Guest Blogged by John Gideon of VotersUnite.org and VoteTrustUSA.Org
Nevada County (California) Registrar of Voters/County Clerk-Recorder Kathleen Smith recommended against contracting with ES&S for AutoMark deployment for the June 6, 2006, election, at the Board of Supervisors meeting yesterday. Mr. Tom O’Brien of ES&S said ES&S would not agree to the County’s request for contract terms regarding shared cost of upgrades or specific trade-in terms on future improved equipment. Now, 41 days before California’s Primary Election, Lou Dedier of ES&S refuses to provide services to Nevada County (software coding for optical scan ballot tabulation equipment) for the June 6 election without a service agreement. A typically arrogant act by a company that does not care if they lose business because they have much more than they can possibly handle….
AR: Pulaski County � Train Wreck – Readying of voting machines is lagging LINK
CA: Nevada County � Train Wreck – County may miss voting law compliance LINK
IN: Porter County � Train Wreck – Incorrect ballots will be replaced. But many problems remain unresolved for next week’s primary. LINK
OH: Summit County � Train Wreck – Summit vote system to debut. ES&S has extra memory cards on hand; elections board LINK
OH: Summit County � Train Wreck – E-VOTE TRAIN WRECK ’06: ES&S Memory Cards Continue to Fail in Ohio as Primary Kicks off Next Tuesday. But ES&S Has a Brilliant New Plan for Technical Support! LINK
PA: Allegheny County � Train Wreck – New Allegheny County voting machines criticized in court hearing (ES&S) LINK
PA: Allegheny County � Train Wreck – Expert warns of voting chaos LINK
CA: Seven Counties Dismissed From California Voters Lawsuit to Block Use or Purchase of Electronic Voting Machines LINK
FL: Leon County – County will get voting machines LINK
GA: DeKalb County – DeKalb voters need to watch the mail LINK
IN: Elections panel to OK use of new voting equipment (MicroVote) LINK
IN: Voting software likely to get state’s OK Friday LINK
IN: Delaware County – Delaware election officials expect voting machines to be approved LINK
IN: Randolph County – Randolph ready to vote electronically (Voting Technologies International) LINK
MS: Madison County – Study: County voting precincts in compliance LINK
NE: Dawes County – Election features new voting machines (AutoMark, ES&S M-650) LINK
NJ: Belmar – Tie in Belmar leads to recount LINK
PA: Pa. lawmakers want voting-device break LINK
PA: Westmoreland County – Westmoreland will save on moving voting machines LINK
TN: Sumner County – Early voting ends Thursday LINK
WV: Lawrence County – New voting system goes countywide LINK
**”Daily Voting News” is meant as a comprehensive listing of reports each day concerning issues related to election and voting news around the country regardless of quality or political slant. Therefore, items listed in “Daily Voting News” may not reflect the opinions of VotersUnite.Org or BradBlog.Com**
Nevada County (California) Registrar of Voters/County Clerk-Recorder Kathleen Smith recommended against contracting with ES&S for AutoMark deployment for the June 6, 2006, election, at the Board of Supervisors meeting yesterday. Mr. Tom O’Brien of ES&S said ES&S would not agree to the County’s request for contract terms regarding shared cost of upgrades or specific trade-in terms on future improved equipment. Now, 41 days before California’s Primary Election, Lou Dedier of ES&S refuses to provide services to Nevada County (software coding for optical scan ballot tabulation equipment) for the June 6 election without a service agreement. A typically arrogant act by a company that does not care if they lose business because they have much more than they can possibly handle….
Might I suggest that in states without paper trails on their voting machines you copy or scan your completed absentee ballot then mail it return reciept requested to the proper place. This will give you a verifiable copy of your vote so if the vote is flipped you can demand a recall.
Post above,..
Interesting concept,…
You may have the answer to the riddle.
One of the best to come up the pike.
More vote counting fraud from Ohio,..
More Ohio vote count fraud : Link
I like the practicality expressed by one person in the CA (7 counties dismissed) lawsuit:
"No county benefits from risking election funds on expensive electronic voting systems that have acknowledged vulnerability and accessibility problems and fall short of satisfying legal requirements" (link here).
Throw in the waste of democracy by the use of such machines, and one can only wonder what possessed these election officials to go down this dead end road (at full speed in the Silver Tongued Bullet [apologies to Coors]).
barryg #1
The only problem is they may refuse to accept it since the additional step is required. I had that happen in a personal matter where the recipient was a private individual. I don’t know about the registrars office.
John Gideon
In your links above you mention the 7 California counties pledging to use paper ballots instead of machines.
How will these ballots be counted?
BlueBear 2 #6
Brad’s post today points out that Texas counties may have to do the same thing.
Wow, being forced to do the proper thing … who knew?
Dredd – I saw that thread and it does say Texas will hand count, I’m wondering if they will do the same here in the seven counties mentioned, or use tabulators which can still be hacked.
I’m also watching Nevada County which lies just North East of here. They have turned down ES&S machines. Nevad county is one of the more progressive areas containing long itm hippie enclaves in the old gold mining towns of Grass Valley and Nevada City. More recently though there has been an influx of monied people driving up the housing costs and taking over the landscape.