Why didn’t Bridgeport CT order enough ballots?…Hennepin Co MN reporting error showed 880,000 votes cast instead of 470,470..MN Governor’s Race Likely Headed For A Recount…Nassau County (NY) Suing To Get Old Voting Machines Back..Paper vs. Electronic Voting in Today’s Election in Houston…Google Glitch May Have Sent 700000 People to the Wrong Poll..Colbert Goes ‘Inside’ The U.S. E-Voting Problem…Key Post-Election Disputes in the States..
All this and more in today’s voting news below…
Readers – expect more reports to come in this week and next, its not over on election day.
Hotspots: Key Post-Election Disputes in the States
http://electls.blogs.wm.edu/2010/11/03/hotspots-key-post-election-disputes-in-the-states/
AL: Election officials make sure every vote is counted despite ballot issues*
http://www.waff.com/Global/story.asp?S=13429628
Madison County Probate Judge Tommy Ragland says they’ve had reports of bad ballots in eight of 74 precincts today. Ragland says there are several reasons some of the ballots are not being read. One is printing.
Poll workers say some ballots are being cut off on the very bottom of the page, which means voting machines aren’t counting the votes like they should.
AR: Glitch in Gassville delays ballot counting*
http://www.baxterbulletin.com/article/20101102/UPDATES01/101102028
/1002/NEWS01/Glitch+in+Gassville+delays+ballot+counting http://tinyurl.com/23vraa2
Two precincts in Gassville have not reported in the 2010 election. Officials blame the delay on the voting
AZ: 35,000-plus ballots may still need counting* (absentee ballots)
http://azstarnet.com/news/local/govt-and-politics/elections/article_27034224-27c7-520d-8e5d-99fe78296ecd.html Pima County will be waiting until at least late today – and possibly until Saturday – to find out the winners of some closely contested races because more than 35,000 ballots could remain uncounted as of this morning.
…
County Elections Director Brad Nelson said one in four ballots cast Tuesday were early ballots hand-delivered to the polls. Because the Pima County recorder must verify signatures, those votes can’t be counted on Election Day.
The county hopes to have early ballots counted by Friday.
CA: Calif. poll worker arrested for stealing ballots*
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/n/a/2010/11/03/state/n100331D65.DTL&type=newsbayarea
San Francisco police arrested a polling inspector Wednesday on suspicion of stealing up to 75 ballots, a voting roster and other election material in a bizarre Election Day heist.
…
Nicholas was in charge of a polling site in the city’s southern most district when he inexplicably made off Tuesday afternoon with the ballots, a memory pack that records information from the ballots, the voter roster and another poll worker’s cell phone, said John Arntz, San Francisco’s director of elections.
CA: Repeat of slow ballot count raises ire*(49,300 absentee ballots)
http://www.pe.com/localnews/stories/PE_News_Local_D_webpoll.a209aa.html
Elections officials finished counting the ballots cast in person on Tuesday at 11:20 a.m. today. There are still about 49,300 vote-by-mail ballots to count. That will be done by Saturday, officials reported on the registrar’s website.
Also, an additional 28,800 provisional ballots must still be counted.
CA: Watchdog: LA voters told to vote after election*
http://www.mercurynews.com/news/ci_16502648
LOS ANGELES—About two dozen Los Angeles residents received Spanish-language robocalls and mailers instructing them to vote a day after Election Day, a polling watchdog group said Tuesday.
Election Protection said the Hispanic voters in central and southern parts of the city received the reminders telling them to vote on Wednesday, Nov. 3.
CA: Ballot shortage causes frustration at EPA polls*
Voters leave after long lines lead to frustration at East Palo Alto polling place
http://www.paloaltoonline.com/news/show_story.php?id=18847
The line snaked through the City Hall lobby for hours after the ballots ran out and voters had to use electronic machines to cast their votes.
The problem was exacerbated by voters who were reading the ballot for the first time on the machines, each person taking 20 to 30 minutes to vote, Ethan Frantz, a San Mateo County election official, said.
“An insanely long ballot” also added to the long voting times, he said.
CA: San Leandro mayor won’t be known for days
http://www.mercurynews.com/breaking-news/ci_16506296
However, since no candidates received a majority of the vote after the initial count, the race now will be decided by the ranked-choice voting process — something that will not happen until Friday at the earliest.
CA: Some East Bay Voters Confused By Voting System
http://sanfrancisco.cbslocal.com/2010/11/02/some-east-bay-voters-confused-by-voting-system/
CA: SF Supervisor Results Remain Unclear
Ranked-choice voting obscures final outcomes in contested districts
http://www.baycitizen.org/sf-supervisors-race/story/sf-supervisor-results-remain-unclear/
CA: P.O. box snag impacts Ruth voters
http://www.trinityjournal.com/news/2010-11-03/News/PO_box_snag_impacts_Ruth_voters.html Many Ruth residents say their right to vote in Tuesday’s election was trampled on in an episode that highlights the area’s ongoing problems with the U.S. Postal Service. Dave and Melinda Perkins were among the post office box holders from Ruth who made a last-minute scramble to get their mail-in ballots in on time after the ballots were not delivered to their boxes.
CO: Midterm elections: Latest updates
http://edition.cnn.com/2010/POLITICS/11/02/election.glance/
Several polling locations ran out of provisional ballots in Arapahoe County, Colorado, because of large voter turnout, Pat Waak, the head of the Democratic Party in Colorado, said. As a result, residents continue to wait in some in Arapahoe County while additional ballots are brought in from an off-site warehouse
CO: Weld County system glitch slows voting in Windsor, Weld*
http://www.coloradoan.com/article/20101102/NEWS03/311020012/1002/
NEWS01/Weld+County+system+glitch+slows+voting+in+Windsor++Weld
http://tinyurl.com/2c22dmw A Windsor election official confirmed tonight that the Score system that voting centers use to verify voters’ addresses went down for about an hour, slowing down the voting process.
…
Sarchet said his election officials had to go to a manual system to check the authenticity of voters until the Score system came back online
CO: Routt County vote tallying finishes at 2:30 a.m.* (coding error)
http://www.steamboatpilot.com/news/2010/nov/03/routt-county-vote-tallying-delayed/
Steamboat Springs — The tallying of mail-in ballots extended past midnight and into this morning, causing election night complications stemming from a coding error that was announced Oct. 20 and rendered unreadable more than 5,700 ballots mailed to county voters.
…Teams of election judges had hand-copied more than 3,300 ballots since Oct. 22 as a result of the coding error. Those ballots had to be scanned and tallied in a time-consuming process.
CO: Few glitches as area polling places open for voting, turnout appears strong*
http://www.gazette.com/news/dorsey-107340-election-drive.html
The election hit a few snags in southwest Colorado Springs as voters were given the wrong ballot.
Voters at three precincts at Cheyenne Mountain Elementary School received the wrong ballots, ones without any of the three Colorado Springs questions, said Liz Olson, elections manager for the El Paso County Clerk and Recorder’s Office
CO: Aspen voters vote to ditch IRV
http://www.aspentimes.com/article/20101103/NEWS/101109959/1077&ParentProfile=1058
65.3 percent, said IRV should go, while 880, or 34.7 percent of voters, said they wanted to keep it.
CT: Legal Challenge Possible From Bridgeport Ballot Shortage
http://www.courant.com/news/connecticut/hc-bridgeport-voting-mess-2010-20101102,0,5361160.story
A judge’s decision to extend voting hours to 10 p.m. in Bridgeport led to threats from Republicans that they would challenge the legality of votes cast after 8 p.m.
Bridgeport officials ran out of ballots in a number of polling places, forcing an emergency hearing and the decision to extend the hours at 12 of Bridgeport’s 25 polling places.
Connecticut’s state Democratic Party sued because of a ballot shortage. Bridgeport officials ordered 21,000 ballots despite the fact that the city has more than 69,000 registered voters, Secretary of the State Susan Bysiewicz said.
CT: Connecticut Governor Race: Integrity Issues
http://ctvoterscount.org/connecticut-governors-races-integrity-issues/
Initial assessment…to be updated and subject to further editing.
FL: Minor “glitch” in Hillsborough forces recount of 38,000 votes*
http://www.wtsp.com/news/local/story.aspx?storyid=154271&catid=250
Tampa, Florida — Elections officials in Hillsborough County are blaming a computer glitch for the loss of around 38,000 votes not properly uploaded to the office’s computers.
…
Officials say the votes from the 38,000 ballots did not get uploaded properly with other early votes, forcing elections workers to rescan those ballots
FL: Pasco elections supervisor: Voters confused in Norman race*
http://www2.tbo.com/content/2010/nov/02/022121/voting-begins-early-at-tampa-bay-precincts/news-breaking/ About 12,000 of 38,000 early voting ballots have been rescanned by Hillsborough election officials so far. Out of 70,000 early voting ballots cast over the past three days, the 38,000 had an issue with the memory card that stored the information.
The ballots were cast at the Jan Platt, West Tampa, South Shore, Temple Terrace and Town N’ Country polling stations.
…
Robert Picket, from Dominion Voting Systems Inc., the company that manufactures the equipment, said the problem was discovered earlier today. He said the company was not not sure what the problem is.
FL: Vote buying allegations in District 3
http://jacksonville.com/opinion/blog/403455/abel-harding/2010-11-01/vote-buying-allegations-district-3 A flyer distributed by U.S. Rep. Corrine Brown’s office promised “a complimentary coupon” for a meal at an Orlando restaurant to “the first 350 to vote” at an early voting site on Friday, sparking the latest charge in the contentious race in Florida’s Third Congressional District.
HI: Hawaii voting running relatively smoothly, elections official says
http://www.bizjournals.com/pacific/news/2010/11/02/hawaii-voting-running-relatively.html with voting machines not functioning at the Leilehua High School polling site and a mix-up of machines between the Waipahu High School and August Ahrens Elementary School polling sites.
IA: Snags, complaints mar some voting
http://www.desmoinesregister.com/article/20101103/NEWS09/11030350/-1/NEWS04/Snags-complaints-mar-some-voting Dozens of frustrated voters left Point of Grace Church in Waukee without casting ballots because of a backup caused by a poll worker who couldn’t figure out a computer program to verify voters’ addresses.
…
• In Cedar Rapids, a handful of voting machines malfunctioned, probably because of changes in temperature or humidity, according to the Cedar Rapids Gazette. The faulty devices were replaced. A ballot recount was not necessary.
IL: Computer glitch delays vote posting* (memory card probs)
http://mywebtimes.com/archives/ottawa/display.php?id=417097
Thanks to a computer glitch, those watching the Internet for La Salle County vote results Tuesday night waited a little longer than anticipated .
Polls closed at 7 p.m., and typically, results begin being posted by the La Salle County Clerk’s Office within the following hour. However, Tuesday night, results couldn’t be posted until close to 10 p.m.
County Clerk JoAnn Carretto explained late Tuesday that during the uploading process, the computers froze. There also were issues with some memory cards from the optical scan machines not being recognized in the system.
Staff members and technicians worked through the issues Tuesday, getting about 65 percent of the votes up at about 10 p.m., with the last four precincts — South Ottawa 1 and 2, and Manlius 1 and 4 — posted close to midnight, as staff members had to re-feed those ballots into the counter because of technical issues.
IN: Tippecanoe County to fix election database problem
Glitch did not change outcome of races
http://www.wlfi.com/dpp/news/politics/tippecanoe-co-to-fix-election-database-problem
Few problems were reported on election night. However, one technical glitch resulted in over a thousand voters not having access to a write-in option in Tippecanoe County.
If a voter decided to use the write-in option, a keyboard was supposed to appear on the touch-screen voting machine, but the keyboard did not appear.
Approximately 1,400 absentee votes would not upload to the electronic database. Tippecanoe County Clerk Linda Phillips said she will be working with the election board’s vendor to figure out a solution to that problem.
IN: Snafu halts county vote count*
http://www.tristate-media.com/pdclarion/news/local_news/article_162e6836-e70e-11df-bb6f-001cc4c03286.html Still incomplete is the race for county treasurer that will be hand counted. Computer problems held up the county results until this morning.
…
The hand count of the treasurer’s race between Mary Key (R) and Sandy Greube (D) was delayed as the local election board was preparing to start the work when the county was served with a notice from the Indiana Recount Commission of ballot impoundment for two precincts involved in the Indiana State Rep. Dist. 76 race between Democrat Bob Deig and Repubican Wendy McNamara.
The local election board was waiting for word from the state on whether the hand count of the county treasurer race could proceed or would be delayed by the impoundment.
KY: Broken machine, ballot shortage make for long lines at Crestwood precinct
http://www.courier-journal.com/article/20101102/ZONE09/311020027
Barr said the electronic voting machine was not working when the polls opened at 6 a.m., leaving the precinct with only one voting mechanism that used paper ballots.
…
Around that same time, precinct workers at the school realized there were not enough paper ballots that included the city candidates on them, Barr said.
Barr said the shortage of ballots was due to a “clerical error,” and she was able to have more ordered and delivered by 9:30 a.m
MD: As polls close, waiting for election results begins
http://www.baltimoresun.com/news/maryland/bs-md-election-web-updates-20101102,0,885401.story
Two voting machines at a Parkville precinct were shut down for less than an hour after three voters found the machine was not correctly recording their votes.
The glitch at Pine Grove Middle School was one of a few isolated cases of touch-screen machines not giving Baltimore County voters the choice they wanted, said Katie Brown, executive director of the county Board of Elections. Brown said she was aware of problems there and at two other polling places.
MN: Governor’s Race Likely Headed For A Recount
http://kstp.com/news/stories/S1822324.shtml?cat=1
The margin is so close that, if the numers don’t change, will likely force an automatic recount in Minnesota’s race for governor.
MN: County official: Human error caused vote-counting glitch*
http://www.startribune.com/politics/local/106634333.html?elr=KArksLckD8EQDUoaEyqyP4O:DW3ckUiD3aPc:_Yyc:aUXAsA_tHt0q6gM_Hzdgxq_TU
A staff person pushed the wrong button when uploading a large file of voting returns to the Secretary of State’s website, Smith said.
…
The county and state website showed that 880,000 votes had been cast in Hennepin County. The actual number was 470,470.
The results were corrected on the county’s website within 45 minutes. But computer crashes delayed corrections on the state’s website for another hour and a half, Smith said.
MN: Hennepin County Responds to Election Night Snafu (wireless transmission?)
http://www.myfoxtwincities.com/dpp/news/politics/hennepin-county-election-results-snafu-nov-3-2010 MINNEAPOLIS – Hennepin County issued a statement Wednesday afternoon in response to an error in election results on its website last night, leading to a period of incorrect reporting by the Secretary of State and news outlets.
…
“Until approximately 10 p.m. election night, our wireless transmission technology for reporting election results was working perfectly.
“We were updating to our website and the Secretary of State’s site without a problem. At approximately 10 p.m., we temporarily paused transmission of precinct results to verify absentee ballot counts that were also being uploaded at the same time. When we resumed transmitting precinct results, a staff person pushed the wrong button – ‘add to’ instead of ‘replace.’ As a result, for a short time, all previously reported data was reported again, resulting in an almost doubling of data results.
MO: Missouri voting glitch repaired
http://www.kansascity.com/2010/11/02/2384092/missouri-voting-glitch-repaired.html
The computer glitch that struck a Missouri database of registered voters for most of the day has been repaired, officials say.
The problem prevented local election workers and the public from accessing the statewide voter registration computer system.
NC: Judge-Ordered Signs Not Up When Some Polls Open*
http://www.digtriad.com/news/local/article.aspx?storyid=149993&catid=57
Guilford County Board of Election Director George Gilbert blamed Tuesday morning’s delays on the timing of the judge’s ruling. He said it was up to precinct coordinators to deliver the signs to their 10 or 12 precincts on Election Day and that it “takes a little time” to do that.
Gilbert said the touch screens in Guilford County already have the same information contained in the alert posted on the machines.
NC: Computer glitches lead to voting delays* (problems with voter reg laptops)
Paper copies used; some may have left during 11/2-hour wait
http://www2.journalnow.com/news/2010/nov/03/computer-glitches-lead-to-voting-delays-ar-506662/ Forsyth CO. Some computer laptops that pull up voter-registration records malfunctioned yesterday morning, and poll workers had to rely on hard copies instead, Coffman said.
It took about an hour and a half to fix the laptops at several precincts.
NC: Minor problems experienced at polling places throughout the day*
http://www.starnewsonline.com/article/20101102/ARTICLES/101109943/1004?Title=Minor-problems-experienced-at-polling-places-throughout-the-day
Two New Hanover County precincts received incorrect paper ballots Tuesday morning containing candidates for the wrong N.C. House and Superior Court districts, the director of the county’s Board of Elections said Tuesday.
The incorrect style of ballot was accidentally sent to the Harnett 1 precinct at Freedom Baptist Church, 802 N. College Road, and Harnett 2 at the Northeast Regional Library, 1241 Military Cutoff Road, said Bonnie T. Williams.
…
The problems were corrected at 8:08 a.m. for the library precinct and 8:15 a.m. for the Freedom Baptist Church, Williams said. Polls opened at 6:30 a.m.
“If a voter (in those precincts) voted before those times and voted on paper, it will count except for the House district and the Superior Court district,” Williams said
…
At Wilmington Precinct 16, tabulation equipment was reported not working when the polls opened. Additionally, at the same precinct equipment was reported to have jammed and ballots spilled onto the floor.
The second problem Williams attributed to the large size of the ballots in this election, which made jams likely as the 17-inch ballots piled up.
NC: Carolinians line up to be heard on Election Day*(wrong ballots, paper poll books)
http://www.thesunnews.com/2010/11/03/1789790/carolinians-line-up-to-be-heard.html
Meanwhile, there were scattered reports of problems in North Carolina. Elections officials in New Hanover County say nearly 300 voters received incorrect ballots that could affect one local and two state races.
And Surry County kept its polls open an hour later after discovering it had been using n incorrect list of registered voters.
NC: Justice calls for investigation into NHC Board of Election*
http://www.wect.com/Global/story.asp?S=13438027
State Board of Elections director Gary Bartlett said Tuesday night that the New Hanover County problem occurred in two precincts. He said there is no way for election officials to correct the error and that problem impacts two state House races and a local race for Superior Court judge.
Voters reported other problems too. The touch screens appeared to be having glitches and the paper ballot counter wasn’t working.
ND: Morton County counting system fails, workers must manually tally tapes*
http://www.bismarcktribune.com/news/local/govt-and-politics/election2010/article_77e4de3e-e6ff-11df-8b84-001cc4c002e0.html
Morton County’s tally of election results hit another snag Tuesday when its hard drive and software failed to read cards that count ballots in the voting scanners, and they could not feed them to the North Dakota Secretary of State’s online system.
It’s the same glitch the county experienced in its 2008 fall general election and the June 2010 primaries, according to county auditor Paul Trauger. “It won’t read. The Omni drive is broke,” he said shortly after 10 p.m. Tuesday.
Trauger said that forced county workers to manually enter data from tapes that counted votes by hand.
NJ: Voting machine glitch postpones tally in Buena*
http://www.thedailyjournal.com/article/20101103/NEWS01/11030346
Mayor Joseph Baruffi said Tuesday night the problem occurred at the polling station at Borough Hall in Minotola.
Baruffi said the electronic voting machine recorded votes, but for some reason it would not print the results.
The Atlantic County Clerk’s Office instructed the borough to send the recording cartridge to Folsom for collection and shipment from there to its office.
NV: Nevada results delayed by late poll closures
http://www.ktvn.com/Global/story.asp?S=13434179
LAS VEGAS (AP) – Nevada’s top election official delayed vote results statewide until polls closed late due to long lines at ballot stations in three northern counties.
…
Pam duPre tells The Associated Press every voter in line at 7 p.m. in Washoe, Elko and Eureka counties was allowed to vote.
…
Clark County Registrar of Voters spokesman Dan Kulin says a power outage lasted about 45 minutes about 5:45 p.m. at a polling place at Schofield Middle School in southeast Las Vegas.
NY: Nassau County Suing To Get Old Voting Machines Back
http://www.wpix.com/wpix-flawed-machines,0,5132212.story “We feel that it’s a public policy mistake to switch over from a lever system that people have confidence in and is trustworthy and is reliable to an electronic system that creates it’s own problems,” said Board of Elections Commissioner William Biamonte.
NY: New Yorkers Still Adjusting to New Voting Machines*
http://www.dnainfo.com/20101102/manhattan/new-yorkers-head-polls-with-mixed-success
A person who voted at 715 W. 179th Street said there were no pens in the voting stations, and a voter at Eighth Avenue and 14th Street said the ballots were for the wrong election district, de Blasio’s office said.
…
In Harlem, one scanning machine for disabled voters remained broken throughout the morning on Tuesday, as poll workers scrambled to find a repair crew.
…
Even elected officials had trouble voting. One scanning machine at gubernatorial hopeful Andrew Cuomo’s Mt. Kisco polling station jammed up about 6:30 a.m., and Upper East Side Congresswoman Carolyn Maloney’s ballot was initially rejected by the scanner at the 92nd Street Y because she had folded it in half.
NY: Despite a few glitches, Elmira area voting goes smoothly
http://www.pressconnects.com/article/20101102/NEWS01/11020392/
Des pite+a+few+glitches++Elmira+area+voting+goes+smoothly http://tinyurl.com/2bz22zx
Nehrbass arrived at 5:30 a.m. as usual Tuesday, but he didn’t get to vote until 7:20 a.m.
The delay was a result of a glitch that sent the Van Etten voting machine to Erin and vice versa.
NY: Some hiccups reported with new N.Y. voting machines
http://www.deseretnews.com/article/700078268/Some-hiccups-reported-with-new-NY-voting-machines.html In Westchester County, one of the three ballot-scanning machines at the Mount Kisco church where the Democratic candidate for governor, Andrew Cuomo, voted Tuesday morning was out of service.
…
New York City officials said the city’s 311 hot line had received more than 4,100 election-related calls, with 360 calls classified as complaints about the new ballot and the new machines.
NY: Vote machine woes rampant in Lower Hudson Valley*
http://www.lohud.com/article/20101102/NEWS05/11020389/-1/newsfront/Vote-machine-woes-rampant-in-Lower-Hudson-Valley Ossining voter Martin Fischer, 60, said he wasn’t even told he could fill out a paper ballot after the scanner broke down at his polling place.
NV: Vote allegations keep authorities busy
http://www.lvrj.com/news/vote-allegations-keep-authorities-busy-106505448.html?ref=448 ‘Challenge has been sorting out the serious complaints from the frivolous ones,’ official says
OH: Secretary of State website live results with report on provisional ballots
http://vote.sos.state.oh.us/pls/enrpublic/f?p=130:11:0
OH: Voting machines experience glitches*
http://www.oxfordpress.com/news/election/voting-machines-experience-glitches-993619.html HAMILTON — Various TSX units had calibration problems Tuesday throughout Butler County, said Betty McGary, director of the board of elections. The problems did not impact voter numbers though, McGary said.
…
If the screen froze, the voter was directed to another machine. She also said area troubleshooters were sent to precincts with problem machines to recalibrate. If the machine didn’t recalibrate, it was shut down.
The scrolling results on the board of elections Web site went off-line sometime after 2 a.m., according to administrator Tippi Slaughter, but is now back on-line
OK: Add another state to voter ID rules
http://minnesota.publicradio.org/collections/special/columns/news _
cut/archive/2010/11/add_another_state_to_voter_id.shtml http://tinyurl.com/2d6at9g
PA: Lebanon County addresses voting machine malfunctions*
http://www.pennlive.com/midstate/index.ssf/2010/11/lebanon_county_addresses_votin.html Malfunctions relating to touch screens were reported in fewer than 10 voting precincts this morning throughout Lebanon county, the voter registration office reported. A recalibration of the malfunctioning machines was done, and votes ended up being cast properly,
RI: Voter turnout OK, few polling hiccups
Master lever confusion, car hits polling place
http://www.wpri.com/dpp/news/politics/providence-voter-turnout-trouble-polling-place-crash a car crashed into a wall at the Dunn’s Corners Fire Department just after 7:00 a.m., hit a gas line, and forced voters and poll workers to evacuate for fear of an explosion.
RI: Voters encounter problems at North Providence polling station*(has paper ballots)
http://ww.abc6.com/Global/story.asp?S=13430118 Some voters were turned away at a polling station in North Providence because of problems with voting machines.
RI: Board of Elections moves quickly to fix glitches*
http://www2.turnto10.com/news/2010/nov/02/board-elections-moves-quickly-fix-glitches-ar-278799/ A voting machine at Brown Avenue Elementary School in Johnston malfunctioned Tuesday.
…
A replacement machine arrived by 7:45 a.m.
An electrical surge burned out a memory pack used in a voting machine at St. Stanislas in Woonsocket. A replacement was sent to the polling place and the ballots counted.
SC: Carolinians line up to be heard on Election Day* (ES&S iVotronic-calibration)
http://www.thesunnews.com/2010/11/03/1789790/carolinians-line-up-to-be-heard.html
At the precinct at the Myrtle Beach Church of Christ on Wild Iris Drive in Myrtle Beach, one of the voting machines had a couple of problems.
By early afternoon the machine had been repaired twice. Both repairs were made in less than half an hour, said the poll clerk Amanda Butler.
“It was really hard to press on it,” Butler said. “They’ve had to be calibrated. … It was an easy fix.”
TN: Editorial: Paperless era should end now
Voting machines with the capacity to be audited manually are overdue in Tennessee.
http://www.commercialappeal.com/news/2010/nov/03/editorials-paperless-era-should-end-now/ But by 2012, a system must be in place that can be trusted by those who go to the polls and cast a vote they hope will be counted.
TX: Paper vs. Electronic Voting in Today’s Election in Houston
http://www.freedom-to-tinker.com/blog/dwallach/paper-vs-electronic-voting-todays-election-houston (Computer scientist e-voting expert Dan Wallach describes his voting experience in Harris County, the county whose voting machines were destroyed in a warehouse fire. Harris Co used new & borrowed machines, & also had paper ballots available at the polling place if voters asked. Did poll workers offer? )
TX: Precinct judge calls authorities to remove poll watchers*
http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/metropolitan/7276186.html
Precinct judge Carolyn Moore said she needed help to deal with poll watchers who interfered with poll operations and positioned themselves inappropriately close to voters and voting machines.
One man wanted a seat at the sign-in table in the school auditorium and would not move when asked, Moore said.
…
Observers outside the polling place said an elderly man stormed out of the high school shouting about how a man was standing near him and telling him who to vote for.
“A citizen just came out and said, ‘I’m not voting. They are trying to tell me who to vote for,'” said Diane Landin, who was campaigning outside in favor of Proposition 1. “He was really upset.”
UT: Computer glitch causes problems for voters in Utah County
http://www.ksl.com/?nid=148&sid=13117151
When the polls opened at 7 a.m., all of the 110 polling locations in Utah County were running into the same problem.
“It was the cards,” said downtown Provo assistant poll manager Annie Erickson. “As soon as someone would put a card in (the voting machine), it wouldn’t bring up the election; it would reject the card.”
…
“We had a problem with the security card that is run through the encoders. It appears to be a programming glitch,” said Utah County Clerk/Auditor Bryan Thompson. “The poll managers instituted plan B, which was to go ahead and utilize one of the (voting) machines as an encoder.”
UT: Computer glitch causes problems for voters in Utah County (youtube video)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fh-1ShT6JC4
WA: UPDATE: Hundreds in line at three King Co. voting sites
http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/politicsnorthwest/2013328284 _ long _lines _at_voting_sites_for.html http://tinyurl.com/2cgzz4f Although King County went entirely to vote-by-mail, three sites are maintained to help special-needs voters with touch-screen voting machines and other assistance. But the sites have become defacto polling sites for voters who say they’ve lost or never received a ballot.
WI: Ballot mix-up in Brookfield biggest problem at polls
http://www.jsonline.com/news/milwaukee/106521533.html
A mix-up at a Brookfield polling site caused as many as 40 people to vote in the wrong race, a mistake that could be an issue if a contested state Senate race is close.
The votes will count, even though the voters in the wrong ward might have cast them, a spokesman for the state Government Accountability Board said.
…
A ballot machine in the Dane County town of Verona wasn’t reading ballots, according to Madison television station WISC-TV. Ballots filled out before 11:30 will be counted by hand,
WI: Some problems with ballots but all votes will be counted, county clerk says*
http://host.madison.com/ct/news/local/govt-and-politics/elections/article_e846279a-e697-11df-816c-001cc4c03286.html
The ballots in the town of Verona weren’t being accepted by the electronic tabulating machines, so new ballots have been ordered and are being delivered as soon as possible. Ballots already cast will be counted manually.
Counting problems also were reported in the village of Maple Bluff, the village of Deerfield, the town of Madison and the city of Middleton.
“There’s so much on the backside of the ballot, it could be affecting the machines trying to read the ballots,” Ohlsen said.
…
In the four polling places aside from the town of Verona that were experiencing problems, the ballots were put into the machines a different way and were then able to be tabulated.
WV: Minor issues delay tallies for counties* (iVotronic paper trail prob,software)
http://www.newsandsentinel.com/page/content.detail/id/540850/Minor-issues-delay-tallies-for-counties.html?nav=5061 Wood County’s final precinct reported to the clerk’s office at 9:15 p.m., but the online tallies froze at around 8:30 p.m., with the results of only 30 of 84 precincts showing. The percentages for those tallies likewise were in error, officials said.
The results began being updated again around 9:23 p.m.
Wood County Commissioner Blair Couch said the delay in the totals from the county was due to a glitch in the vote tabulation system.
“We have a programming error where the votes are counting, but the column for the number of registered voters voting is still as zero,” he said. “We are working to correct it now rather than waiting until the morning.”
…
A few polling places also reported improperly installed paper rolls in several machines, but those problems were quickly corrected.
“We caught that early on. That does not affect the vote count at all,” Six said, “only the paper voting trail.”
…
Wirt County reported some minor issues, such as jammed machines and a dead battery, both of which officials said were easily corrected.
WY: Park County voting smooth after fixing minor glitch in voting machine clocks*
http://billingsgazette.com/news/state-and-regional/wyoming/article_94fce560-e6c4-11df-8003-001cc4c03286.html Machines had been preprogrammed to change time last week, which is usually when daylight saving time changes, but not this year,” said Park County Clerk Kelly Jensen.
That meant that dozens of reports printed out by election judges starting their shifts showed the time as an hour earlier than it really was.
…
Jensen said the machines were incorrectly programmed for the change by Election Systems & Software…
…
County clerks around the state experienced the same problem, but quickly shared information on how to fix the problem,Jensen said.
Internet Voting Watch
Online voting – election day debacle in the making
http://www.scpr.org/programs/patt-morrison/2010/11/02/online-voting-election-day-debacle-in-the-making/ Podcast with J. Alex Halderman, Assistant professor of electrical engineering and computer science at the University of Michigan and David Jefferson, a computer scientist at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory and Chairman of the Verified Voting Foundation, a nonpartisan nonprofit organization working for reliable and publicly verifiable elections.
National
NY Times: Widespread Reports of Problems at Polls
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/11/03/us/politics/03voting.html?partner=rss&emc=rss
Although most were general inquiries, nearly 2,100 involved reports of problems like polls opening late, machine malfunctions and confusion over voter registrations. More than 200 calls involved claims of voter intimidation.
“One of the most worrisome things we’re seeing is an uptick in voter intimidation and misinformation compared to prior elections,” said Wendy Weiser, director of the voting rights and elections project at the Brennan Center for Justice at New York University.
Google polling app misleads voters
http://www.politico.com/news/stories/1110/44571.html
A study Tuesday by Aristotle, a political technology company, predicts that more than 700,000 households in a collection of 12 battleground states may have experienced errors on the site that told them to head to the wrong polling stations.
Colbert Goes ‘Inside’ The U.S. E-Voting Problem…
http://www.bradblog.com/?p=8174
Equation: Calculating Ballot Bungles Is All About the P-Value (audits)
http://www.wired.com/magazine/2010/11/st_equation_votes/
Most laws leave the determination of the recount threshold to the discretion of registrars. But not California—at least not since earlier this year, when the state assembly passed a bill piloting a new method to make sure the vote isn’t rocking a little too hard. The formula comes from UC Berkeley statistician Philip Stark; he uses the error rate from audited precincts to calculate a key statistical number called theP-value.
Electronic Voting Machine Problems Raise Early Concerns
http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2010/11/02/electronic-voting-machine-problems-raise-concerns/ According to Pamela Smith, who heads the Election Protection Command Center, a national non-profit, non-partisan vote monitoring organization, early results from volunteers around the country and from voters who call a toll-free number (1-866 OUR VOTE) show that reports of vote flipping and other problems are already severe enough to “cause concern.
Some complaints surface amid stepped-up efforts to monitor voting fraud
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/11/02/AR2010110206892.html
Tea party supporters became poll watchers in precincts across Houston to guard against voter fraud. A fight over absentee ballots erupted as an issue in Pennsylvania. Democrats in Delaware accused Republicans of voter intimidation, and the Kansas attorney general is looking into a round of deceptive calls telling voters that they should show up at the polls on Wednesday.
Researchers Use Technology to Improve Voting
http://blogs.wsj.com/digits/2010/11/02/researchers-use-technology-to-improve-voting/
WHAT TUESDAY MEANS FOR REDISTRICTING
http://electionlawblog.org/archives/017796.html
Biggest Election Night Losers: Self-funded Candidates
http://www.opensecrets.org/news/2010/11/biggest-losers-on-election-night-se.html
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