Daily Voting News For February 22-24, 2007

Princeton’s Professor Ed Felten said this in regards to the Sarasota Co. Florida voting machine report, “Experience teaches that systems that are insecure tend to be unreliable as well — they tend to go wrong on their own even if nobody is attacking them. Code that is laced with buffer overruns, array out-of-bounds errors, integer overflow errors, and the like tends to be flaky. Sporadic undervotes are the kind of behavior you would expect to see from a flaky voting technology. The study claims to have ruled out reliability problems as a cause of the undervotes, but their evidence on this point is weak, and I think the jury is still out on whether voting machine malfunctions could be a significant cause of the undervotes.”

The town of Putney, Vermont may be about ready to accept a free optical-scan machine from the state. They will no longer count their votes the traditional way; hand counting. Gone will be the crowd of counters sharing pizza and enjoying the community spirit. Putney is not alone as 75 of the state’s 246 municipalities have already made the decision to change over to optical-scan. ...

• CA: Riverside County – Critics feed Riverside County review panel examples of voting system issues LINK
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• California: San Joaquin County - Questions linger for electronic voting machines LINK
• Florida: 'Paper trail' printer jams can gum up vote recounts LINK
• Florida: Sarasota County – Ed Felten - Sarasota Voting Machines Insecure LINK
• Florida: Sarasota County - Jennings Says Florida's Audit of Election 'Flawed, Incomplete' LINK
• Florida: Sarasota County - Panel Cites Voter Error, Not Software, in Loss of Votes LINK
• Florida: Sarasota County - Missing votes in Sarasota not caused by machines LINK
• Florida: Sarasota County - Jennings has another loss at voting machines LINK
• Florida: Sarasota County - State audit concludes Sarasota election fair LINK
• Iowa: Paper trail for votes LINK
• Idaho: Ada County will do away with punch-card ballots, move to optical-scan system LINK
• Minnesota: Houston County - Mound Prairie to vote on election changes LINK
• New York: Spitzer must protect New York voters with disabilities LINK
• New York: ‘Paper’ tigers issue warnings - Greens lead fight to scrap electronic voting machines LINK
• Ohio: Cuyahoga County - A Report from the Public Monitor of the Cuyahoga County Board of Elections LINK
• Vermont: Putney mulls buying electronic vote-counting machine LINK
• Wyoming: Electronic voting study requested 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 Scoop.**

According to the South Florida Sun-Sentinel, “A state-mandated test of voting machines before the March municipal election went off without a flaw Friday at the Palm Beach County Supervisor of Elections, officials said. Elections Supervisor Arthur Anderson tested 2 percent of the 830 machines that will be in use during the March 13 city elections, running mock ballots to make sure the computerized voting systems and touch-screen machines are working.” 2 percent? That’s not a test, it’s a spot check. // In a press release today PFAW said, “An audit report released by the Florida Secretary of State’s office regarding Sarasota County’s November election debacle came under fire shortly after its release today. “This audit’s a whitewash. It is the result of a flawed process overseen by people with a stake in the outcome, and it will not be the last word on this matter,” said People For the American Way Foundation President Ralph G. Neas. “Something went terribly wrong in Sarasota County last November—and voters have provided credible evidence that widespread voting machine malfunctions were part of the problem. Unfortunately, this report papers over that evidence.”...

• NAtional: "The Ballad of Sarasota" captures Voters' Angst LINK
• National: E-voting Testers Accredited U.S. Election Assistance Commission approves SysTest and iBeta Quality Assurance to check machines. LINK
• National: H.R. 811, the New Holt Bill LINK
• Arkansas: Benton County - State says county handling election issues LINK
• Florida: Palm Beach County - Voting machine test goes off without a hitch in Palm Beach County LINK
• Florida: Sarasota County - March election could be last for voting machines that led to dispute LINK
• Florida: Sarasota County - Secretary of State’s FL-13 Audit Report Whitewashes Clear Evidence of Voting Machine Problems in Sarasota LINK
• Florida: Sarasota County - State: No problems with Sarasota voting machines LINK
• Florida: Sarasota County - Two reports reach same verdict: No voting machine fault LINK
• Florida: Sarasota County - Audit finds no evidence of voting machine malfunctioning LINK
• Florida: Sarasota County - OFFICIAL FLORIDA AUDIT ON FL-13 RELEASED: Conflicting Conclusions Revealed Despite State Claim of 'No Evidence to Suggest Official Results in Error' LINK
• Illinois: Chicago - State Supreme Court says two aldermen should not be on ballot LINK
• Illinois: Chicago - Ill. High Court: Ex-felons can't run for city office LINK
• Kansas: Kansas Senate Passes Controversial Voter ID Bill LINK
• Minnesota: Township tradition threatened New state law causing officials election headaches LINK
• Ohio: Public Monitor Reports Serious, Possibly Illegal, Security Breaches During Ohio Mid-term Elections LINK
• Utah: SL TRIB: Cost for Utah Presidential Primary 'Balloons' from $850k to $3.4 MILLION(!) Due to New Electronic Voting Machines 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 Scoop.**

According to an article in the San Francisco Chronicle, “San Francisco supervisors told representatives of a voting machine company Wednesday that the firm will need to publicly display details of the software it uses to count ballots in order to win a $12.6 million, four-year contract with the city. At a Budget and Finance Committee hearing, Supervisors Tom Ammiano and Chris Daly urged representatives of Sequoia Voting Systems of Oakland to place software codes for touch-screen voting devices and paper ballot-scanning machines on the Internet or in another public forum, so the public can review how the machines tabulate votes.” “Steven Bennet, a Sequoia representative, said Sequoia won't agree to public disclosure [of source code on voting machines] since it would "jeopardize the security to all of our customers in California and across the country."” ...

• NAtional: Ask Congress to amend Holt Bill - HR 811 LINK
• National: John Bonifaz makes the case for amending Holt's HR 811 LINK
• National: Beyond the Voting Machine: Stealth Barriers to Voter Participation LINK
• California: Riverside County - Committee looks into Riverside County's electronic-voting system LINK
• California: San Francisco - Software fight delays use of high-tech ballots LINK
• California: San Francisco - Supes want to know how voting machines count Company balks at public disclosure, offers alternative LINK
• California: San Francisco - Sequoia Voting Systems Spokes**** Laugh Line of the Moment... LINK
• Florida: Her job is to improve Florida's voting woes Elections Director Amy Tuck will lead the change to optical-scan machines. LINK
• Florida: Volusia County - Diebold Examines Volusia Voting Machines LINK
• Georgia: Concern growing for voters LINK
• Illinois: Chicago - Lesson learned: Get more pens LINK
• Illinois: Chicago - New procedures, tools should make election day glitch-free LINK
• Illinois: Chicago - Board of Elections: Low voter turnout expected LINK
• Illinois: Chicago - City Election Officials Say Voting Problems Fixed LINK
• Indiana: Centers bring flexibility for voters Casting ballots in Richmond won't be Election Day-only option LINK
• Kansas: Kansas Senate Passes Controversial Voter ID Bill LINK
• North Carolina: Buncombe County - Princeton professor buys Buncombe’s old voting machines LINK
• New Jersey: Voting activists demand constitutional paper trail: Sequoia vows to install voting-machine printers by next January LINK
• Ohio: Editorial - Making sure votes count LINK
• Pennsylvania: Northampton County - Panel demands answers on voting machines LINK
• Rhode Island: Bill would allow public to see rejected ballots LINK
• Rhode Island: After election confusion, R.I. lawmakers unveil reform bill LINK
• South Carolina: S.C. coalition to take on electronic voting machines LINK
• Texas: Cost may stall ballot paper trail LINK
• Virginia: GOP amendment to require ID for provisional ballot voters fails 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 Scoop.**

John Gideon
Executive Director www.votersunite.org and
Member www.votetrustusa.org

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