[lbo-talk] 'cast your ballots with care'

[JBrown72073 at cs.com]

Expensive machines pieces of crap?  Blame the voter.  
We're still using paper ballots with optical scanners in my Florida county.  
What's NYC using these days?

Jenny Brown

http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/news/politics/elections/15869924.htm

Glitches Cited in Early Voting
By Charles Rabin and Darran Simon

The Miami Herald Saturday 28 October 2006

     Early voters are urged to cast their ballots with care following 
scattered reports of problems with heavily used machines.

     After a week of early voting, a handful of glitches with 
electronic voting machines have drawn the ire of voters, reassurances 
from elections supervisors - and a caution against the careless 
casting of ballots.

     Several South Florida voters say the choices they touched on the 
electronic screens were not the ones that appeared on the review 
screen - the final voting step.

     Election officials say they aren't aware of any serious voting 
issues. But in Broward County, for example, they don't know how 
widespread the machine problems are because there's no process for 
poll workers to quickly report minor issues and no central database 
of machine problems.

     In Miami-Dade, incidents are logged and reported daily and 
recorded in a central database. Problem machines are shut down.

     "In the past, Miami-Dade County would send someone to correct the 
machine on site," said Lester Sola, county supervisor of elections. 
Now, he said, "We close the machine down and put a seal on it."

     Debra A. Reed voted with her boss on Wednesday at 
African-American Research Library and Cultural Center near Fort 
Lauderdale. Her vote went smoothly, but boss Gary Rudolf called her 
over to look at what was happening on his machine. He touched the 
screen for gubernatorial candidate Jim Davis, a Democrat, but the 
review screen repeatedly registered the Republican, Charlie Crist.

     That's exactly the kind of problem that sends conspiracy 
theorists into high gear - especially in South Florida, where a 
history of problems at the polls have made voters particularly 
skittish.

     A poll worker then helped Rudolf, but it took three tries to get 
it right, Reed said.

     "I'm shocked because I really want ... to trust that the issues 
with irregularities with voting machines have been resolved," said 
Reed, a paralegal. "It worries me because the races are so close."

     Broward Supervisor of Elections spokeswoman Mary Cooney said it's 
not uncommon for screens on heavily used machines to slip out of 
sync, making votes register incorrectly. Poll workers are trained to 
recalibrate them on the spot - essentially, to realign the video 
screen with the electronics inside. The 15-step process is outlined 
in the poll-workers manual.

     "It is resolved right there at the early-voting site," Cooney said.

     Broward poll workers keep a log of all maintenance done on 
machines at each site. But the Supervisor of Elections office doesn't 
see that log until the early voting period ends. And a machine isn't 
taken out of service unless the poll clerk decides it's a chronic 
poor performer that can't be fixed.

     Cooney said no machines have been removed during early voting, 
and she is not aware of any serious problems.

     In Miami-Dade, two machines have been taken out of service during 
early voting. No votes were lost, Sola said.

     Joan Marek, 60, a Democrat from Hollywood, was also stunned to 
see Charlie Crist on her ballot review page after voting on Thursday. 
"Am I on the voting screen again?" she wondered. "Well, this is too 
weird."

     Marek corrected her ballot and alerted poll workers at the 
Hollywood satellite courthouse, who she said told her they'd had 
previous problems with the same machine.

     Poll workers did some work on her machine when she finished 
voting, Marek said. But no report was made to the Supervisor of 
Elections office and the machine was not removed, Cooney said.

     Workers at the Hollywood poll said there had been no voting 
problems on Friday.

     Mauricio Raponi wanted to vote for Democrats across the board at 
the Lemon City Library in Miami on Thursday. But each time he hit the 
button next to the candidate, the Republican choice showed up. 
Raponi, 53, persevered until the machine worked. Then he alerted a 
poll worker.

***