Reply #24: Back to the Future For N.Y. Voters [View All]

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Back to the future for N.Y. voters
By Cara Matthews
Albany Bureau

ALBANY — Before lever machines were first introduced in the late 19th century and spread throughout the state and country, New York voters filled out paper ballots to elect leaders.

The practice was abandoned because of rampant fraud. Ballot-box stuffing was common. So was chain voting, in which a voter armed with a stolen, marked ballot cast it at the poll, sneaked out with a blank one and got money or liquor in exchange for giving it to the political appointee, said Bo Lipari of New Yorkers for Verified Voting. The process would continue throughout the day.


“This was a very common thing that political parties did,” he said.

A decision this week by the state Board of Elections makes it likely that people who have spent a lifetime pulling levers will be handed a pencil when they go to vote in 2009.
Election commissioners decided that the disabled would vote this fall on one of three ballot-marking devices — which have features like Braille and audio — and the marked ballots will be scanned into vote tabulators. They will decide later this year which machines will be available for the general public in 2009, but many believe counties will choose a compatible system — paper ballots that voters mark with pencils then scan into the system — rather than ATM-style touch-screen machines, the other major voting technology. They think counties would be reluctant to incorporate a new system and doing so could be cost-prohibitive

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http://www.theithacajournal.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080126/NEWS01/801260354/1002