Ohio company's voting machines lead election issues in Maryland

[helderheid]

TOM STUCKEY
Associated Press

ANNAPOLIS, Md. - With Maryland facing what could be its most hotly contested election season ever, it's no surprise that election-related issues have grabbed the attention of lawmakers during the 2006 legislative session.

Some of the debate in the General Assembly has been highly partisan, with Republicans charging that Democrats are trying to stack the deck by making it easier to vote and Democrats saying Republicans want to restrict voting rolls because they fear a big turnout will hurt their candidates.

But the biggest election issue, which cuts across party lines, involves the electronic voting machines of Ohio-based Diebold that are scheduled to be used by all Maryland voters this year. With doubts growing about the reliability of the machines, a campaign to return to the days of paper ballots, at least for one year, is gaining momentum in the General Assembly.

"Republican Gov. Robert Ehrlich, who approved purchase of the Diebold Accuvote-TS voting system in 2003, now questions the reliability of the touchscreen machines.

I no longer have confidence in the State Board of Elections' ability to conduct fair and accurate elections in 2006," the governor said in a letter last month.

<snip>

More:

http://www.ohio.com/mld/beaconjournal/14025144.htm

[helderheid]

1. more (excellent article)

But the House Ways and Means Committee voted 20-3 on Friday to scrap the Diebold touchscreen machines for at least this year and use paper ballots with an optical-scan system for the primary and general elections. That would give the state two years to resolve questions about the touchscreen machines and add printers that would produce a paper copy of each ballot.

[Jane Austin]

2. Do I remember this correctly or not?

That in 2004 in Florida, the precincts that were most different from their exit polls (or maybe their pre-election polls) were the ones that used optical scanners.

In other words, it seems like the optical scanners are easier to manipulate than the touch-screen ones.

Anybody remember this?

[helderheid]

3. you're right. They use central tabulators too and can be manipulated that

way.

[Jane Austin]

4. So the only answer is

either to count all votes by hand, or

count votes at the precinct level with lots of citizen monitoring, and make a stink if they don't jibe with the tabulator's total.

Or is there some other way I'm not seeing?

[helderheid]

5. Open source machines:

http://www.openvotingconsortium.org/