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GOVERNOR O’MALLEY FUNDS VOTING SYSTEM CHANGE
New, Less Expensive System Will Allow for Recounts
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: Jan. 16, 2008
CONTACT:
Robert Ferraro, Co-Director, SAVEourVotes.org (Columbia)
Save Our Votes (SOV) sent its congratulations to Maryland Governor Martin O'Malley today for including in his proposed budget for the next fiscal year funds for the purchase of a new voting system based on paper ballots counted by optical scanners in each precinct.
The Governor has long advocated replacing the state's paperless touch-screen system. His action today is supported by nearly two-thirds of Maryland voters, according to a recent statewide public opinion poll by Gonzales Research. [www.saveourvotes.org/releases]
"We are delighted that the Governor and the General Assembly have responded to the voters and moved forcefully to replace our risky system with one that will be both secure and cost-effective," Robert Ferraro, co-director of SOV said today.
The new system will allow voters to ensure that their votes are recorded as they intend to cast them, and provide a means for independent recounts, capabilities which are not possible with the current voting system. This change will bring Maryland into line with the many other states that have recently abandoned touch-screen voting in favor of voter-marked paper ballots counted by optical scanners. Florida expects to have optical scanners in place statewide before this year’s presidential election. California and Ohio have both enacted severe restrictions on the use of touch-screen voting machines after thorough reviews of their security and reliability.
SOV co-director Shelley Fudge said, "The new system will also provide special ballot-marking equipment in each precinct for voters unable to mark their ballots by hand."
SOV, a statewide grass-roots organization, has worked for the past two years with legislators, state officials and dozens of citizens’ groups throughout the state to bring about this change in the state's voting system. In April of last year, the General Assembly voted unanimously to replace the touch-screen system. Governor O'Malley signed the bill in May, and all that remained was for funding to be provided to make the change in time for the 2010 general election.
"Today's action, when adopted by the General Assembly in April, will reverse the soaring operating costs that the state and counties have experienced since adopting the touch-screen system," Rebecca Wilson, a co-director of SOV pointed out. "So, beginning in 2010, Maryland voters will not only be voting on a more secure, voter-verified system, but one that will save the taxpayers millions of dollars each year." (See www.saveourvotes.org for an analysis of voting system costs.) ###
Poll Shows Maryland Voters Favor Funding Switch to Paper Ballots 2 to 1;
Survey Finds Support Higher, 3 to 1, among Democrats and Independents
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: Oct. 23, 2007
CONTACT:
Robert Ferraro, Co-Director, SAVEourVotes.org (Columbia)
As the state legislature prepares for a special budget session to begin next week, a new poll released today shows overwhelming support among Maryland voters for funding the switch away from paperless electronic voting machines.
Survey participants were asked: “Last spring Maryland's General Assembly voted unanimously to switch from touch screen voting machines to a less expensive system that uses paper ballots counted by optical scanners. This would ensure that votes are recorded as voters intend, and make recounts possible. The change will happen in 2010, but only if funded in next year's budget. Do you think the Governor should, or should not, provide funding for this change?”
The survey revealed particularly strong support in some demographic groups, with 75% of Independents, 74% of Democrats, and 71% of African Americans favoring funding the switch. A majority of voters in every region of the state endorse the change.
"Election expenses have soared to nearly 10 times their cost before we began using the touch-screen voting machines,” stated SAVE our Votes Co-Director, Rebecca Wilson. “This move to a less expensive, more reliable voting system is fiscally responsible as well as highly popular. It's just common sense."
Maryland’s switch to paper ballots is part of a national trend as election day problems and one prestigious study after another confirm the risks of paperless electronic voting. Florida will change to optical scanners statewide by 2008 after touch-screen machines lost 18,000 votes last fall in a hotly contested congressional race that was decided by less than 400 votes. California has decertified most of its touch-screen voting machines and will use them only under stringent restrictions next year. New Mexico switched in 2006, and a recent study by the CalTech/MIT Voting Technology Project showed high satisfaction with the change among both voters and election workers.
The survey was paid for by SAVE our Votes, a nonpartisan, nonprofit, grassroots organization working for Secure, Accessible, Verifiable Elections in Maryland. The survey results are posted in full at www.saveourvotes.org. ###
Election Watchdog Group Monitors Baltimore City Primary
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: Sept. 10, 2007
CONTACT:
Robert Ferraro, Co-Director, SAVEourVotes.org (Columbia)
SAVE our Votes, a grassroots election integrity organization, will monitor the Baltimore City Primary Election on Tuesday, September 11, 2007. Citizen volunteers, working as election judges and credentialed poll watchers for candidates, will be checking for compliance with election laws, rules and procedures, and be on the lookout for any problems with the paperless, electronic voting system.
“Numerous studies of Maryland’s Diebold touchscreen voting system have shown it to be very vulnerable to undetectable tampering, and California recently decertified similar machines for this reason,” said Shelley Fudge, Co-Director of the Columbia, MD based organization. “Maryland’s Board of Elections relies on administrative procedures to protect these machines from tampering, so strict compliance with these rules is extremely important.”
Voters in Tuesday’s primary election are urged to be attentive to any glitches or strange behavior from the touchscreen voting machines and to insist that election judges record any problems in their election day logs. Past monitoring efforts around the state have documented various types of problems such as candidates missing from the ballot, difficulty selecting a candidate’s name with the screen touch, and machines freezing up in the middle of voting. All of these problems could cause an inaccurate recording of voters’ choices.
Similar problems in the November, 2006, election in Sarasota County, FL, resulted in 18,000 votes going unrecorded in an hotly contested race for the US Congress that was decided by less than 400 votes. With some very close races expected in this primary election, even seemingly small problems could alter the outcomes.
“The overall, and presently unsolvable problem, however, is that Maryland’s paperless system cannot be audited for accuracy”, said Robert Ferraro, another Co-Director of the group. “If, by fraud or malfunction, the fully electronic system fails to accurately record or tally votes, we have no way of recovering lost or changed votes.”
This glaring deficiency will be remedied when Maryland changes to a paper-based voting system in 2010. The General Assembly mandated this change unanimously earlier this year. Governor O’Malley recently pledged to fund this change of voting system on a Baltimore radio show last week. A two-minute audio clip of his remarks is available at the SAVEourVotes.org website. ###
Governor O'Malley Pledges to 'Do Everything in My Power' to Fund Paper Ballots Bill
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: September 10, 2007
CONTACT: Robert Ferraro, Co-Director, SAVEourVotes.org (Columbia)
Responding to a question from a caller on a Baltimore talk radio show on September 6, Maryland Governor Martin O’Malley reaffirmed his commitment to moving the state from electronic touch-screen voting machines to an election system that uses voter-marked paper ballots counted with optical scanners by 2010.
Appearing as a guest on the Marc Steiner Show on WYPR radio, Gov. O'Malley said, “I think, given what other Marylanders are sacrificing for democracy abroad, we certainly have the ability to invest in protecting our election system here at home — protecting democracy in Maryland. So that's a promise I intend to be able to keep; and I'm going to do everything in my power to do so.”
Last April the Maryland House and Senate unanimously passed a bill requiring that State elections be held using paper ballots beginning with the 2010 election. But a provision in the law renders it null and void unless the purchase of the necessary equipment is funded in the next State budget, which the Governor’s office is currently preparing.
Public opinion polls show that 69% of Maryland voters want a paper record of their votes, and 57% would prefer to use optically scanned paper ballots compared with 41% who favor the paperless touch-screen voting machines. Nineteen of the state’s 24 election jurisdictions used optical scan systems before switching to touch-screen voting machines in 2004, so the equipment is already familiar to voters as well as to elections administrators and poll workers. All absentee and provisional ballots are currently cast and counted this way throughout the state.
Maryland’s switch to paper ballots is part of a national trend as one prestigious study after another confirms the riskiness of using direct-recording electronic (DRE) voting machines. California recently decertified most of its DREs and imposed strict limitations on those in use for disability access, requiring that all votes cast on them be hand-tallied solely from the paper print-outs already mandated on all their machines. Florida decided to move to paper statewide by 2008 after DREs failed to record 18,000 votes last November in a hotly contested Congressional race that was decided by less than 400 votes.
New Mexico was the first state to eliminate its DREs and implement optical scan systems statewide less than a year before the 2006 elections. A recent study of New Mexico’s 2006 elections by the CalTech/MIT Voting Technology Project reported a high satisfaction rate with the new system among both voters and poll workers. The study found that, “Poll workers gave the new process particularly high marks on reliability, privacy, and ease of use” and that “over eight in 10 voters (81.9%) voters rated their voting experience excellent or good.” The full report is available at . A transcript and an audio file of the Governor’s remarks. ###
CONTACT: Robert Ferraro 301-661-2989, Co-Director, SAVEourVotes.org (Columbia, Md.)
In a letter dated July 2, 2007, SAVE Our Votes, a non-partisan citizen organization working for verifiable elections in Maryland, called on the Montgomery County Ethics Commission to investigate the appearance of County Election Director, Margaret Jurgensen, in a Diebold Election Systems marketing brochure. Ms. Jurgensen’s photo appears in the brochure along with comments praising the Diebold voting stations that have been used in Montgomery County since 2002. Elections officials from Georgia, Kansas and California also appear in the brochure.
As with the recently reported controversy over State Board of Elections Administrator Linda Lamone’s appearance in a Diebold marketing brochure, the appearance of Ms. Jurgensen seems to be a clear violation of the County’s Ethics law on misuse of prestige of office.
(Montgomery County Code Chapter 19A, Ethics 21, Sec. 19A-14) “A public employee must not intentionally use the prestige of office for private gain or the gain of another.”
http://www.montgomerycountymd.gov/content/ethics/docs/19a.pdf
“Although the brochure seems to be several years old, it is very important for the Ethics Commission to investigate and issue a ruling as to whether this type of conduct by the Election Director is permissible under County law,” said Robert Ferraro, Co-Director of SAVE Our Votes. “This brochure illustrates a disturbing trend that voting rights advocates have observed nationwide of many elections officials being too cozy with voting machine vendors,” he added.
“As Maryland prepares to transition from paperless electronic voting to a paper-ballot voting system, how is the public to have confidence in the impartiality of the procurement process if elections officials are helping to promote products from a particular company?” said Shelley Fudge, another Co-Director of SAVE Our Votes.
Both Ms. Jurgensen and Ms. Lamone have been staunch defenders of the Diebold paperless, touchscreen voting systems, despite repeated reports from independent computer scientists that the systems are susceptible to fraud because of severe security vulnerabilities. The lack of a paper record makes recounts or audits of election results impossible.
The Ethics Commission has put the issue on the agenda for its July 24, 2007 meeting in Rockville.
###
CONTACT: Robert Ferraro 301-661-2989, Co-Director, SAVEourVotes.org (Columbia)
Gov. Martin O’Malley signed legislation Thursday that calls for replacing Maryland’s paperless touch-screen voting system with a system that will provide a paper record to allow for recounts of close races. The “Voter-Verifiable Paper Records” bill, SB 392, was sponsored by Senator Edward Kasemeyer (D-Baltimore and Howard Counties) and passed the Senate unanimously. A companion bill, HB18, sponsored by Delegate Sheila Hixson (D-Montgomery County) passed the House unanimously both last year and this year. The transition will occur before the 2010 elections.
“This is a great victory for Maryland’s voters, who overwhelmingly favor a paper record of their votes,” said Robert Ferraro, a Co-Director of SAVE Our Votes, a grass-roots citizens’ group working for Secure, Accessible, Verifiable Elections in Maryland.
Public opinion polls conducted last year showed that two out of three Maryland voters want a paper record of their votes. Most prefer an optical scan system where voters mark paper ballots, either by hand or with the assistance of a ballot-marking machine, which are then counted in the polling place by optical scanners. Nineteen of Maryland’s 24 counties used optical-scan systems before state law required them to switch to touch-screen machines over the past five years.
Maryland’s new law is part of a national trend away from paperless voting. After the loss of 18,000 electronic votes in Sarasota’s 2006 election left a congressional seat in dispute, Florida’s governor announced plans to replace its touch-screen voting machines with optical scanners before the 2008 elections. A federal bill currently making its way through the House of Representatives, the “Voter Confidence & Increased Accessibility Act” (HR 811), would eliminate paperless voting by the 2008 general election and provide funding to replace equipment that does not comply with the law.
Maryland’s bill requires funding by next year’s legislative session, through either state or federal dollars, for implementation to be accomplished on schedule. But the economic benefits of optical scan systems are especially attractive in a time of fiscal deficits when the new administration is looking for ways to reduce government waste to balance the budget. Studies have shown a large jump in election expenses when counties across the nation switched to paperless electronic voting.
“We look forward to working with the governor to find funding for this bill,” said SAVE Our Votes Co-Director Rebecca Wilson. “In this time of tight budgets, we don't have the luxury of operating a voting system that is as fiscally wasteful as Maryland's current system is.”
“Gov. O’Malley is a strong advocate for making government more transparent and accountable,” said Co-Director Shelley Fudge. “This legislation will move Maryland a huge step in that direction.” ###
Maryland’s General Assembly last night passed legislation that calls for replacing the paperless touch-screen voting system currently in use with a system that will provide a paper record to allow for recounts of close races. The transition will occur before the 2010 elections.
“This is a great victory for Maryland’s voters. It is a giant leap toward ensuring that our votes can be counted exactly as we cast them,” said Robert Ferraro, a Co-Director of SAVE Our Votes, a grass-roots citizens’ group working for Secure, Accessible, Verifiable Elections in Maryland.
Public opinion polls conducted last year showed that two out of three Maryland voters want a paper record of their vote, and the vast majority prefers an optical scan system. Voters mark paper ballots, either by hand or with the assistance of a ballot-marking machine, which are then counted in the polling place by optical scanners. Nineteen of Maryland’s 24 counties used optical-scan systems before state law required them to switch to touch-screen machines over the past five years.
The economic benefits of optical scan systems are especially attractive in a time of fiscal deficits when the new administration is looking for ways to reduce government waste before resorting to other revenue sources, such as tax increases, to balance the budget. Studies have shown a huge increase in election expenses as counties across the nation have moved to paperless electronic voting.
Since the implementation of touch-screen voting machines, Maryland’s election budget has swelled from $5 million annually to more than $27 million per year. At the same time the State Board of Elections staff has grown from five employees to its current size of 38.5 FTE positions. The state’s contract with Diebold Elections Systems, Inc. to provide support for the 19,000 touch-screen machines is so complex that a project management firm oversees it, at a cumulative cost of nearly $10 million by the end of 2008.
“Not only can we afford to make this change, we can't afford not to. In a time of tight budgets, we don't have the luxury of operating a voting system that is as fiscally wasteful as Maryland's current system,” said Co-Director Rebecca Wilson.
The bill also provides a means for voters with disabilities to mark their paper ballots. “This legislation is the strongest in the nation in protecting access for voters with disabilities,” said Co-Director Shelley Fudge.
###
GROUPS URGE SENATE TO PASS NEW PAPER TRAIL BILL
Urge House to Enact Before Session Ends
After “recommitting” the bill last week, the Senate Education, Health and Environmental Affairs (EHEA) Committee successfully submitted a newly amended paper trail bill to the Senate Thursday. The new SB392 is likely to pass the full Senate today.
These new amendments remove the possibility of the State Board of Election certifying an electronic verification system, a move that election integrity activists see as critical. “We could not allow the previous bill to go forward with that option,” said Shazia Anwar, Director of TrueVoteMD, an election integrity group with over 3000 members statewide. “We can live with these amendments.”
The new amendments ensure that any new voting system certified for use must include a voter verified paper record. These changes would require an optically scannable paper ballot marked by hand or with the help of an assistive marking device.
“We are delighted that the Senate is now listening to the two-thirds of Maryland voters who want a paper trail when they vote,” said Shelley Fudge, Co-director of SAVEourVotes. “This bill would not only secure our elections, but would also significantly reduce the expense of operating them, which is critical with our current budget deficit. Studies have shown that operating costs for optical scanning equipment are 30% to 40% lower than for our current touchscreen machines.”
Both groups had urged passage of HB18 as amended, which passed the House unanimously on March 18 and crossed over before the deadline, because it contained three essential components: 1) required voter verifiability; 2) made the paper ballot the official vote record for audits and recounts; 3) required mandatory audits of election results to confirm accuracy.
“We hope the House of Delegates quickly resolves the discrepancies between SB392 and HB18 if the Senate bill passes today,” said Ms. Anwar. “Maryland needs this legislation in place if the Governor has to find a way to fund it in time for 2010.”
Both groups stressed that both HB18 and the current SB392 reflect a significant but acceptable compromise between the legislature, concerned about a growing fiscal deficit, and election integrity activists. The compromise includes delaying new system implementation until 2010 (instead of in time for the 2008 Presidential election) and making implementation null and void unless funded in the Governor’s budget next year.
“With only three days left in this session, there are still many hoops that this legislation must go through in order for the bill to reach the Governor’s desk for his signature,” said Ms. Anwar in a statement to the group’s members. “We urge all citizens concerned about protecting our voting rights to tell their legislators to support the current paper trail bills.” ###
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: March 23, 2007 CONTACT: Shelley Fudge 301-580-9224 or Robert Ferraro 301-661-2989 [ PRINTABLE PDF]
VOTING RIGHTS ADVOCATES APPLAUD MD. HOUSE PASSAGE OF
REAL VOTER-VERIFIED PAPER TRAIL, URGE SENATE TO DO THE SAME
On March 21, the Maryland House unanimously passed, for the second year in a row, legislation to meet voters’ demands to replace the state’s current unreliable electronic voting system with a secure system that provides for a voter-verified paper audit trail (VVPAT) and optical scanning. Unfortunately, the Senate’s now considering amending its version (SB 392) to remove all the protections the House bill requires.
“Polls show two of every three Maryland voters are troubled and want a paper trail,” said Shelley Fudge of Save Our Votes. “The House deserves high praise for again listening to the voters. Now the voters are counting on our Senators to do the same.”
As introduced by Sen. Edward Kasemeyer with an impressive 37 co-sponsors, SB-392 had virtually the same vital provisions as HB-18 (sponsored by Del. Sheila Hixson and passed unanimously March 21). But the EHEA Committee is considering amendments to remove those very requirements that proponents and experts, including Dr. Avi Rubin of Johns Hopkins, have testified are absolutely necessary to detect and recover from vote fraud, security breaches, and technical failures. Such incidents have shaken voters’ confidence and plagued recent elections in Maryland and the nation. For example, the U.S. Congress seat remains undecided for Sarasota, Fla., where 18,000 votes were not recorded in November 2006.
“The proposed amendments to the Senate bill do not require voter verification, paper ballots, or audits,” said Robert Ferraro of Save Our Votes. “That completely defeats the purpose of a voter-verified paper audit trail bill, and makes it not worth the paper it’s printed on.”
While opponents of the VVPAT requirements blame the states budget crisis, lack of funding is not a real obstacle because replacing our touch-screen voting machines with a paper ballot and optical scan system would save the state millions each year from the beginning, according to Rebecca Wilson of Save Our Votes. “Studies of comparable purchases in other states have shown that Maryland would save $3-5 million annually in operating expenses,” she said. “A $20-million purchase financed over five years would cost $4 million each year. If the purchase cost were split 50/50 with counties, as with our current system, the state’s annual share would be about $2 million. So Maryland would save $1-3 million each of the first five years and $4-5 million thereafter on annual election expenditures -- savings that would ease the state’s fiscal pressures.”
Save Our Votes and other election integrity advocates urge Senators to support the original intent of SB 392, pass legislation similar to the House bill, and restore election integrity in Maryland.###
Recommended References: *Reports, News Articles, list of election integrity organizations and more at www.SAVEourVotes.org
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:SEPT. 25, 2006
CONTACT: Robert Ferraro, 301-661-2989 or, Shelley Fudge, 301-580-9224
SBE Response to Primary Problems is Inadequate
Election Integrity Group Releases Its Own 9-Point Plan to Address Issues Overlooked by Elections Administrator’s Proposal
Columbia, MD, Sept. 25 – SAVE Our Votes, a non-partisan voting rights organization, today criticized State Elections Administrator Linda Lamone’s analysis of the problems that marred Maryland’s Primary Election, saying that her proposed solutions fail to address many serious issues.
In a letter to the State Board of Elections in advance of its meeting on Tuesday, the group called for nine measures to help remedy problems encountered in the Sept. 12 election.
“The best way to prevent the serious problems that occurred in the Primary Election is to set aside the touch-screen voting machines and use optically scannable paper ballots in the November General Election,” said founding member Robert Ferraro. "However, if the precarious touch-screen system will be used again, it would be irresponsible not to institute these nine simple measures."
The recommended remedies include providing enough provisional ballots in each polling place to allow every voter to cast a ballot in an emergency, as well as issuing clear guidelines about what constitutes an emergency and how to respond appropriately if scarcity or unavailability of equipment causes unacceptably long wait times.
“Election judges had not been prepared for a malfunction of the magnitude of Montgomery County’s failure to deliver Voter Access Cards,” said Shelley Fudge, another founding member of the group. “Unable to reach the county elections officials for instructions, they did not know how to proceed.”
The report also questions the effectiveness of security measures instituted in light of numerous reports recently released that document the vulnerability of touch-screen voting equipment to fraud. It calls for clear mandates about how to handle equipment on which security breaches are discovered, clarifying both when to pull equipment from service and how the votes already cast on suspect machines will be regarded, since there is no possibility of detecting many dangerous types of tampering.
Other recommendations include setting aside of the electronic pollbooks, investigating inaccurate information in e-pollbook records such as incorrect party affiliation, and informing voters about how to check and correct their voter registration records.
Additional measures suggested are more aggressive oversight of the screening and training of voting equipment technicians and better education for election judges in the use of the Visually Impaired Ballot Stations.###
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