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PRESS ADVISORY
Instant Runoff Reform Costly and Threatens North Carolina Verified Voting Law
Press Release/ Winston Salem, NC, United States, 06/30/2008 - Last Tuesday North Carolina set a record low for voter turnout in the Labor Commissioner runoff. Activists are saying that the state should adopt instant runoff voting as a way to save money. The fact is, a switch to "instant runoff" voting could cost taxpayers an estimated $20.3 million in the first year.
Instant Runoff Voting Increases Election Costs in North Carolina
North Carolina Estimated General Fund Expenditures for Instant Runoff Voting
Average Cost $5.2 Million Per Year to Administer Instant Runoff Voting
The cost study below is based on fiscal analysis prepared by the state of Maryland for the cost to implement Instant runoff for statewide elections. Maryland has repeatedly introduced and turned down legislation to require such IRV elections. Using the numbers from the fiscal analysis prepared for Maryland lawmakers for IRV implementation, we can expect that voter education alone would cost North Carolina taxpayers approximately $2.9 Million per election year. General costs associated with IRV increase that figure to $5.2 Million per year for North Carolina. This is based on Maryland's estimated voter education costs of only .50 cents per registered voter per year.
A true cost comparison of voting machines cannot focus just on election day costs.
All costs must be considered, including documentation revision, information technology, additional or new software
and or voting machines, voter education, election judge training development costs leading up to the elections.
 *Does not include cost for software, additional or new voting machines.
or adjust the thresholds for these elections. Third parties can be helped by making ballot access easier, and considering other voting methods that don't require complex tabulation. These reforms are compatible with North Carolina's Public Confidence in Elections Law, whereas Instant Runoff is not.
Fiscal analysis by Maryland's state legislature: figures do not include the cost of buying new voting machines and or special IRV software. Those costs would be extra.
Maryland Bills for IRV in 2009 and 2007 that have fiscal analysis included: the Maryland legislature estimates that costs could be as high as an additional $3.50 per registered voter in their 2006 IRV bill, and a little less in the 2008 bill which did not include the cost of software.
Fiscal Summary of two IRV bills in Maryland (none have passed)
Elections - Instant Runoff Method of Voting
This bill establishes an instant runoff method of voting intended to ensure majority rule in an election.
The bill takes effect January 1, 2007.
Fiscal Summary
State Effect: General fund expenditures would increase by roughly $11.1 million in FY2008 and $1.5 million in FY 2009, reflecting documentation revision, information technology, voter education, and election judge training development costs leading up to the 2008 presidential primary and general elections. General fund expenditures also would increase by $1.5 million in FY 2011 due to voter education costs prior to the 2010 gubernatorial elections. These estimates do not include costs that cannot be reliably estimated for additional staff to assist in the ballot counting process and additional voting machines possibly needed if allowing voters to rank candidates will cause significantly longer voting lines.
Local Effect: Local election boards would experience increased expenditures due to
voter education and election judge training costs.
This bill establishes an instant runoff method of voting intended to ensure majority rule in an election. The bill takes effect January 1, 2009.
Fiscal Summary
State Effect: General fund expenditures would increase significantly prior to the 2010 and 2012 elections to implement an instant runoff method of voting. Implementing the new method of voting is anticipated to require revisions to various aspects of the election management process and a considerable voter outreach campaign to educate voters on the new method of voting. The extent of the increase in expenditures cannot be reliably estimated at this time.
Local Effect: Local election boards are expected to also experience increased expenditures for voter outreach and for election judge training costs.
State Fiscal Effect: General fund expenditures would increase significantly leading up to the 2010 elections to implement an instant runoff method of voting, with expenditure increases expected to begin in fiscal 2009. General fund expenditures are also expected to increase prior to the 2012 elections for continued voter outreach and possibly further revisions to documentation and SBE’s election management system. The increases in costs, however, cannot be reliably estimated at this time.
SBE indicates it is difficult to determine the full extent of the changes that would need to be made to accommodate the new method of voting, though such a change would require revisions to regulations and documentation used in the election process (including judges manuals and canvassing instructions), SBE’s election management system, and election procedures. A considerable voter outreach campaign would also be required, likely including advertising through television, radio, and print media, direct mailing, and staff outreach to various organizations.
Local Fiscal Effect: Local boards are also expected to experience increased expenditures primarily due to voter education (in addition to SBE’s voter education costs) and election judge training. Local boards likely would need additional staff or would
need to hire a public relations firm to assist with voter education. In addition, SBE recommends, as a part of voter education, that a mandatory primary election specimen ballot mailer be sent to each voter to allow them to determine how they will rank
candidates prior to voting.
SBE advises that election judge training has become more complex due to added security requirements and Help America Vote Act mandates. Adding subject matter on the instant runoff method to election judge training may increase time needed for training and therefore compensation costs for the judges.
...more on costs of Instant runoff voting here
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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
North Carolina, November 11, 2007/ NCVVNewswire/NC Coalition for Verified Voting
NC Coalition for Verified Voting Responds to AP’s “Fair-election advocates battle for turf”
AP News “Hit Piece” On Fledgling Election Advocate Group boosts issue of accurate elections to the forefront. Calling it “a stroke of promotional genius,” Joyce McCloy said “We owe the AP news desk a debt of gratitude – we couldn’t buy this kind of publicity. Thank you AP News, for getting our organization’s name into papers, radio and television news across the state!”
At issue is the AP article “Fair-election advocates battle for turf” (Nov 5, 2007 in multiple outlets)[1], a sort of “Rosie verses Trump” story.
The AP, having a slow news day, decided to have some fun and create a little controversy by re-making the Winston Salem Journal’s article, "Vote-counting done correctly is her goal"[2]. They gutted the positives, and ramped up the negatives. The new title was provocative: “Fair-election advocates battle for turf”.
The story cited many zingers by reform leader Bob Hall such as: "They come at it from basically a paranoia or a caution or a fear of votes not being counted,’ said Bob Hall, executive director of Democracy North Carolina and one of the state's foremost activists for clean elections and political reform.
Weighty organizations such as the California based Electronic Frontier Foundation shared our concern enough to provide us legal representation, pro bono - when a voting vendor challenged our tough new law.
The AP gave the story fever with: “Hall also said he doesn't very much respect how McCloy's group has advocated the issue, referring to her opposition of an instant-runoff pilot program in the town of Cary.” And there’s this gem: “Hall said most voting-rights leaders support instant-runoff elections because voters turn out in low numbers to costly runoffs. McCloy opposes such elections, saying they can be confusing to voters.”
Electionline’s Nov 8, 07 article on San Francisco’s recent IRV election validates our concern, though - citing "Voters also questioned the value of ranked-choice voting…"There are a lot of people who only mark one [candidate] or the same person three times," [3]
Thanks to the publicity, the issue of election transparency and the controversy over “instant runoff elections” is getting the public attention it needs.
What are the real issues?
The AP clearly knows about North Carolina’s voting system problems, and said so in these in their description of the Nov 2004 election:
"A Florida-style nightmare has unfolded in North Carolina in the days since Election Day, with thousands of votes missing and the outcome of two statewide races still up in the air." AP Newswire, Nov 13
North Carolina’s election failures in 2004 were caused by poorly designed software causing voting machines in several counties to add votes, subtract votes, lose votes, or just plain crash.
The state legislature responded to the loss of 4,400 votes in Carteret County by setting up the “Joint Select Committee on Electronic Voting” in December 2005. The committee met for months and heard testimony from computer scientists, election officials, advocates and citizens. The legislation passed with a unanimous vote in August 2005. [4]
Thanks to NC’s tough election law, we lead much of the country in efforts to improve elections. In an Aug 1, 2007 press release the Brennan Center said: "Only one state, North Carolina, has collected and made public the most significant data from post-election audits for the purpose of improving future elections." [5]
Touch-screen voting machines remain a concern:
A national study of incident reports for the November 2006 election found more problems with touch screens than any other voting system. The report logged “over three and a half times as many reports of problems with DREs(touch-screen machines); nearly nine times as many usability difficulties with DREs; and over fifteen times as many reports of long lines and/or voters leaving without voting.”[6]
The NC Coalition for Verified Voting has worked with the Brennan Center for Justice and Project Vote, to reverse the state’s “no match, no vote” policy . On Oct 17, 2007 John Tanner, Chief Justice of the US Department of Justice Voting Rights Division – pre-cleared the law. This change ensures that voters will not be blocked from registering because of clerical or database errors as long as they provide identification the first time that they vote. [7]
Now we can raise the profile of election “reform” issues and get the public to start taking a stake in issues such as verified voting, election transparency, and to question controversial election methods like “instant runoff voting”. Two cities in North Carolina, Cary and Hendersonville – have tested IRV. The State Board of Elections hopes to enlist 10 counties to try this new method of voting in 2008.
We believe that our state should learn to walk before running, and that means holding off on experimental election reforms like “instant runoff voting” until we know how this would affect our election system and voters. The key principle in electoral confidence is simplicity and transparency.
For questions or comments, contact the North Carolina Coalition for Verified Voting. Email joyce.mccloy at earthlink dot net or phone (336) 794-1240.
[1] “Fair-election advocates battle for turf” Nov 5, 2007 Charlotte Observer and multiple outlets http://www.charlotte.com/204/story/349531.html
[2] "Vote-counting done correctly is her goal", James Romoser, Winston Salem Journal, Nov 04, 2007 http://www.journalnow.com/servlet/Satellite?pagename=WSJ%2FMGArticle%2FWSJ_BasicArticle&c=MGArticle&cid=1173353369204&path=!localnews&s=1037645509099
[3] Electionline Nov 8, 07 Newsletter. Ranked-Choice Voting and Flawed Ballots Tax San Francisco's Election - http://www.electionline.org/Publications/Newsletters/tabid/87/Default.aspx
[4] SL 2005-323 Public Confidence in Elections Law - signed into law on August 26, 2005 http://www.ncleg.net/Sessions/2005/Bills/Senate/HTML/S223v7.html
[5] In an Aug 1, 2007 press release the Brennan Center
http://www.brennancenter.org/press_detail.asp?key=100&subkey=50088&proj_key=76
[6] E-Voting Failures in the 2006 Mid-Term Elections – by Voters Unite, Voter Action, Vote Trust, and Pollworkers for Democracy http://www.votersunite.org/info/E-VotingIn2006Mid-Term.pdf
[7] SL 2007-391 pre-cleared by Chief Justice Tanner. Memo to NC SBoE. http://www.ncvoter.net/downloads/SL_2007_391_PreCleared_By_DOJ.pdf
PRESS ADVISORY
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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
North Carolina, July 23, 2007/ NCVVNewswire/NC Coalition for Verified Voting decries efforts of Guilford County Election Director to block or weaken federal election legislation currently being considered by congress.
NCVV strongly also strongly urges citizens to call or email their congressman toll free at 888-597-0909 to support HR 811 Rep. Rush Holt's (D-NJ) "Voter Confidence and Increased Accessibility Act" in its current form without modifications.
George Gilbert,Guilford County Election Director has been called by the minority party to testify in Washington DC on July 25, 2007 against voter verified paper ballots for all 50 states. [1]
This is the second time the minority party has asked Gilbert for help in shooting down federal legislation that would require voter verified paper ballots for every vote. He also presented testimony to US congress on March 23, 2007. [2]
This is a smack in the face to all voters in North Carolina who believe that if your vote doesn't count - nothing else matters. For people in the many states who have paperless voting, [3] this is a kick in the gut.
Its outrageous that in 2007 we still have some states voting on paperless computers with no way to hold recounts and no way to conduct audits. Congress needs to pass federal legislation now to prevent another Florida style meltdown in 2008.
Accurate and transparent elections are not a partisan issue.
Advocacy groups Working Assetts [4] and Right March [5] both have also issued a call of support for verified voting for all 50 states.
Director Gilbert tried to kill voter verified paper ballots in North Carolina but failed. [6]
Now he's trying to kill verified voting at the national level.
North Carolina has had a successful statewide primary and General Election since our
law passed. We have had audits and recounts, increasing voters confidence in elections.
Don't let one of our election directors take part in denying voters in other states from having this protection.
Call or email your congressman toll free at 888-597-0909 to support HR 811 in its current form without modifications.
For questions or comments, contact the North Carolina Coalition for Verified Voting. Email joyce.mccloy at earthlink dot net or phone (336) 794-1240.
[1] Senate Committee on Rules and Administration Hearings
[2] George Gilbert's testimony to US congress on March 23, 2007
[3] Verified Voting map showing status of 50 states
[4] Working Assetts: H.R. 811: Our Best Hope For Election Integrity By 2008
[5] Right March: Tell Congress to Require Voter-Verified Paper Trail "No-confidence Vote" Earned by Machines
PRESS ADVISORY
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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Prestigious Lemon Award Presented to Maryland, the New "Florida of Elections"
North Carolina, Sept 27, 2006/NCVVNewswire/ NC Coalition for Verified Voting,
is pleased to present the September 2006 Elections Lemon Prize to Maryland.
NCVV is greatful to Maryland for being the new Florida of elections, a title that North Carolina
was happy to eschew. Runner up this month is the state of Georgia.
Election officials in North Carolina say: "We are glad that its not us getting the blame for all of those snafus.!"
Honorable mention goes to Georgia.
North Carolina passed a tough new "No Excuses" election law, therefore,
we are pleased to pass on the special Lemon Elections Award to Maryland.
North Carolina earned this prize in 2004 by permanently losing over 4,400 votes
on one paperless voting machine in Carteret County.
While enjoying their Lemon Award, (and honorable mention), the Maryland and Georgia legislatures could consider
passing their own "No Excuses" anti Lemon law, like North Carolina did:
(b) Penalties. – Willful violation of any of the duties in subsection (a) of this section is a Class G felony. Substitution of source code into an operating voting system without notification as provided by subdivision (a)(2) of this section is a Class I felony. In addition to any other applicable penalties, violations of this section are subject to a civil penalty to be assessed by the State Board of Elections in its discretion in an amount of up to one hundred thousand dollars ($100,000) per violation. A civil penalty assessed under this section shall be subject to the provisions of G.S. 163-278.34(e)." http://www.ncleg.net/Sessions/2005/Bills/Senate/HTML/S223v7.html
Maryland Has More lemons, But No Lemonaid:
John Gideon, Executive Director of Voters Unite notes this in the daily news news:
"Diebold has now divulged that there were three software problems with the e-poll books used in
Maryland in the primary a couple weeks ago. These poll-books were federally certified.
Why were these problems not found when they were certified as part of a complete voting system?
Is the EAC going to track the software updates and ensure they get inspected prior to use in other states,
if Diebold even makes the corrections in other states? /
Diebold has also now divulged that the same e-poll book failure in Maryland also happened in July in Georgia.
How many other states are using these machines and will they be told of the failures?"
Sept 29, 2006. Maryland Gazette: We’re No. 1 Maryland beat Georgia. Unfortunately it wasn’t in football.
A North Carolina voters advocacy group gave Maryland an ‘‘Elections Lemon” award for the primary snafus.
http://www.gazette.net/stories/092706/montcou182224_31944.shtml
*Turns out that one of the "independent consultants", Connie Schmidt - has her picture plastered
on Diebold sales fliers that have been spread all over the country.
Ms. Schmidt had been hired to audit this county that was plagued by Diebold voting
machine related problems. Instead, another "independent consultant" sent by "The
Election Center" is going to audit the election. Never mind that "The Election Center"
accepts 10% of its budget from voting machine companies.
MD: Ehrlich pushing paper absentee ballots. Governor says it’s a safer alternative,
but his suggestion gets mixed reviews from elections officials, lawmakers
*The computer scientist community agrees, as do many citizens, so whats the holdup?
Oh, thats right, Linda Lamone said there would be a paper trail "over my dead body".
She also said "the buck stops with me." Right.
MD: Democratic governor backs Ehrlich on balloting
*Thats the democratic governor in New Mexico who supports it, but the democratic candidate for
governor in MD is no where to be found on this critical issue.
*Well thats one root. I think this thing is like a tree, and you will find more "glitches"
since the testing protocols are woefully inadequate.
Time after time, Diebold equipment fails, and time after time, we are told that the "glitch" has been fixed.
*The State Board of Elections created insane pressures on the county boards of elections,
and rolled out complex systems that DIDNT work Training is good, but making the job
do-able is part of the administrative process and the decisions made at the State Board of Elections.
When a State Elections office adds layers of new laws, procedures, equipment and possible ballot changes -
at the last minute - this is a poor way to administer state elections.
Montgomery County Election workers should qualify for Post Traumatic Stress Disorder therapy.
North Carolina rolled out all new voting machines 2 months after the counties purchased them,
and we did it successfully. Whats wrong with Maryland?
Related Election Lemon Award Links:
Tuesday, September 26. 2006
Showing the efficiency and responsiveness they are famous for -
Diebold has fixed the problems with Maryland's Electronic Poll Books - almost.
Friday, September 22. 2006
WHY ISN'T ANYONE RAISING HECK ABOUT THIS?
Thursday, September 21. 2006 Maryland's Governor wants return to optical scan.
Video of this available at the above link.
Today Linda Lamone (State Board of Elections Administrator of Maryland) appeared before the Board of Public Works
to talk about Maryland's primary election debacle.
The issue on everyone's mind - What caused the election failures, and who was to blame?
This election was truly a sad litany of one problem after another.
Wednesday, September 13. 2006
Connecting Maryland's Election Debacle Dots
Sunday, September 10. 2006
The only way to get up close and personal with Diebold Touch Screen machines
in Maryland is to get hired as a "temp".
Lemon Elections Award Honorable Mention Goes to Georgia:
Lemon Must See TV -
Election Deception --Cathy Cox 03/04/04
Cathy Cox and Election Deception 03/11/04
(note: the machines on display were from Avante and TruVote)
Ms. Cox has "modeled" for Diebold's sales brochures as well -
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February 9, 2005
North Carolina Citizens Demand Voter Verified Paper Ballots
North Carolina General Assembly Committee on Electronic Voting Fails to Specify Most Secure and Economical Election Technology
NC Citizens want Elections, not Selections.
Citizens believe that elections should be decided by the voters, not by expediency.
When Britt Cobb conceded the race for Agriculture Commissioner, he solved an embarrassing problem for our elections division, but not for voters. Thanks to the permanent loss of 4,438 votes on a paperless voting machine in Carteret County, we will never know if Mr. Cobb or Mr. Troxler won the contest.
North Carolina Newspapers reported serious voting problems starting with the first day of early voting in the 2004 General Election and continuing through Election Day and beyond.
· Voters' selections changed in front of their eyes on the touch screens of paperless voting machines.
· Tabulation equipment began subtracting votes after accumulated totals reached 32,000.
· Voting machines lost votes, miscounted votes, and mysteriously added votes.
· Machines broke down, froze up, paged through ballots backwards, and skipped past important races.
Currently, 40 NC Counties use paperless direct recording electronic voting systems (DREs) for early voting and election day but employ optical scanners to tabulate their mail in absentee votes. The rest of the state uses one system only, thus treating all voters equally.
The least expensive yet most efficient way to prevent the many problems that occur with paperless voting machines or DREs (Direct Record Electronic) would be to replace all the DREs now in use with paper ballots counted either by hand or by optical scan systems.
To allow blind or disabled voters to vote privately, one touchscreen ballot marking system with audio feedback might be purchased for each precinct.
With DREs, only as many voters can vote at a time as there are DREs. Hence, while only one optical scanner would be required in each precinct, ten to twenty DREs per precinct would be required to allow the same pace of voting and prevent excessively long waits.
The NC Coalition for Verified Voting estimates the costs of converting one precinct to DRE voting and compared to the cost of converting one precinct to paper ballots with one optical scanner and one ballot marking device roughly as follows:
· To deploy a minimal five DREs at $4,500 apiece, $22,500, or for ten DREs $45,000
· For one optical scanner, one automark device, ten voting booths, and 1000 paper ballots: $12,000
Training, maintenance, and storage would be far more for DREs, their being far more complex and there being far more of them, than paper, optical scanners, and automark combined.
DREs do not last more than ten years before needing to be replaced, so the costs are repeated frequently.
Even with open source code and ability to print paper ballots (requirements for DREs that are being considered by the committee), use of DREs is likely to continue to be fraught with glitches, breakdowns, insecurity, and uncertainty over the accuracy of election results.
· Numerous instances of incompetence, deceit, and bribery by all the vendors whose DREs are currently used in North Carolina have been reported. See website NCVOTER.net
· Salesmen for the same vendors are ubiquitous at occasions where boards of elections and election officials meet. The Election Center, a nonprofit supposedly providing education to election officials is supported by those vendors and takes an extreme position in favor of paperless DREs. The vendors also intensely lobby the legislature. North Carolina has no effective code of ethics for elections officials. With all of the cronyism with lobbyists and salesmen, hosted dinners and multiple cases of known bribery by vendors, there is an appearance that North Carolina voting systems are chosen as much because of the personal influence vendors have with officials as for any objective standards.
· DREs generally are operated with modems and tabulators. Chuck Herrin's demonstration to the committee on January 7, posted on the committee's web site, showed that the Diebold GEMs tabulator seems to be designed to be amenable to manipulation of vote totals. Totals at precinct level as well as with central tabulators can be manipulated through modems. Tabulators and modems should not be allowed in any combination. Tabulating totals from a few dozen precincts is not rocket science, it is not even higher math. It is arithmetic. It can be done on any spreadsheet.
The Association of Computing Machinery, the world's oldest professional computer association has come down in favor of paper:
"Many electronic voting systems have been evaluated by independent, generally-recognized experts and have been found to be poorly designed; developed using inferior software engineering processes; designed without (or with very limited) external audit capabilities; intended for operation without obvious protective measures; and deployed without rigorous, scientifically-designed testing."
"ACM has recommended that e-voting systems enable voters to inspect a physical (e.g., paper) record to verify the accuracy of their vote, and to serve as an independent check on the record produced and stored by the system. In addition, those records should be made permanent, not based solely in computer memory, to allow for an accurate recount."
A poll of 4,600 ACM members showed 95.6% supported this view, something quite unprecedented amongst computer professionals. http://www.acm.org/usacm/weblog/index.php?p=73
Regardless whether votes are counted by DRE tabulators or optical scanners, which are manufactured by the two largest vendors of DREs, a machine count is not transparent. The public cannot observe if, and it is vulnerable to manipulation. Unless results of each election are audited by observable hand counts of a large proportion of the paper ballots there will be no assurance that the electronic vote totals are accurate or honest.
Even if hand counts take an extra day or two, costing up to another thousand dollars per precinct, it is a small price to pay for assurance of honest elections. The pressure against hand counting and for the fastest possible calls of elections comes not from the public, but from the media, whose motive is profit, not good government, and also from election officials who are concerned about the ease of administering elections. Those pressures are in conflict with the requirements of honest and secure elections, and they need to be firmly resisted.
North Carolina should avoid the experience of Ireland where, according to a story in the Irish Times, the government must write off 50 million euros already invested in DREs after its Independent Commission on Electronic Voting reported serious deficiencies of security and accuracy with the systems.
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CONTACT INFORMATION
Joyce Mccloy
NORTH CAROLINA COALITION FOR VERIFIED VOTING
Visit Our Site www.ncvoter.net
336-794-1240
Email us Here
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