Legislature 2015 | CTVotersCount.org

Hartford Election Report: Sad, yet an easy recommended read.

As they and we often say, “Diagnosis before cure”. Lest the cure be ineffective or worse than the disease.

The Hartford Common Council empowered a Committee of Inquiry to gather facts on the widely reported late opening of polls on election day, the long known disfunction in the Registrars Office, and the less reported inaccurate, yet to be corrected reports of election results. We recommend reading the whole report. It is an easy read, yet sad, disappointing, and as some have said outrageous

The Hartford Common Council empowered a Committee of Inquiry to gather facts on the widely reported late opening of polls on election day, the long known disfunction in the Registrars Office, and the less reported inaccurate, yet to be corrected reports of election results. Here is the summary. We recommend reading the whole report. It is an easy read, yet sad, disappointing, and as some have said outrageous. <full report>

The Committee’s investigation confirmed that several Hartford polling places did not allow voting to commence at 6:00 a.m., as required by law. In addition, the investigation revealed additional irregularities. The Head Moderator failed to account for all of the absentee ballots received, failed to correctly tally and report the vote count, and failed to submit a timely Amended Head Moderator’s Return. The Hartford Registrars:

failed to provide the Secretary of the State (“SOTS”) with information about the polling place moderators ;

failed to file the final registry books with the Town Clerk by October 29

failed to timely prepare and deliver the final registry books by 8:00 p.m. on November 3, and thereafter failed to develop or implement a plan for delivering the books to the polling places before the polls opened at 6:00 a.m. on November 4;

failed to adequately prepare and open several polling places;

failed to maintain adequate communications among key election day personnel;

failed to provide the Head Moderator with the proper form to submit his Head Moderator’s Return in advance of the election;

failed to attend a statutorily required meeting to correct errors in the Head Moderator’s Return; and

failed to identify and correct discrepancies in the vote tallies reported by the Head Moderator, with the result that the final vote tally remains unclear, and no Hartford election official can explain what happened to approximately 70 absentee ballots reported as having been received

In short, multiple, serious errors plagued the administration of the 2014 General Election in Hartford. These errors appear to have resulted in the disenfranchisement of Hartford voters and, even several months later, a lack of an accurate vote count.

The Committee has determined that many of the Election Day problems are attributable to errors or omissions by certain Hartford election officials (as described in detail below); a dysfunctional working relationship among all election officials; a lack of leadership and accountability; and the absence of a clear, legally prescribed chain of command.

Once again, I recommend reading the entire report. It really brings home the points made in the summary.

I add some additional thoughts:

Nobody seems interested in actually determining what happened to the “missing” ballots, or determining the actual vote count — a team could easily get all the numbers from the tape and at least determine votes for governor from the machines, which are very very likely to be less than the number of ballots counted by the machines — this report demonstrates, unsurprisingly, that people should not count anything alone, but should work together to verify addition and transcription. Double checking by “two eyes” works.
Some authority could also actually count all the ballots and votes by hand. I will guarantee the number of votes per race will not exceed the number of ballots. (If the count is accurate)
Someone authority could actually count the number of envelopes for ABs. Then count then number of ABs checked-off, then count the number returned on the Clerk’s log…then if there is a discrepancy, match the envelopes to the voter names on both those lists to help uncover the source of any differences.
How many other towns have check-in lists, or ballot counts that are way off from vote counts? Does anybody check…or has this only surfaced because of the visible problems on election day? (We know some towns and moderators check and that others have at least sometimes not)
The official system has yet to a) recognize the actual counts in Bridgeport for Governor in 2010. b) never audited the other towns in 2010 with many copied, hand counted ballots c) Never checked other towns since then that that have had huge numbers of hand counted votes on copied ballots – even those that have chosen deliberately to forgo scanners in some elections. d) Never checked the discrepancies between voters checked-in in Bridgeport vs. ballots in 2010, or checked for such errors anywhere else!!!
And, in Hartford, how about checking the reported counts that weren’t for Governor?

Make no mistake. We applaud the investigation as far as it went. It provides plenty to consider and change.

Yet the Hartford Courant is dissatisfied with the report, apparently believes the investigation was unnecessary. Reflection and deliberation, based on effective gathering of facts, in their opinion, seems a waste of time. The Editorial Board would also apparently place the prime responsibility for choosing actions solely on the Mayor over the entire Council.

Thumbs down on lack of city plan to fix registrar mess-ups

Thumbs still down on Hartford’s handling of the registrar of voters mess. Mayor Pedro Segarra and city council president Shawn Wooden formed a council committee to investigate the registrars’ election day screw-ups. The committee reported Friday what everyone already knew — the registrars bungled things so badly that some polls were unable to open on time. The Friday announcement is full of indignant language — but not a peep about what the mayor plans to do about the situation. “That is being determined,” a spokesperson said. Lame.

As they and we often say, “Diagnosis before cure”. Lest the cure be ineffective or worse than the disease.

Ambitious agenda should be reasoned and well-planned

In today’s print edition of the Courant, one in a series of editorials setting an agenda for the State, Agenda 2015: Ambitious Goals For The State, one portion focuses on elections,

We diverge from the Courant in our opinion. We continue to point out that the most comprehensive system of election administration reform would be to regionalize elections, obtaining some of the same benefits obtained by regionalizing probate.

Also, Professionalization does not include ignoring science. There is a reason we do not connect our scanners to the internet to report results.

In today’s print edition of the Hartford Courant, one in a series of editorials setting an agenda for the State, Agenda 2015: Ambitious Goals For The State, one portion focuses on elections:

Elections

Isn’t it time Connecticut’s registrars came into the 21st century? Hartford was so unprepared for Election Day that President Obama had to beg voters who had given up waiting to vote to try again.

State law should be changed to let towns and cities appoint a single trained nonpartisan registrar. The current system under which two registrars (or more) are elected for each town is expensive, wasteful, inefficient. Connecticut needs to professionalize these offices or have municipal clerks take over the job. U.S. Sen. Chris Murphy is right to call for reforming the state’s entire election system in 2015.

The state must professionalize voting too. Machines here could transmit results electronically, as in Massachusetts, but they aren’t allowed to. Instead, pages of results are hand-transcribed and faxed to the state the next day. What is this, 1992?

And can the legislature silence those irritating, intrusive political robocalls that invade households at election time? Though most unsolicited pitches are against the law, political robocalls are legal. Some states ban or restrict them. So should Connecticut.

We really have two basic problems with election administration. One predominantly in small towns and another in large towns. In smaller towns there is often a lack of sufficient funds and time for very part time registrars to keep up with the laws, requirements, and technology, and to have staff members to gain such experience to be possible replacements. In large towns there are sufficient funds and staff, yet in some there is a a lack of professional actions – apparently replaced by some incompetence and excuse making. Patronage and selecting candidates by party loyalty often contributes to the problem. Some of these same problems exist in mid-sized towns as well. It would be unfair and highly inaccurate to paint all registrars with this same brush. Most are of individuals of integrity, some in large towns are very competent or employ competent staff, many in small towns expend the efforts necessary despite low pay.

No system is perfect. There are states with effective county administrators, elected or appointed. Yet there are areas with incompetent and obviously unfairly partisan officials appointed, and elected.

Its hard to believe that registrars appointed by the Hartford or Bridgeport Council’s (or any towns) would reduce partisan action/pressure. It might work sometimes, and not work other times. That is no improvement. Registrars make important decisions effecting who is on the ballot, who runs polling places, and when to recanvass a suspicious result. In 2010 the Secretary of the State’s Office reached an agreement with the registrars in Bridgeport to audit every district after the election day debacle – the agreement was nixed by the Mayor and city attorneys. As for saving money, its the council’s that set the salaries for registrars and deputies today.

Moving elections to the clerks would be close to moving deck chairs on the Titanic. It would not solve the time and money problems for small towns. For large towns it would not change the risks of political pressure or in itself save money.

We do need more professionalism in election administration. Less partisan, more professional administration. That requires some form of education and certification, plus a career path so individuals can learn the job and make elections a career. That is why we recommend rationalization with appointed officials.

Also, Professionalization does not include ignoring science. There is a reason we do not connect our scanners to the internet to report results. The Professionals at Uconn agree with other computer scientists and security experts that connecting voting machines to the Internet or phone systems is unsafe. That is why we do not to it. In fact, Connecticut is much earlier than many other states in reporting election results. Where we need professionalism is in taking a bit more time to report more accurate, more complete results.

General Assembly ready to protect everything Internet. Except voting?

Meanwhile Congress, in-spite of gridlock, takes the time to appeal old law calling for Internet voting experiments. Isn’t it time for the General Assembly to follow suit?

Hartford Courant article yesterday: Drones, Privacy: Legislative Issues Reflect Changing Times <read>

The coming legislative session is likely to be dominated by the usual fights over taxes and spending. But lawmakers are also poised to ponder other issues that reflect changes in the social fabric propelled by technology.

From protecting student privacy from firms seeking to access a burgeoning trove of educational data to regulating smartphone – based car services such as Uber to a bold future of drones and driverless cars, the General Assembly could be asked to craft public policy on concepts that scarcely existed a few years ago…

Rep. Vin Candelora, the deputy leader of the House Republican caucus, said that in many ways these are the issues that define our times. “I really think issues are as big as the budget. One is dealing with our fiscal health but these are dealing with the health of our society,” he said.

“The big theme here is data collection. What are people’s rights to privacy? Once information gets out on the Internet, it can never be taken back,”

In 2013 the Legislature unanimously passed Internet voting for the second time. It was vetoed the 1st time for good reason by Governor Malloy, yet signed inexplicably the second time. It would force the Secretary of the State and 169 towns individually to do what the State, the U.S. Government, (including the Military), retailers, and big banks, not to mention Sony have failed to do: Defy science and secure the Internet. <read our past stories on Internet voting here>

Time to ask your legislator “If Internet banking attacks annualy cost banks billions, and Sony cannot protect its email from North Korea, how can you expect our town registrars to protect Internet voting? Who will pay for an election debacle?”

Some related good news:

Congress, in-spite of gridlock, takes the time to appeal 2002 law calling for Internet voting experiments. Isn’t it time for the General Assembly to follow suit?

Last week the National Defense Authorization Act contained a small provision appreciated by voting integrity advocates, repealing a mandate for demonstration project for Internet voting project:

FY 15 NDAA Bill Text (RULES COMMITTEE PRINT 113–58 HOUSE AMENDMENT TO THE TEXT OF S. 1847) (now Act):

“SEC. 593. REPEAL OF ELECTRONIC VOTING DEMONSTRATION PROJECT.

Section 1604 of the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2002 (Public Law 107–107; 52 U.S.C. 20301 note) is repealed.”

Joint Explanatory Statement (JOINT EXPLANATORY STATEMENT TO ACCOMPANY THE NATIONAL DEFENSE AUTHORIZATION ACT FOR FISCAL YEAR 2015 (which accompanies the Act):

Repeal of electronic voting demonstration project (sec. 593)

The Senate committee-reported bill contained a provision(sec. 1076) that would repeal section 1604 of the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2002 (Public Law 107- 107)that requires the Secretary of Defense to carry out an electronic voting demonstration project. The House bill contained no similar provision. The agreement includes this provision.

Advocates have long worked to have the act repealed and to get the FVAP to reveal results of a study of Internet voting. As we posted last September: What is FVAP hiding? Whom if anyone are they assisting?

Hopefully, it won’t take 12 years for Connecticut to understand the risks of Internet voting and repeal its risky 2013 law.

Will it take a Pearl Harbor or 9/11 for Internet security (and voting integrity)?

To err is human, to react without thinking is to compound the err

The goal should be to solve a problem of huge risk, without requiring a catastrophe, without attacking others, spending what is necessary and moving on.

Let us also not forget the twin risks of doing nothing and doing too much of the wrong thing, apply as Connecticut tackles our voting system which may have had a wake up call this November, but nothing like Pearl Harbor or 9/11.

To err is human, to react without thinking is to compound the err

A thoughtful post at the NY Times, that deserves a better title: Hacked vs. Hackers: Game On <read>

The problem, Mr. Kocher and security experts reason, is a lack of liability and urgency. The Internet is still largely held together with Band-Aid fixes. Computer security is not well regulated, even as enormous amounts of private, medical and financial data and the nation’s computerized critical infrastructure — oil pipelines, railroad tracks, water treatment facilities and the power grid — move online.

After a year of record-setting hacking incidents, companies and consumers are finally learning how to defend themselves and are altering how they approach computer security.

If a stunning number of airplanes in the United States crashed tomorrow, there would be investigations, lawsuits and a cutback in air travel, and the airlines’ stock prices would most likely plummet. That has not been true for hacking attacks, which surged 62 percent last year, according to the security company Symantec. As for long-term consequences, Home Depot, which suffered the worst security breach of any retailer in history this year, has seen its stock float to a high point.

In a speech two years ago, Leon E. Panetta, the former defense secretary, predicted it would take a “cyber-Pearl Harbor” — a crippling attack that would cause physical destruction and loss of life — to wake up the nation to the vulnerabilities in its computer systems.

No such attack has occurred. Nonetheless, at every level, there has been an awakening that the threats are real and growing worse, and that the prevailing “patch and pray” approach to computer security simply will not do.

I agree that the problem is huge. We should hope that it does not take an attack like Pearl Harbor or 9/11 to change things. How would World War II have gone without Pearl Harbor – I suspect not much different. I am not a historian. I was not alive then, but overall our reaction to Pearl Harbor was on balance justified, appropriate, and successful. I do not think that 9/11 worked out that way, our wars “of choice” in Iraq and Afghanistan have yet to be successful, have been arguably unjustified and inappropriate as well. They certainly have been costly with no end in sight. When it comes to security, again the Patriot Act was a knee-jerk reaction, with every wishlist item of the security state fulfilled. It is questionable that the fortune and liberties we have sacrificed have been worth it or that all in all we are safer.

The goal should be to solve a problem of huge risk, without requiring a catastrophe, without attacking others, spending what is necessary and moving on.

That has happened once that I know of. It was called Y2K, a disaster avoided, a significant yet limited expense. Y2K was real, those warning about it in the late 1980’s were ignored for many years. The ultimate risk was overblown by the media, then when all went well we had years of poopooing the risk as overblown. For the record, I was a Y2K contractor for a bit over two years for three companies – I did small jobs that needed to be accomplished, where I was uniquely qualified. There were excesses. In fact, I helped save a client from a wasteful proposal. Yet overall we solved and prevented a problem that could have been avoided at a lower cost if more leaders had listened to those who warned us early. Even now, occasionally someone in a discussion will complain about “all the money computer programmers took home working on Y2K”, as if that caused our deficit. Yet, it is worth it to me, it to know that a real problem was avoided, despite the occasional uninformed criticism.

Yet as this article points out, we have already paid a huge, largely unrecognized price for Internet vulnerablity:

The Wake-Up Call
A bleak recap: In the last two years, breaches have hit the White House, the State Department, the top federal intelligence agency, the largest American bank, the top hospital operator, energy companies, retailers and even the Postal Service. In nearly every case, by the time the victims noticed that hackers were inside their systems, their most sensitive government secrets, trade secrets and customer data had already left the building. And in just the last week Sony Pictures Entertainment had to take computer systems offline because of an aggressive attack on its network.

The impact on consumers has been vast. Last year, over 552 million people had their identities stolen, according to Symantec, and nearly 25,000 Americans had sensitive health information compromised — every day — according to the Department of Health and Human Services. Over half of Americans, including President Obama, had to have their credit cards replaced at least once because of a breach, according to the Ponemon Group, an independent research organization.

But the value of those stolen credit cards, which trade freely in underground criminal markets, is eclipsed by the value of the intellectual property that has been siphoned out of United States corporations, universities and research groups by hackers in China — so much so that security experts now say there are only two types of companies left in the United States: those that have been hacked and those that do not yet know they have been hacked.

And this year, American companies learned it was not just Beijing they were up against. Thanks to revelations by the former intelligence agency contractor Edward J. Snowden, companies worry about protecting their networks from their own government. If the tech sector cannot persuade foreign customers that their data is safe from the National Security Agency, the tech industry analysis firm Forrester Research predicts that America’s cloud computing industry stands to lose $180 billion — a quarter of its current revenue — over the next two years to competitors abroad.

Finally, let us also not forget the twin risks of doing nothing and doing too much of the wrong thing, apply as Connecticut tackles our voting system which may have had a wake up call this November, but nothing like Pearl Harbor or 9/11. On 9/11, I had a temporary pass to enter the World Trade Center and had friends that worked there – what happened in Hartford on November 4th, and the Courant not getting all the results that night was no 9/11.

Editorial: Diagnosis before cure. Planning before plunging ahead.

We agree in part with the other critics, that we need radical change in Connecticut election administration. Yet, we need a carefully considered approach and a deliberate implementation of change. Our recommended approach is to do for elections what we have done for probate: Regionalize, Prioritize, and Economize. It won’t be easy, simple, or cheap in the short run, yet simply moving local administration to municipal clerks as many suggest would be a band-aid, with many of the same limitations and risks of the current system.

In the wake of the recent election day problems in Hartford, elsewhere in this election, and in previous elections, we have heard may cries to reform the system. To some extent, to us, they often sound like “Do something! Do anything! Change the system now!” For example <here>, <here>, and <here>. Perhaps Senator Chris Murphy best sums up the frustration and the problems in recent elections:<here>.

The Democrat called it “inexcusable” to have breakdowns, such as polling places in Hartford not opening on time during this month’s election – a mishap that prompted President Barack Obama to call in to WNPR-FM and plead with voters who couldn’t cast ballots to return to the polls later in the day. Murphy also pointed to other instances, such as in 2010 when there weren’t enough ballots in Bridgeport and in 2012 when there weren’t enough workers at the West Hartford polls.,,

A former state senator, Murphy said Connecticut is well past the point of incremental reform and needs comprehensive changes. He said the “balkanized” election system where autonomous local registrars run elections with little state oversight has “resulted in major problem after major problem” and stunted the development of voting technology in the state.

Here is what the public and politicians, in general, do not know:

Running elections anywhere takes special training and expertise, much of which comes from experience working in the polls and managing elections on election days. Experienced gained one day at a time, for the most part, with one to three elections per year.
Outside of experienced officials in leadership positions, such as registrars, deputies, and moderators, nobody understands the complete picture of how the parts fit together, or how it could be modified, without damaging the system. Even many of those officials do not have the prospective of the requirements in different size municipalities across Connecticut. Nor how the alternatives work, or do not work in other states.
Elected officials, except registrars, are naturally barred from election administration activities. Very few have any direct experience and little knowledge of the administration of elections – they do understand how to get elected, the requirements to get on the ballot, and campaign finance rules.
Other states with radically different elections administration organization had problems in this election and other recent elections. Corruption, votes lost, massive absentee voting fraud, unauditable machines, questionable results that cannot be verified, long lines, voters denied access to the polls, and results provided days and weeks later than Connecticut.
Moving the process from elected registrars to municipal clerks is not as simple as it sounds. Registering voters is very similar to what clerks do. Today many do registrations for registrars in small towns. Administering elections is different, planning a one day event, understanding and executing all the special activities before and after election day, recruiting a large one day staff, and then managing that huge event. Of course, clerks can learn and do elections, but many of the training and staffing challenges would remain, many of the constraints and benefits of local administration would remain. It is like saying that if the sewer department is working well, let them take over snow plowing and emergency management because the roads were not cleared well by public works; Or why not hand over managing defense to the Post Office since they wear uniforms and manage to deliver the mail so well.
Adding responsibility to the Secretary of the State will not cure many of the problems. In some cases that would be a good idea, in others not so good. The Secretary should have independent authority to call for “discrepancy recanvasses” in cases like Bridgeport 2010 and Hartford absentee ballots ‘s in 2014. (So should the State Elections Enforcement Commission). But having a strong Secretary of the State is not a cure all. The SOTS and few in the SOTS Office have basic and comprehensive experiences in local elections administration, even while they have a unique prospective not shared by others. (For what can go wrong, consider Florida in 2000, Ohio in 2000 and 2004 or Kansas today. For the limitations of a bi-partisan board of elections, see NY). There are advantages and disadvantages of any system.

Everyone should understand and recognize:

Radical change takes time and care to accomplish successfully and well. Radical change means large risks of failure. Speed without expertise is a formula for failure. Look no farther than the original Obamacare web site for an example. Look at our success instilling democracy in and rebuilding Iraq.
Every system takes time to change. Like rebuilding a railroad while keeping trains running. You may need the old system while the new system is being constructed, comprehensive education and testing is necessary, just like obtaining and testing new railroad cars took several years of planning and testing.
Change costs money, for making the change, and for running the new system. Electronic pollbooks, perhaps $2-3 million dollars, plus connecting every polling place to the Internet (Electronic pollbooks improves quality and efficiency, but do not make checking in any faster nor require fewer lines). Providing the opportunity for “voters to vote at any polling place” is hugely expensive, can delay results, and can take a lot of extra expense to avoid the risks of fraud, error, and protect the secret/anonymous vote.
It is human nature to claim that every wanted change, is a cure for the current problem (see: 9/11 Patriot Act). When we want to increase turnout, every change is touted as a panacea for low turnout (Early voting decreases turnout, but is touted to increase it, as is every other reform. Some reforms do increase turnout). Similarly, every possible reform for Connecticut’s recent troubles will be touted to speed results, shorten lines, and magically prevent all human errors.
As we have stated before, it is also human nature to ignore costs when we want something, yet complain of very small cost when we do not want to do something

Editorial, Diagnosis before cure. Planning before plunging ahead.

Yet Rome was not built in a day or a year or two. Nor was probate reform ( where implementation took from 2009 to 2011). We need a thoughtful approach to reform. We should investigate what works well in other states, and fit the best to Connecticut. We should look at the alternatives and choose wisely, and dare we mention, funding the reforms adequately. Change costs money for the change itself, and for the hoped for better result.

We see three stages 1) Investigating, proposing, estimating costs, and choosing the change (e.g. regional professional election administration) 2) Planning the change. (Exactly how many regions, exactly where they are, planning staffing, conversion tasks, along with the steps and effort involved in the implementing the change), and 3) actually implementing the change.

Regionalizaing elections is more complex than consolidating the probate system. I suspect at least a year, maybe two for the 1st stage, another year for the 2nd stage and two years for the third. How long did it take to plan and build t the new New Haven to, Springfield rail line? Or just purchasing, testing, and deploying new rail cars?

Catching Up – More Post-Election Fallout

Starting with three more articles in the Courant on Thursday: An apology, a column, and an editorial.

Starting with three more articles in the Hartford Courant on Thursday: An apology, a column, and an editorial. <read>

Uraina Petit the Working Families Party provided an apology: Hartford Registrar: ‘I Am So Incredibly Sorry’. You can read the article, our comment online was:

Apology accepted. There is more work to do. There is accountability ahead. Yet, we should all appreciate what it takes to apologize in this situation,and take responsibility for what happened. Sad to see the majority of comments are so vitriolic and completely devoid of understanding.

Next was an opinion piece by Dan Haar, business reporter, delving into election administration Get Rid Of Hartford’s Voter Registrars. Haar has some very good insights on the business beat. We suggest he keep that day job, and observe election administration more closely to provide more appropriate diagnosis and cure.

For the most part this piece gets the problems right. Its also correct that regionailization is key to facilitating many improvements. Beyond that it is a complex system, that needs coordinated improvements that actually end in a result that fixes more deficiencies that the problems and risks it adds. Electronic reporting of results will not fix anything with missing pollbooks. Although electronic pollbooks are a good idea, they do not eliminate paper copes, necessary as backup in case of power outages etc. They do not eliminate updating the voting lists with those that have voted absentee. We have a centralized voter registration system already, it needs improvement in several areas, including not mysteriously throwing voters off the list. Electronic returns can help but they still require care and verification and counting of the votes first. Yesterday, Alaska, in a very close Senate race still had at least 40,000 absentee votes to count (they don’t even know how many they have not counted). The nations largest jurisdiction, LA County, professionally managed, like all of California, still has another 20 days to finish counting absentee ballots which account for about 50% of their votes. Can this state of steady habits wait 24 hours for reasonably accurate results for offices that will be taken in January? The IRS gives us 3.5 months to do our taxes, yet many of us and many businesses can’t get it done in time!

And another large editorial. Electronic Vote Counting Was Coming Anyway, But Registrars Must Go

Once again, we favor regionalization and hope the next attempt at electronic reporting by the Secretary of the State is a winner – providing accurate, timely results, in a way that is workable for officials. We doubt that alone will get results as quickly as the Courant would like, yet provide the accuracy everyone needs, and the detailed statistics activists need to evaluate those results. We are not as enamored as the Courant of election integrity, accuracy, and claims of speed in other states.

More to come over the next few days. There is no need for a rust to judgement. The Legislature starts in January. We will not be able to accomplish much good, and could create havoc in attempting too much in a year, or two, or more.

Let us act deliberatly to actually improve elections

We are amazed by the number of election integrity issues raised by this election and the flurry of suggestions for improvement, led by the Hartford Courant. Yet in all the excitement and rush to judgement and improvement, among the good intentions and good ideas, there is also a misunderstanding of the system, ideas that are not feasible, uninformed, and that would make a worse system.

In fact, its too early to rush to judgement with knee-jerk reactions, without deliberate, complete plans for reform. Yet, we have attempted to counter errors and support good directions in letters to the editor and blog comments. Here we archive some of those articles, editorials, and some of our (edited) comments.

On Sunday the Courant had an article, an investigative report, an opinion piece, and an editorial mostly focused on Hartford’s mess-up, and the allegation that our votes are reported slower than the rest of the nation. The article and the investigative report are a true service, the best of factual journalism. Not so much the editorial and opinion piece<read>

Our response was a letter to the editor of the Courant, addressing the editorial and opinion piece, withing the limits of the 200 words allowed by the Courant, now published online:

Vote Count Accuracy More Important Than Speed

I agree in part with the editorial “Where Were The Results?” [Nov. 9]. Our current system of local registrars is antiquated. We should do for elections what we have done for probate: regionalize, professionalize and economize. Yet, change should not include blind pursuit of speed over accuracy or risk tampering with elections.

Beyond tampering with results, connecting scanners or memory cards to the Internet risks that the scanners can be infected to compromise future elections. Recognized computer scientists and security experts agree. Based on UConn’s recommendations, the external ports on our voting machines are required to be sealed.

Contrary to the opinion piece by Brandon Finnigan, “Learning Who Won Takes Too Long” [Nov. 9, Opinion], some states are more organized and careful than Connecticut in reporting reasonably complete results. Los Angeles County is the nation’s largest election jurisdiction, managed by a professional election administrator, Dean Logan. California has about 50 percent its votes cast by mail. As the Los Angeles County website states, mail ballots received by Election Day and some others are counted over a 28-day period after election night.

Let’s regionalize. Let’s improve the system. And let’s lighten up on getting results, any results, without regard to their accuracy.

Luther Weeks, Glastonbury

The writer is executive director of CTVotersCount.org, an election issues advocacy site.
Copyright © 2014, Hartford Courant

What follows are some of my comments online on those articles and opinions, edited for grammar and completeness.

Two of the articles complained that results were too slow, including an “Expert” from Southern California who wrote the opinion piece. I said:

California counts absentee ballots for up to 28 days after the election. In 2008 Minnesota took at least a couple of months to determine the winner of the Frankin-Coleman race for the Senate. Connecticut would rush to complete our recanvass in eight days…

Connecticut accepts no absentee votes after 8:00pm on election night. In CA, where about half the vote is mail-in they continue counting them for days and weeks after the election. They are not required to be done for 28 days – I know that LA county, the largest jurisdiction in the U.S. goes quite a while. The only thing we count later (if we do) is the provisional ballots.

Connecticut is far from the slowest. Take Alaska’s election counting, please:

Alaska will begin counting more than 53,000 absentee and questioned ballots on Tuesday[Nov 11] in an effort to resolve the state’s unsettled contests for the Senate and for governor. Democratic Sen. Mark Begich trailed Republican challenger Dan Sullivan by about 8,100 votes after Election Night…The race for Alaska governor is actually closer than the Senate contest. Independent candidate Bill Walker, aided when the winner of the Democratic primary bowed out of the race to run as Walker’s lieutenant governor, led incumbent Republican Gov. Sean Parnell by about 3,000 votes.

So, Connecticut is “among the last in the nation to get election results”, yet days, maybe weeks ahead of Alaska, California, and Colorado:

It’s a week after Election Day and they’re still counting votes in Colorado, where some are blaming a new state law that replaced polling booths with mandatory mail-in ballots. Top-ticket races have been decided—Democratic Gov. John Hickenlooper was re-elected and Republican Cory Gardner unseated Democratic Sen. Mark Udall—but the vote totals in a dozen state House and Senate races remain unknown

To the suggestion that we should connect our scanners to the Internet because Massachusettts has found no problems, I said:

Massachusetts has never had an election audit until this year. So there is no evidence of the reliability of their processes. In fact, half the states have no audit at all and there is very little to go on to know if there ever was or will be errors or fraud in those states. It could always be that paper ballots and audits actually deter fraud and reduce error. NY did find errors a couple of years ago in their audit, as we have in Connecticut. Respected computer scientists like Professor Shvartsman at Uconn agree there are risks, that is why he advised the state to seal the ports on our scanners. Finally, even though we counted all the ballots in Bridgeport in 2010, the system was never able to recognize the actual results there or to investigate the difference between voters signed in and the number of ballots there.

At CTNewsJunkie: Problems at the Polls Highlight Limitations of Locally Operated Election System <read>.

The main point was that the the new election night reporting system by the Secretary’s office will solve many of the problems – it may solve some, but certainly not all. I commented:

I hope the new reporting system works and is workable. The previous system prototyped twice required too much data entry by each moderator, many after a 17-24 hour day. An improved system will get the data earlier and more accurately, provided time is still taken to double check it in each town before entry and if the system allows the efficient entry of data by refreshed people and their entry is also double checked.

Anyone who pronounces such a system as ready for general use by moderator’s should be required to use it to enter central absentee results after a long long day.

There is much to improve in the whole system especially by regionalization. Yet, there is much that could be done in the name of speed and modernization that could make things worse rather than better.

Human nature being what it is, we tend to believe that any change we are in favor or against will or would have prevented this problem. e.g. see “911 Patriot Act”. Several commenters indicated that if we had kept lever machines or went to touch screens, we would not have all this problems counting absentee votes. I commented:

As an experienced central count absentee moderator I would like to point out a few things:
1) Our absentee procedures are no more complex than other states. Actually simpler than those that require that signatures be matched with those on file.
2) When we had lever machines, and if we changed polling place technology, we would still need paper absentee ballots.
3) The only difference with absentee ballots now is that we have scanners to help count them faster and more accurately. Much more quickly than by hand counting.
4) Absentee ballot counting can start at 10:00am, when 95+% are available. In a well organized operation, all there is to do at 8:00pm is to process a few that came in at the end of the day, print machine tapes, and complete paperwork. That should not take more than a couple of hours.
5) You can pretty well predict the number of absentee ballots based on those that are requested, so you can staff accordingly to get the job done.
Finally, there are good reasons we have voter verified paper ballots in polling places as well as for absentees- they provide a much more secure and auditable vote, over all its a much less costly technology, its less likely to cause long lines (check-in is a separate issue), and paper ballots can be used despite machine and power failures etc.

Ironically, some who complain about the results of the knee-jerk, partially helpful, Help America Vote Act, also propose knee-jerk action this time.

Bottom Line for now:

There were many problems highlighted by this election
There is a lot to fix, things that voters should not put up with
But like some hurricanes, we missed the big one – by Wed we knew who the winners were, a few voters and votes were lost, and the media had a field day complaining about their not getting results fast enough.
Deliberate action based on a bit of experience, facts, and research can lead to positive improvement. Lets do that, not forget the problems and not forget do the work.