Thu
Mar 26 2009
06:05 am
Tennessee Republicans do not want voter verifiable voting in 2010
By: R. Neal

The Tennessee General Assembly passed bi-partisan legislation (HB1256) last year requiring voter verifiable optical scan ballots for elections in all Tennessee counties and for new systems to be in place no later than the 2010 elections. The Governor signed it into law on June 5th (Public Chapter 1108).

According to the bill's fiscal note, the cost for new machines would be a one-time expense of approx. $25 million.

At that time, the most recent U.S. Election Assistance Commission report showed that Tennessee has approx. $31.4 million in unused federal Help America Vote Act (HAVA) funds available for the upgrade.

Now Republicans legislators and the newly appointed GOP state election coordinator are backpedaling.

They say it will cost the state too much money. As noted previously, there was more than enough unused federal funding available for the upgrade.

They say there are no federally certified machines available. Florida passed a similar law in 2007 and had optical scan ballots in place for nearly every voter in the 2008 elections.

In fact, according to Pew Research, other states using optical scan ballots exclusively include Alabama, Iowa, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Montana, New Mexico, North Dakota, and Rhode Island. Connecticut, Maine, New Hampshire, and Oklahoma have optical scan ballots and vote by phone.

Tennessee Republicans would have you believe that all of these states are in violation of federal election certification standards.

Optical scan systems are available from a variety of manufacturers. Hart Intercivic, whose ESlate systems are used in Knox and thirty other counties, has a precinct optical scan system that meets Tennessee's Voter Confidence Act requirements. Presumably it is compatible with the back-end election management and tabulation systems already in place.

The bottom line is that Tennessee Republicans all of a sudden do not want voters to be able to verify that their vote is counted in the 2010 elections. They also do not want a a human readable paper ballot to be the official vote of record in case of a recount. Why do you suppose that is?

UPDATE: The "federally certified" requirement was snuck into the final bill at some point and I completely missed it. The original bill just said machines had to be certified by the state. The federal program is new and just getting underway. State participation is voluntary. This could all be fixed by changing the bill back to its original requirement.

RELATED:

• TennViews: TACIR report on Tennessee elections and voting systems

• TennViews: Verifiable voting: It's the law!

• Liberadio(!): Urge Tennessee’s Legislators to Keep the Voter Confidence Act Intact

• Liberadio(!): Tennessee Republicans Play the Electronic Voting Machine Hokey Pokey

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bizgrrl's picture

So, they need to provide

Submitted by bizgrrl on Thu, 2009/03/26 - 6:32am.

So, they need to provide further explanations. Theoretically there is $31 million to cover the costs. What is this $11 million they speak of that local governments will have to spend?

R. Neal's picture

The only thing I can figure

Submitted by R. Neal on Thu, 2009/03/26 - 6:49am.

The only thing I can figure is it is some kind of recurring cost for printing and storing paper ballots?

News flash: Elections cost money!

Andy Axel's picture

They say there are no

Submitted by Andy Axel on Thu, 2009/03/26 - 9:53am.

They say there are no federally certified machines available. Florida passed a similar law in 2007 and had optical scan ballots in place for nearly every voter in the 2008 elections.

Actually, under applicable federal law, the state has to do the certification of the machines. The quote that I read was "no optical scanner system has been certified in accord with applicable federal law, so no qualifying machine is available." What this means is that Brook Thompson has been digging in and dragging his feet and not doing the required work. And now that it's come time to get things moving, whoops! There's no machines that meet HAVA requirements - for certification that has to be done by each state according to the law. There's also the priceless whine about, "Well, even if we certified one, then we'd be sponsoring a state monopoly and we caaaaan't dooooooo thaaaaaaaaaat." Which means that they REALLY didn't do their job.

There is no such thing as a federally certified machines. The federal government doesn't run elections. States do.

____________________________

Dirty deeds done dirt cheap! Special holidays, Sundays and rates!

R. Neal's picture

no optical scanner system

Submitted by R. Neal on Thu, 2009/03/26 - 11:32am.

no optical scanner system has been certified in accord with applicable federal law

Yes, was exactly my point (without getting into technicalities), that this is doublespeak designed to mislead the voter.

Here are the state's rules:

(link...)

I can't imagine any system that wouldn't qualify.

I'm also curious why Brook Thompson was (as I recall) gung ho for this bill and now he seems to be backtracking, too.

Andy Axel's picture

It's not for lack of

Submitted by Andy Axel on Thu, 2009/03/26 - 12:02pm.

It's not for lack of product. You'd figure that Tennessee's ES&S sales rep would be pretty hot to get this system implemented as a "pull-through." Diebold Premier Election Solutions is an approved vendor for touch-screen voting, and they have a comparable optical scan solution. As does Hart InterCivic.

The problem is that verified voting isn't a priority with the Department of State. Period. Brook Thompson was certainly hot to get electronic voting put in place, but he constantly bitched about how much that deadlines worked against him in implementing things like the ES&S solution. And now Mark Goins has his job.

____________________________

Dirty deeds done dirt cheap! Special holidays, Sundays and rates!

rc joyner's picture

voting machines

Submitted by rc joyner (not verified) on Thu, 2009/03/26 - 12:08pm.

the real cost will be each and every election.

you have to have 104% ballots for ALL registered voters - not just the ones that vote each year.

the cost to the counties will go on and on.

R. Neal's picture

I thought the law allowed

Submitted by R. Neal on Thu, 2009/03/26 - 12:10pm.

I thought the law allowed for print on demand?

Kent Flanagan's picture

Skepticism fading into cynicism

Submitted by Kent Flanagan (not verified) on Thu, 2009/03/26 - 4:06pm.

We have all heard of and read horror stories about unverifiable voting scandals in other states and they cover the political spectrum. I shouldn't want to suggest that Republicans are trying to hedge their bets for the next election, but it is hard not to. Why wouldn't anyone want to be able to leave the voting booth assured that his or her vote is verifiable? Hey, just look at what is going on in Minnesota.

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