{"id":3929,"date":"2006-12-19T10:05:33","date_gmt":"2006-12-19T18:05:33","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.bradblog.com\/?p=3929"},"modified":"2006-12-20T04:10:32","modified_gmt":"2006-12-20T12:10:32","slug":"election-election-costs-doubled-in-utah-due-to-diebold-touch-screen-voting-systems","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/bradblog.com\/?p=3929","title":{"rendered":"Election Costs Doubled in Utah Due to Use of Diebold Touch-Screen Voting Systems"},"content":{"rendered":"

<\/a>If you needed any more evidence to counter the argument that it would be “too expensive” to dump all the shitty, unreliable, inaccurate, hackable, disenfranchising touch-screen (DRE) voting systems in favor of paper ballots<\/i>, just take a look at Utah. They’re the state which pushed out heroic 23-year Emery County Election Clerk Bruce Funk because he had the temerity to allow independent computer security experts to test the Diebold touch-screen systems the state was forcing him to use. (The experts found massive security flaws described as<\/a> “the most severe” ever discovered.)<\/p>\n

Well, now Utah has finally discovered that their switch from punch-cards to shitty, unreliable, inaccurate, hackable, disenfranchising Diebold touch-screen systems has doubled the cost of their elections. And then some. Get a load of this from the Salt-Lake Tribune<\/i>…<\/a><\/p>\n

“I’m not sure any of us realized how much it is going to cost to own and operate this system,” said Michael Cragun, elections director for the Lieutenant Governor’s Office. <\/p>\n

Those costs are so prohibitive that many Utahns in next year’s local elections will revert to a voting style used for generations: checking a box on a paper ballot.
\n…
\nCity leaders are worried, having heard rumors they may have to triple their election budget if they go with the touch-screen machines.
\n…
\nin August 2005, [Lt. Gov. Gary] Herbert signed a contract with Texas-based Diebold Election Systems for $24.5 million. He paid the tab with a federal grant issued through HAVA.<\/p>\n

In return, Utah received about 3,000 voting machines and the technical support to run statewide elections this year and in 2008. <\/p>\n

But it is now becoming clear that was just the start of the costs. <\/p>\n

“We are not sure everyone understood what happened when they flicked that first domino over,” Cragun said.
\n…
\nSalt Lake County Clerk Sherrie Swensen says she had to double the pay for poll workers because of the necessary training. She now spends $12,000 per month storing the bulky machines. And all of the memory cards, batteries and other essential machine accessories cost her office an extra $138,000 this year.<\/p>\n

These costs will continue to accrue as Swensen and other county clerks say they need more machines for the 2008 presidential election.<\/p><\/div>\n

Unbelievable. I love how they’re running around and saying “we had no idea!”… Idiots.<\/p>\n

Have I mentioned lately how important it is that you — and everybody you know — sign this petition<\/b><\/a> to demand Congress require a paper BALLOT for every vote cast (and get rid, once and for all, of all the shitty, unreliable, inaccurate, hackable, disenfranchising Direct Recording Electronic touch-screen voting systems in the bargain)?! As they say…Don’t wait! ACT NOW!<\/a><\/p>\n

(Hat-tip John Gideon<\/a><\/i>)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

If you needed any more evidence to counter the argument that it would be “too expensive” to dump all the shitty, unreliable, inaccurate, hackable, disenfranchising touch-screen (DRE) voting systems in favor of paper ballots, just take a look at Utah. They’re the state which pushed out heroic 23-year Emery County Election Clerk Bruce Funk because […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,147,31],"tags":[],"coauthors":[],"class_list":["post-3929","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-dieboldpremier","category-lava","category-utah"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/bradblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3929","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/bradblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/bradblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bradblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bradblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=3929"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/bradblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3929\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/bradblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=3929"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bradblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=3929"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bradblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=3929"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bradblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcoauthors&post=3929"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}