In Focus This Week
Cuyahoga County weathers the storm
Optically-scanned paper ballots debut; hours extended in some precincts
By Sean Greene
electionlone.org
CLEVELAND, OHIO – Foul weather, not election-day chaos, troubled an otherwise mostly smooth vote in an area of the state not known for running problem-free elections in recent years.
Tuesday’s primary began with promise as all polling places in Cuyahoga County were reported to have opened on time and predictions of a wintry weather mix did not initially pan out.
The polling place at Cudell Recreation Center in Cleveland opened exactly at 6:30 a.m. and handled more than two dozen voters in the first 20 minutes. Nearly 20 polling stations were set up for voters to fill in their optically-scanned paper ballots, the first time that they were rolled out in the county.
Since the ballots would be counted at a central site, ballots were placed into a simple cardboard box.
One voter was observed folding his ballot before inserting it in the box while most others put their ballots in flat and unfolded. At other polling places, some voters complained about the lack of privacy of putting ballots in unfolded as their votes could be seen by voters or poll workers nearby, reported the Plain Dealer.
As in other polling places, one touch-screen voting machine was available for voters with disabilities. At Cudell, it sat unused, but nonetheless was a reminder of the recently bought system that was just demoted as the primary voting machine in the county in favor of a paper-based system. And some voters were nostalgic for the system that had been in place for all of one federal election cycle.
“This is archaic,” said Roy, a voter at the Heights Library in Cleveland Heights about casting his ballot on paper. “Voting on touch screens was much easier.”
Another voter at the Parma Heights Service Garage agreed that while touch screens were easy, there were advantages to casting ballots on paper.
“I preferred touch screens for ease of voting,” said Ron Dziak, but added paper ballots “seem a little more infallible. There is less room for error.”
Karen McKeeham, the polling place coordinator at Cleveland Heights, greeted voters at the door and helped direct them to their correct precinct table. Her main job was to be in charge of the touch-screen voting machine, but as of 10:30 a.m. it had not been used.
She said she was also point person to call the board of elections office if any problems emerged, although she voiced a great deal of faith in her fellow poll workers.
“We have many great, experienced poll workers here,” she said.
Most of the rest of the day was uneventful until the predicted ice storm finally descended around 5 p.m. just as the evening voting rush was starting.
Blustery winds accompanied by pellets of ice made driving and walking – not to mention voting – a challenge.
The bad weather, combined with complaints from Sen. Barack Obama’s campaign that some polling places in Cuyahoga County were running out of Democratic ballots, led a judge to order voting at 21 precincts to remain open until 9 p.m.
County election officials and Secretary of State Jennifer Brunner (D) questioned the ballot shortage charges.
Ned Foley, an Ohio-based election expert and professor at The Ohio State University’s Moritz College of Law, also disagreed with the judge’s ruling.
“Unfortunately, it is a fairly common campaign tactic to try to find a sympathetic judge to keep the polls open a little while longer, in the hope that campaign workers can increase voter turnout favorable to the candidate and thereby perhaps make a difference in the outcome if the race is close,” Foley, wrote in his Free & Fair blog. “But it is a mischievous tactic, because it attempts to change the rules at the end of the game, in order to give one side an extra advantage because of the last-minute rule change.”
The bad weather also caused delays getting ballots back from polling places to the warehouse where the vote counting was taking place. The first ballots arrived a little after 9:30 p.m. and according to news reports the last ballots did not arrive until around 1 a.m., with the count completed at a little after 5 a.m.
Overall, county election officials were pleased with how the day went.
Candice Hoke, director of Cleveland State University’s Center for Election Integrity was impressed as well.
“This board proved they are able to handle huge challenges and high turnout and run a quality election,” Hoke said. “Considering the huge burdens they faced they performed admirably.”
The Center, along with other groups, is requesting the county perform a post-election audit to check the accuracy of the tabulation system and determine rates of over votes and under votes. According to Hoke this could not only help assess how the technology performed on election day but also inform any future decisions by the county when selecting voting systems.
In Focus This Week Pt. 2
High Turnout for Texas Two-Step
Voters cheerful despite lines; few hiccups administering the vote
By Kat Zambon
electionline.org
AUSTIN, TEXAS—Long lines caused mostly by overwhelmed check-in stations slowed down but did little to discourage many casting ballots in the state’s primary on Tuesday.
Despite a chilly morning, about 50 voters were waiting in line at the Austin Bible Church on Woodrow Avenue when the polls opened at 7 a.m., Steve Long, Republican alternate judge said.
Robin Ross was one of them.
Lines were “encouraging,” she said, clearly unbothered by the somewhat time consuming process. “It moved pretty quickly. We were in line for about an hour … it was exciting.”
In fact, most saw few negatives in waiting, especially since it meant interest in the process was extremely high.
“The wait was a little wild but I expected that, that’s a good thing … that tells me people are getting involved,” Jody Ginn said after voting at Ridgetop Elementary School on Caswell Avenue.
The check-in process at registration tables caused delays said Chris Pieper, Ph.D. candidate at the University of Texas, after he waited to cast a vote.
“At any time there were eight open booths” while a line of voters waited. “They had to open an additional line for Democratic registrants.”
“I think there’s a lot more people in there than they expected,” Tom Benton, a graduate student in education at UT said.
After voting at Ridgetop Elementary, Jack Wilson said, “There’s just a lot of people voting, that’s how it went. I don’t think I’ve seen a line like this in years.”
Poll workers at Dessau Elementary School in Pflugerville handed out sample ballots to those in queue that stretched from the registration table to the parking lot.
“The line looks longer than it felt … the volunteers do a good job,” Ben Cecil said after voting.
The volunteers had a long day, however.
Mary Fero, Travis County’s public information manager, said that they were trying to accommodate poll workers who might not be able to volunteer for the full day by assembling early start teams. The teams worked from 6 a.m. to 8 a.m. to help set up voting machines at the polls.
“This is the first election day we’re trying that … We’re really looking for ways to get the younger generation of workers” who may have some technical skills to offer, Fero said. Hopefully later in their lives when they have the time to volunteer for a whole day, they will return to poll working, Fero added.
Machine malfunctions were rare. Peter Lichtenheld, operations director for Hart InterCivic’s elections division said that the people at Hart’s help desk don’t receive many calls on election day.
“Usually we’re bored, we over-prepare for that,” Lichtenheld said. “We play ping pong.”
At Austin Bible Church, the precinct faced some technical difficulties during set-up when the eSlates made by Hart InterCivic wouldn’t connect to the judge’s booth controller (JBC), Long said, though those problems were resolved by the time the polls opened.
Angela Stigler, a Democratic judge at Ridgetop Elementary School said that she used to be a poll worker in south Texas. “We’re still on the paper ballots [in south Texas]. The eSlate machines are so much easier, I love it.”
It was Jeff Fazio’s first time voting in Texas “so I hadn’t used these machines before but they’re pretty easy to understand,” he said.
Electronic voting is not without opponents in Austin, however. Karen Rennick, VoteRescue co-founder and director, advocates running elections by hand-counting paper ballots.
“You just can’t ignore these studies that they’ve done,” Rennick said about California’s top-to-bottom review of election systems and the Evaluation and Validation of Election-Related Equipment, Standards and Testing (EVEREST) in Ohio.
VoteRescue volunteers conducted exit polling with affidavits at the polls on Tuesday in conjunction with Project Vote Count.
Texas Democrats’ combination of a primary and a caucus confused voters, some of whom asked if their votes would count if they didn’t attend the caucus.
“I’m a Democrat but I don’t like that,” Victor Rodriguez said about having to return to the polls for the caucus after voting at the Pleasant Hill Apartments.
Election Reform News This Week
The remaining New England states – Vermont and Rhode Island – held primaries this week, largely in the shadow of Ohio and Texas. Rhode Island saw a record turnout with a few scattered problems at polling sites throughout the state. According to The Boston Globe, election officials in Rhode Island had printed twice as many ballots as usual for the primary, hired additional poll workers and sent extra voting booths to precincts to prevent long waits. Only minor, sporadic voting problems were reported around the state, such as broken optical-scan machines and voters told to go to the wrong precinct. Bob Kando, executive director of the state Board of Elections told the Globe that Tuesday turnout in some locations beat the turnout in general elections. “This primary is just, it’s fabulous,” he told the paper. “We’re delighted that the turnout is what it is.”
Vermont had no published reports of any major problems on election day although at least one polling place ran short of ballots. “Turnout was heavy, as predicted,” Secretary of State Deborah Markowitz (D) told The Rutland Herald. But what might be more significant is that 13,000 Vermonters newly registered to vote since the start of January, she said. “Almost 4,000 of them were voters between the ages of 18 and 24,”
The Hawai’i Office of Elections rejected an appeal by voting machine vendor ES&S this week to reconsider awarding a $43 million voting machine contract to Hart InterCivic. According to The Star-Bulletin, Hart InterCivic won a state contract to provide ballot-counting machines and software for the next decade. ES&S bid to perform the contract for $19 million. While ES&S’ attorneys argued that the state was squandering its money, Kevin Cronin, state chief elections officer, said protests about the weighting formula should have been made before bidding. “ES&S did not in any manner at any time question, challenge, contest, or in any way express any concern about the … cost price analysis or the relative weighting of pricing,” Cronin wrote in his decision.
Counties across the country are busy preparing for November’s general election even as primary battles continue in the Democratic ranks. Anoka County, Minn. has doubled its request for ballots.”That would be wise,” Joe Mansky, Ramsey County elections manager and former state elections director told the Star Tribune. “Statewide, we expect 80 percent of our eligible voters to vote. You’d have to go back to the 1950s to find a percentage higher than what we’ll see in November.” Minnesota mandates that each county order an excess of ballots — enough to cover 118 percent of its current voters. But Anoka County has gotten so many inquiries from prospective new voters that the county will order enough ballots to cover 200 percent of its current voters, said Rachel Smith, the county’s election manager.
Finding enough poll workers to handle the surge of voters is also a concern. The U.S. Election Assistance Commission this week announced grants to recruit young poll workers
The Federal Circuit Court of Appeals has ruled constitutional a Department of Veterans Affairs regulation that had led to denying access to VA facilities for the purpose of registering veterans to vote. The chairman of the Santa Clara County (Calif.) Democratic Central Committee brought the constitutional challenge to the VA regulation after he was ordered off a VA campus when attempting to do a voter registration drive in 2004. The government, argued that the facility is nonpublic property, and that the VA mission “does not comport with opening up its property as public or dedicated public fora.” The appeals court sided with the government, concluding that VA medical centers “are, for First Amendment purposes, nonpublic fora”…and “the fact that the public has been given access…is outweighed by the nature and purpose of the Medical Center.”
Opinions This Week
National: Voter turnout; Primary voting; Instant run-off voting
California: Vote-by-mail; Los Angeles County; Double bubble ballots
Colorado: Paper ballots, II, III; Voting system; Secretary of State
Florida: Sarasota County; Palm Beach County
Indiana: Vote centers
Michigan: Absentee voting
Minnesota: Instant-runoff voting
New Jersey: Ballot deadline; Election integrity
New York: Paper ballots
North Carolina: Same-day registration
Ohio: Primary election, II; Voter education; Cuyahoga County; Richland County; Electronic voting
Tennessee: Poll workers
Texas: Early voting
Utah: Proof of citizenship
Some sites require registration
Job Postings This Week
All job listings must be received by 12 p.m. Eastern on Wednesday for publication in our Thursday newsletter. Job listings are free but may be edited for length. Whenever possible, include Internet information. Please email job postings to mmoretti@electionline.org
Counsel to the Inspector General/Chief Investigator — Federal Election Commission, Washington, D.C. Looking to do legal work in a challenging field, but maintain the balance between work and family? If so, the Federal Election Commission, Office of Inspector General is interested in you. Duties: responsible for all legal work and investigations for the OIG under the broad general direction of the IG and /or Deputy IG. The incumbent will provide legal advice and support to the IG on audit, investigative, and administrative issues. The Inspector General’s Office provides flexible schedules, the ability to work from home and a comprehensive Federal benefits package and supportive co-workers. Inquire today! Salary: $82,961 – $127,442. To apply, see vacancy number 08-020, www.fec.gov . Deadline: March 19, 2008.
General Registrar — Fairfax County Board of Elections, Fairfax, Va. The Fairfax County Electoral Board, serving Fairfax County, the largest locality in the Commonwealth of Virginia and a suburb of Washington, D.C., is currently recruiting qualified candidates with senior management experience for the position of a non-partisan General Registrar to serve the three year remainder of a four year term; reappointment will be based on performance. With over 600,000 registered voters, the incumbent will be responsible for the oversight of a large and complex voter registration and election administration agency using advanced technology. Duties include adherence to Virginia Code Sec. 24.2, and other federal, state and local codes. Additional responsibilities include: monitoring relevant legislation at all governmental levels, conducting public education programs; speaking before diverse groups; working with federal and state agencies, professional organizations and advocacy groups regarding voting programs and voting rights. Qualifications: Any combination of experience equivalent to graduation from college with bachelor’s degree in a related field; plus four years experience in voter registration and elections management; must be a legal resident and registered voter in Fairfax County, Virginia at time of appointment; certification as an Election Administrator, or ability to obtain certification. Strong leadership skills; ability to build good working relationships; experience working with elected officials and board appointees. Salary: $97,147 – $108,435. Application: Submit your resume on-line through the Fairfax County AIMS SYSTEM. Deadline: March 7, 2008
Poll Monitoring/Exit Poll Coordinator — The Asian American Legal Defense and Education Fund, New York City. AALDEF is national organization that protects and promotes the civil rights of Asian Americans through litigation, advocacy and community education. AALDEF has a 15-person staff and is supported by foundation and corporate grants, individual contributions, and special events. A one-year position is available in AALDEF’s Asian American Democracy Project. AALDEF’s Asian American Democracy Project seeks to promote fairness in the electoral process and invigorate the civic participation of Asian Americans, especially new citizens and persons not yet fluent in English. By expanding access to the electoral process for Asian Americans, AALDEF improves the quality of democracy for all Americans. The Poll Monitoring/Exit Poll Coordinator will manage several volunteers and work with other Asian American community groups to conduct a non-partisan exit poll of Asian American voters and an Election Day monitoring effort in twelve states. The job includes recruiting and training volunteers; supervising the development, translation and printing of materials; overseeing logistics for volunteer assignments; and giving educational presentations about the Project. The Coordinator will also oversee post-election follow-up and assist in writing a report about Asian American participation in the 2008 elections. Qualifications: Ability to supervise volunteers and work with a wide variety of community leaders and organizations; strong knowledge of MS Access and other database systems; bilingual ability in an Asian language, preferably Chinese, Korean, or Vietnamese, is desirable; detail oriented and focused; strong organizational and communication skills; experience in community organizing is helpful; ability to travel and work on weekends. Application: Send a cover letter, resume, and three references to: Voting Rights Coordinator Search; AALDEF; 99 Hudson Street, 12th floor; New York, NY 10013-2815; fax: 212-966-4303; Email: info@aaldef.org (put “voting rights coordinator search” in the subject line). Deadline: Applicants will be considered on a rolling basis until filled. For more information, contact Glenn D. Magpantay at 212-966-5932 or info@aaldef.org.