone takes her seriously, but she is a tie-breaking vote of course. The real problem in Shelby County is elections administrator Richard Holden. He is habitually and deliberately deceptive. George Monger is exceptional, and has a good grasp of technical issues, and regularly goes above and beyond protecting voters rights. I know personally that he has made a real difference -- but you can't get much meaningful change when you have an obstacle in the way. I don't usually go after people. I try to focus on issues. But in Shelby County, Richard Holden IS an issue. I have his hard drive, I saw him in action as he lied and obstructed in the 2010 lawsuit, and I've seen the election carnage that's happened since. He's gotta go. That will be a start towards rebuilding an improved system there. The public must be able to see and authenticate these four essential steps for an election to be public, democratic, and valid: (1) Who can vote (voter list); (2) Who did vote (3) The original count; (4) Chain of custody.   From the Mailbag Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant Username: Mailbag Post Number: 328 Registered: 10-2005 Best of Black Box?  Votes: 1 (A keeper?) Posted on Wednesday, August 1, 2012 - 10:50 am:        Received via e-mail: Dear Bev Harris, Give up the idea that this is "mishandling." These people are doing a great job of what they set out to do: deprive certain voters of their right to vote. They don't want everyone to vote and they pick and choose who they are going to "snuff." ("Snuff" might be a slight exaggeration. If they killed the voters they don't want, they might get caught.) They are soldiering on in a dead paradigm and imposing their lost values upon those of us who have moved on out of exploitation and take-the-profit-and-run morality. Basically, you have to convey to the public that this is deliberate and must be fought with everything at our disposal. We are the 99%! J.B.   Rainbow Sally Voting Rights Forum Participant Username: Rainbowsally Post Number: 7 Registered: 6-2012 Best of Black Box?  Votes: 1 (A keeper?) Posted on Saturday, August 11, 2012 - 12:29 pm:        Why isn't this newsworthy in the mainstream. Is it that the banking criminals are getting away with organized crime perpetrated against the nation as a whole is THAT much more important? Hey money and dealing with organized crime is important in any society, but election integrity is most important in a democracy, especially a representative democracy, where we expect the peoples' business to be done by people worthy of public trust.

The public must be able to see and authenticate these four essential steps for an election to be public, democratic, and valid: (1) Who can vote (voter list); (2) Who did vote (3) The original count; (4) Chain of custody.