Sarasota County audit to begin Monday, state officials say

[DoYouEverWonder]

Nov 11, 2006

TALLAHASSEE, Fla. (AP) -- State election officials said Saturday they were very concerned about the unusually high number of voters who didn't choose a candidate in a congressional race in Sarasota County, and planned to start an audit Monday.

The audit of Sarasota County's 13th District race will include ballot accounting, tabulator performance and forensic analysis, Secretary of State Sue Cobb said in a letter to Sarasota County Supervisor of Elections Kathy Dent.

Officials will also conduct at least two "parallel tests" of the voting equipment, using four of the spare machines that were not used on election day.

"Given our level of concern about this race and the number of voters who did not choose a candidate, we are paying very serious attention to the matter," the letter said.

Dent did not immediately return a message left at her office Saturday.

http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/F/FL_CONGRESS_DISTRICT_13_FLOL-?SITE=FLPET&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=state.shtml

Lot's of luck recounting vapor votes.

[daleo]

1. There seems to be an unusual level of concern

Does this district usually skew Republican?

"More than 18,000 voters did not register a selection in the race between Republican Vern Buchanan and Democrat Christine Jennings, but did make choices in other contests. That rate was much higher than what the district's other counties registered in the same congressional race.

Jennings, who was behind in the initial count by 373 votes, has been pressing for an audit."

Perhaps not, judging by the fact that it is Jennings who is pressing for an audit. Still, the tendency has just been to say "glitch", and ignore these things.

[SharonAnn]

2. Maybe they'll overturn it and have another election? Been done before,

but not often.

[Frances]

3. This is Katherine Harris' district

It became an open seat when Katherine Harris ran for the Senate. Although the district is usually Republican, the Dem candidate was very popular and was leading in the polls as I recall.

[daleo]

4. That's interesting context

It is a story well worth following, then.

[John Q. Citizen]

5. This is a strange thing to do:

"Officials will also conduct at least two "parallel tests" of the voting equipment, using four of the spare machines that were not used on election day."

Why not test the equipment used on election day? Wouldn't that be more "real world?"

[papau]

6. Testing the actual machines might reveal the "special" programming

We would not want that to happen, now would we? :-(

[Frances]

7. I assume that they will vote on the spare machines to see if

these machines register the vote for the representative. If the spare machine doesn't register that vote, then there will be reason to assume that the machines that were actually used also failed to register the vote for the representative. If the spare does register the vote, then we are still left with the question of what happened to the 18,000 votes.