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Risk Limiting Audits: Why and How

A recent, paper by the Risk Limiting Audit Working Group, endorsed by The American Statistical Association, articulates and outlines various types of post-election audits, their requirements, and relative advantages.

We cannot help but think that our Coalition audit reports contributed to statements in the section entitled: Trustworthy audits: the virtue lies in the details:

A recent, paper by the Risk Limiting Audit Working Group, endorsed by The American Statistical Association, articulates and outlines various types of post-election audits, their requirements, and relative advantages. <read>

The paper compares and describes three types of risk limiting audits. One table summarizes and simplifies the amount of work required for each type of audit:

We say the table simplifies the comparison, because there are a lot of details behind accomplishing a ballot level comparison audit, which would be the obvious choice all other things being equal.

CTVotersCount strongly supports advances in electronic auditing which provide the opportunity for states to exploit the advantages of ballot level auditing, perhaps combined with our current selection of 10% of districts statewide after each election, that would likely provide Connecticut with a much more comprehensive, accurate audit than the one we have today…provided it is enacted and accomplished to meet appropriate standards of ballot security and public verifiability.

We will have more to say on this in future posts. The technology is maturing, with several states providing public tests of machine auditing. We can expect bills in the CT Legislature this year authorizing electronic auditing. We will work to see that they are sufficient to provide public confidence.

In addition to discussing the statistical requirements for risk limiting audits, the paper describes additional requirements and issues in areas such as ballot security, results reporting, public confidence, and vote confidentiality. Connecticut has a long way to go in several of these areas. We cannot help but think that our Coalition audit reports contributed to the following statements, in the section entitled Trustworthy audits: the virtue lies in the details:

No matter how attractive the inherent properties of an audit trail [such as paper ballots], it is only as reliable as it is secure. Past elections have been tainted by allegations – and even strong evidence – of ballot box “stuffing” after the election; anecdotes abound of ballots gone lost. Auditing or recounting an untrustworthy audit trail yields untrustworthy results. Moreover, it is highly desirable not only to assert that the audit trail has been secured, but to be able to demonstrate that it has. Some analysts speak of a compliance audit to verify that the preconditions for a risk-limiting audit have been satisfied…

Risk-limiting audits are easy to define, and in broad outline they are fairly easy to implement: Draw a sample, look at the ballots in the sample, do some math to see if more counting is required. However, some implementation details need careful attention.

Public observation and transparency

Risk-limiting audits provide one means for citizens to monitor how well election systems are functioning. Audits provide valuable information to election officials, but crucially, they inform the public and provide evidence as to whether reported election outcomes are correct. The Principles and Best Practices for Post-Election Audits state the case…

These principles impose important responsibilities both on election officials and on public observers. When all parties take these responsibilities seriously – but not grimly – audit observation builds positive relationships between election officials and the citizens they serve.

Good audits are confidence-building exercises; not-so-good audits are more like sullen skirmishes. In the past, some audit observers and would-be observers have reported events like these: never receiving advance notice of audits despite statutory or regulatory requirements; being confined in one corner of a room with no meaningful opportunity to observe; receiving no information about the procedures to be used; having no opportunity to ask basic questions; witnessing unambiguous violations of written procedures but being unable to persuade officials to refer to, or conform with, those procedures. Contrariwise, many other observers have reported interacting cordially with election officials and workers, in some cases politely making suggestions that were immediately adopted, and generally forming a favorable opinion of the audit and other election processes. Clear written procedures, made available in advance of the audit, help observers and other interested citizens understand how the audit evinces the integrity of the results…

Some states provide for partisan observers in certain election audit processes. We recommend that audits be explicitly open to non-partisan observers as well. All interested individuals and groups should be permitted to observe the audit process to the greatest possible extent. Effective audit observation can increase public confidence in the audit and in the integrity of elections, by making the process more transparent and providing an independent verification of the results.

Observability includes not only direct public observation of audits, but clear reporting of the audit findings. Election officials should systematically report audit results, identifying any differences between the audit and voting system counts, and explaining them if possible. These reports need not be long in order to be informative and reassuring.31 The audit results should be forwarded to state election officials, who in turn should compile a summary statewide report – perhaps within 30 days of completion of the audit. Among other things, this report should integrate results from local officials in a consistent, comprehensible, searchable format. Such a report may enable state officials to detect patterns of error they otherwise may have missed, or simply to document how well voting systems performed.

Connecticut law provides for public notification, and today, procedures provide for sufficient public observation. Yet, the public notification provisions are inadequate. The open observation process has led to documentation that the process is profoundly inadequate to provide confidence in our elections and election officials. Observations have also demonstrated the far from adequate ballot security as well. Official reporting of election results and audit results falls short of requirements and rigor

We reiterate that we favor automated auditing for Connecticut. Yet we continue to caution that our support is conditional on the details of any proposed solution and law. We must always “be careful what we ask for”, recognizing the devil is in the details.

Others Weigh In On Election Reforms

Last week Secretary of the State Denise Merrill weighed in at her press conference on, as the Courant headlines, how “Reforms Could Boost Voter Participation”. Also weighing in was Melissa J. Russell, President of ROVAC (Registrars Of Voters Association, Connecticut).

Last week Secretary of the State Denise Merrill weighed in at her press conference on as the Courant headlines, how Reforms Could Boost Voter Participation <read> <press release>.

Merrill noted that four of the states with better voter turnout than Connecticut last month — Minnesota, Wisconsin, New Hampshire and Maine — all allow voters to register on election day. Beginning in Nov., 2013, Connecticut voters will be able to do so as well.

Early voting, voting by mail and no-excuse absentee voting would also boost turnout as well as reducing wait times at polling places on election day, Merrill said.

By our references Connecticut ranked 16th and 17th in voter turnout in 2008 and 2010. This year we ranked 7th – much more than respectable in gains and in absolute rank, especially considering Hurricane Sandy! In fact, Connecticut ranked ahead of many states with early voting and long lines such as Ohio and Florida, not to mention 7 of eleven states with Election Day Registration. We reiterate several themes we have discussed previously:

According to statistical analysis and a summary by Doug Chapin at the Secretary’s Election Performance Task Force, which she attended: Early voting, by mail or in-person tends to decrease turnout. In other states, Election Day Registration has increased turnout and mitigated the negative effects of early voting on turnout.
Early voting in person can increase convenience, but would be costly to implement, especailly in Connecticut with our independent 169 town voting system. Seven days of early voting would increase election day costs for such towns by close to a factor of 7.
Early voting in person can have high integrity, if we are willing to pay for extra security when elections are closed each day.
There are better solutions than early voting for long lines on election day. Our scanners can handle thousands of ballots, yet problems this year were caused by a shortage of checkin lines. Each additional line requires one extra official and perhaps a few more privacy booths – much more economical than in person early voting. And it works! Early voting is no panacea – see FL and OH – and during the last two elections storms hit during the likely early voting period, lessening its probable value.
Increase mail in voting increases the risk of documented fraud. Mail-in or absentee voting seems to be the source of the easiest and most frequent fraud in U.S. Elections.
We support Election Day Registration, but point out that the method chosen for Connecticut is not like the successful methods of other states which increased turnout, and is likely to lead to long lines.

Also weighing in was Melissa J. Russell, President of ROVAC (Registrars Of Voters Association, Connecticut), where she “looks forward to working closely with the Board and the Committee chairs to improve the professionalization of ROVAC” Op-Ed: Registrars are continually working to improve elections system <read>

We would hope that the ROVAC President, Board, and Committee chairs will not only strive to become more professional, but also to work cooperatively with the Secretary of the State, her office, legislatures, and advocates in improving our election system.

The word “archaic” has been bandied about, along with censure of the long lines voters faced in West Hartford, Hartford and Manchester. In many of these stories, the registrars of voters across the state are taking the brunt of this criticism.

It is unfortunate that the “other side” of the story is not being told. In the vast majority of polling places in the vast majority of towns, the election went smoothly, with fast moving lines, cheerful service to the voters on the part of the poll workers, and swift reporting of results at the end of the night. Large cities such as Bridgeport, Stamford and Norwalk handled the large turnout of voters with no major problems.

Here we agree that by and large most voters, in most towns, voters were well served. Registrars deserve credit along with courteous dedicated poll workers and the Secretary of the State. We can be proud of selecting economical, paper based optical scanners for our elections, and the push from the Secretary to purchase enough ballots to avoid another Bridgeport. Perhaps the shortage of checkin lines and enough staffing for Election Day Registration will be solved to avoid repeated problems of polling place lines, and now problems similar to those experienced for Presidential balloting.

We applaud ROVAC’s endorsement of electronic checkin also championed by many beyond ROVAC. We wonder if they will endorse and lobby their municipalities to pay for it along with the associated internet connectivity required to reach its full potential. We have often heard registrars complain of tight and reduced budges, unable to cover small obviously needed supplies, such as laptops to calculate audit results, a far cry from the requirements of automated checkin.

It is also unfortunate that the “archaic” system is being blamed on the registrars and their poll workers. The Registrars of Voters Association of Connecticut (ROVAC) educates registrars all over the state, both at statewide conferences held twice a year, and in county meetings held three to four times a year. Consider some of the improvements that registrars are currently using and developing in their towns: the use of Skype to communicate with various polling places in the cities, leaving phone lines open for the public; the use and development of electronic check-in books, where a voter is checked in not on a paper list of many pages, but with several clicks of a mouse on a laptop, or the scanning of a barcode next to a voter’s name; and a post-election audit system that uses high-speed scanners rather than teams of people hand inspecting and counting ballots.

ROVAC also supports the use of technology that is already available for our current tabulator system to report results: using either the ports on the back of our tabulators to send results to the secretary of the state’s office instantly, or placing the memory cards that each tabulator houses into an “ender machine” that will read the information on the card and send it electronically to the secretary of the state.

Such use of this technology, which is used in other states without problems, would speed up the reporting of the election results tremendously, while virtually eliminating the mistakes that come from bleary-eyed election workers attempting to read and accurately record numbers by hand onto a Head Moderator’s Return, which then gets faxed to the secretary of the state’s office.

Here we have a couple problems. First, opening the ports is one of the more dangerous options for our election equipment, endorsed by UConn and eliminated by the previous Secretary of the State. Moving the card to an ender machine, would still expose the card and data to security risks. And this will not do the job. Those bleary eyed workers still need to submit the additional information by hand, such as hand counted regular ballots, write-in votes, and various special ballots that cannot be scanned.

We do support auditing by appropriate independent machines, with proven processes that are combined with transparent procedures that can verify the results to the public. We are concerned that instead, we will end up replacing one black-box with another black-box system that is insufficient, and completely voids the potential value at considerable cost. We would hope that ROVAC, the Secretary of the State, CTVotersCount, and other advocates get the opportunity to work together to propose legislation, test, and implement a system that provides better audits, while finding ways to pay for the valuable provided.

Aug 2012 Primary Audit Observation Report

Coalition finds 31% of Official Audit Reports Lack Critical Data

Municipalities failed to report data critical to audit evaluation. Increasing numbers choose paper only elections, avoiding scanners and audits.

The report highlighted concerns with two increasing trends:

An increase in missing and incomplete official reports. There are 16 of 52 (31%) reports with errors making it impossible to determine if machines had functioned properly. What basis is there to trust audits, with this significant level of error in reporting?
Up up to 19 towns avoided optical scanners and audits by conducting paper only elections. Such voting is not audited, not transparent, and error prone based on past observations of hand counts.

We conclude, based on our observations and analysis of official audit reports submitted to the Secretary of the State, that the August post-election audits still do not inspire confidence.
<Full Report (.pdf)> <Press Release> <Review detail data and municipal reports >

Coalition finds 31% of Official Audit Reports Lack Critical Data

Municipalities failed to report data critical to audit evaluation. Increasing numbers choose paper only elections, avoiding scanners and audits.

The report highlighted concerns with two increasing trends:

An increase in missing and incomplete official reports. There are 16 of 52 (31%) reports with errors making it impossible to determine if machines had functioned properly. What basis is there to trust audits, with this significant level of error in reporting?
Up up to 19 towns avoided optical scanners and audits by conducting paper only elections. Such voting is not audited, not transparent, and error prone based on past observations of hand counts.

Lack of integrity in the random district selection and race selection processes.
Lack of consistency, reliability, and accuracy in the conduct of the audit.
Weaknesses in the ballot chain-of-custody.
Missing or incomplete reports, lacking critical information.

Cheryl Dunson, League of Women Voters of Connecticut’s President, stated, “When officials submit reports missing basic data such as the number of votes counted by hand or by optical scanner, it defeats the purpose of the audits – on what basis can we determine the accuracy of optical scanners without such information?”

Luther Weeks, Coalition Executive Director, stated, “In the past, many officials argued that their staffs cannot accurately count ballots by hand in the ideal conditions afforded by audits, yet now an increasing number choose to forgo optical scanning and report results based on unaudited hand counts performed in the more trying conditions of election night”.

The report found little change from past observations and conclusions and little progress by officials in improving post-election audit integrity. Because of ongoing shortcomings in the performance of post-election audits, the Coalition continues to urge our state election officials to offer more guidance to local personnel and to require more consistency in the conduct of the audit.

Weeks noted, “Once again as a public service we are providing online images of the official audit reports from local registrars, along with our digitized data so that anyone can audit our work.”

75 Districts randomly selected for Nov post-election audit

Selected Districts

On Monday the Secretary of the state randomly selected 75 districts for post-election audit. I assisted by actually selecting the districts from slips of paper in a raffle barrel. You might find the Secretary’s list easier to read in the press release. <Press Release>

Selected Districts

Basic and Bold Steps To Improve Connecticut Elections

We offer the following short list of items for improvement without breaking the bank. Basic steps that cost little, should almost be assumed. Bold steps that could transform the system, and transcend knee-jerk half steps.

As we said last time, “There were many problems! Will we learn anything? Will be do anything? Will we help or aggregate the situation? …Next time it could be different…for better or for worse.” We offer the following short list of items for improvement without breaking the bank. Basic steps that cost little, should almost be assumed. Bold steps that could transform the system, and transcend knee-jerk half steps.

Do for Elections what we have done for Probate. (BOLD) Many of our problems are caused or aggravated by our archaic town by town two+ elected registrars system. Many improvements, reforms. and economy of scale are limited by this system (e.g. early voting, professionalization, and a strong ballot security). We would favor a system of regional civil service professional leaders, perhaps monitored by elected registrars. The starting point would be a blue-ribbon commission reviewing best practices from other states and recommending a comprehensive solution to Connecticut. The goals would be to Regionalize, Professionalize, Economize.

Avoid long lines caused by disasters, human failings, and unexpected turnout. (BASIC) There were three types of disaster that effected polling places this year, at least two in Connecticut, and an impending disaster looming. The causes were 1) unexpected turnout which should be a cause for celebration, but not for for celebrating causing upset voters or to propose knee-jerk solutions 2) Human failure to compute how many lines are needed and how to split them. 3) Storm related requirements to move polling places.What is needed is a standard maximum for the number of voters assigned to single checkin lines for various elections.Collapsing twenty-two polling places into nine is a reasonable thing, but failure to add a few more people to main additional checkin lines is poor economy.

The Presidential Ballot lines managed by Town Clerks, will be replaced by central Election Day Registration (EDR) added to the duties of Registrars. Connecticut’s version of EDR is much more involved than the Presidential Ballot and lightly specified in the law. Registrars and the Secretary of the State need to determine the staffing, equipment, and procedures necessary to serve the law and the public without long lines. The legislature should specify more details in the law (e.g. What exactly is an EDR Ballot? Is the EDR location a Polling Place? Could most EDR voters use a scanner and avoid the costly absentee counting process now required? Are those in line at 8:00 PM entitled to register and vote? What happens when a town does not respond in a timely manner to the legally required “immediate” response from another town?)The current law and model emergency plan provides no guidance in handling EDR when the state registration database or phone lines are unavailable. Contingencies need to be planned in advance and uniform statewide.

Fix the Post-Election Audits to actually provide confidence (BASIC). The audits can be improved without significant expense. Less or equal counting could be done, with better statistical confidence, and more comprehensive coverage. No ballots should be exempt from the audit, originally hand counted and centrally counted absentee ballots should be subject to audit. Standards should be set for determining when to investigate differences between audit and election counts. There is a need for better, standard procedures, and training in performing the audit, along with timely, independent reporting of results and oversight.

Automate Responsively, not Expensively.(Medium BOLD) We have the expensive Help America Vote Act, which was costly and only partially effective. We must avoid knee-jerk reaction. (e.g. calls for expensive Early Voting(*) to cure ling lines, which can be cured by a simple, economical incremental increase in checkin lines, while Florida and Ohio dramatically demonstrate that Early Voting is not guaranteed to be a cure.) We offer the following items:

Electronic Checkin connected via the internet to the voter registration database. This would improve the accuracy of checkin accounting, provide for faster cross-district transfers, and should have been a prerequisite to EDR, and provide for full polling place EDR. We caution that it will have initial and onging costs for equipment, registration system, and connections. There has to be enough equipment to cover the necessary lines as it does not speedup checking, along with paper backup for emergencies.

Electronic Results Returns and district Moderators Returns. The Secretary of the State has prototyped a system. It is a good start, yet Registrars logistical concerns need to be addressed. It should be made mandatory by law. It is not costly, but could greatly contribute to accuracy and transparency.

Automate Post-Election Audits. The technology is emerging as practical. It would provide much stronger audits, without the hassles for officials with hand counting. Costs need to be determined. It must be done in a way that provides public transparency and confidence. One more item that would be facilitated if the 169-town system went the way of the green-eye-shade.

This is a short list. We would be completely pleased if all of these reforms were addressed in the near term. Yet, we could and often do suggest many other reforms, some can be accomplished by the Secretary of the State, others by the Legislature. Here we have emphasized economical and strategic steps mostly in the hands of the Legislature.

(*) We do not oppose Early Voting. It can be done well and securely, and poorly. We do believe that to do it well and fairly in Connecticut would be very difficult in Connecticut while we have the 169-town independent election system. In any case, it is not economical.

Looking forward to the Good, the Bad, or the Ugly in election reform?

There were many problems! Will we learn anything? Will be do anything? Will we help or aggravate the situation? As they say some you win, some you lose, and some are rained out. (At least Sandy did not rain this one out, but it could have been different. Next time it could be different…for better or for worse.)

Many years ago at a college hockey tournament my roommates, friends, and I had rink side seats. We talked to one of the refs several times as he stood on the ice directly in front of us. His worst fear was a tie, to be followed by sudden death overtime – the outcome would depend on every call. Candidates, supporters, and everyone can be pretty sure that Obama won both the Electoral College and the popular vote, neither were very close. What us worry? – but only for this election.

Problems

Pre-election there were charges and law suits over suppression and illegal registration activities: Voter ID laws, registration database purges, along with reduction and selective reduction in early voting.

Hurricane Sandy left many challenged to vote, with NJ allowing risky email and fax voting, along with a lack of planning, notice and guidance to officials, with lack of information for voters.

There were long lines around the country for early voting on election day. Many of these were caused by the shortened hours, and higher volume for for touch screen voting machines. Even optical scan areas had problems largely due to slow check-in lines, and at least in Florida, due to long complex ballots: My sister in Sarasota had a nine-page ballot, while Miami had a twenty-four page ballot! How long would it take you to read and fill out a twenty-four page ballot with many complex resolutions? How long would it take you to feed in that ballot? How many privacy booths would be necessary? How would you like to be ballot clerk responsible for voiding a full ballot or just spoiling and reissuing single pages? How long would it take on a touch screen?

Here in Connecticut we had long lines in several towns. As far as we know, all were caused by slow check-in – not enough lines provided – and for the Presidential ballot offered in town halls to voters who register on election day.

It took Florida several days to count enough to declare a winner. As of this writing at least Washington State and Arizona still have hundreds of thousands of regular votes to count. Presumably there are many states with provisional ballots awaiting adjudication.

An Opportunity for Things to Change
(Yes, Mr. O’Reilly many of us want things! Like election integrity.)

Be careful what you wish for. With opportunity for improvement comes at least an equal opportunity to make things worse.

We should recognize the great danger of another round of knee-jerk reactions and solutions. 911 was used to justify the hastily passed Patriot Act that had reforms that many in law enforcement had wanted for years – some of those may well be good things but others not so good. Same with HAVA which may also have been hijacked by vendor and partisan interests. The trick is some kind of balance between haste and reasonable, deliberate action as the end result.

As an IT Manager, I occasionally got a lot of attention to problems and solutions when there were crises that caused higher levels to ask “How can we prevent this from happening again, and recover faster”. Those were useful opportunities, but they can be misused.

Next Time It Could Be Worse

If it were a bit closer election we could be waiting for several states to finish counting, other states dependent on provisional ballots with information available on how critical those votes might be. We could have screams from a region, like the Northeast, about the disenfranchisement of an new natural disaster. Legitimate and illegitimate charges of fraud, miscounting, and suppression.

Imagine this election as a National Popular Vote Agreement election. Then lots more people would be worried about NJ, both pushing for more to vote by any means possible, charging officials with not complying, and others charging all sorts of irregularities. The Voter-ID and early voting changes would not be limited to the swing states. Today we would be facing arguments over fraud and suppression everywhere, some legitimate. Partisan state officials would be pressured not to accept results from other states based on such charges.

Some Possible National Solutions

Even the winner noticed the problems, referring to elections, in his acceptance speech, President Obama said “we need to fix that,”

The New York Times has a Room for Debate covering possible changes with eight opinions: A Better Way to Vote <read>

Like most political debates this is not much of a debate, with single short statements, little financial analysis, and high-level statements without much detail. Not blaming the authors or the Times, yet it is hardly a start. For now, let me provide some comments to extend the “debate”:

Richard Hasen makes the case for nationalizing our elections with nonpartisan administration like other successful democracies along with a national voter ID. I generally agree. Both centralized and decentralized elections can be done well or poorly. The equality, uniformity, and potential improvement are worth moving it that direction. I am skeptical of his suggesting a 75% confirmation is possible. For those, like CTVotersCount, that would like to see a national popular vote, but realize it as too risky under the current system, this would be a good first step in that direction.

R. Doug Lewis makes the case for local control. Actually he does not make the case. He references the Founders. Claims voters love their current systems – ask those in line in Florida, others with unverifiable votes, others purged, and many just barely escaping draconian ID requirements. There is a case that decentralized administration can protect a process, but it is not a single “the process” as Doug states. We could have a uniform process, with decentralized administration, with both centralized and decentralized oversight.

Cleta Mitchell asks to stop the name calling and work on improving the system now, while there is no election imminent. At a high level we agree with her suggestions to cleanup the voter rolls, protect the secret ballot, and enforce election laws. But her details and arguments coincide almost uniformly with the claims and biases of her party. She is correct when she says “Four years pass quickly. We should get busy”.

Larry Norden reviews many of the self caused problems of real or de facto suppression in the recent election. His point is that our system should be “free, fair, and accessible”. He points to the critical problem of voter registration and on-gong problems with voting machines. One simple step he recommends is actually using and appointing directors to the Election Assistance Commission to produce election best practices. The EAC should be ractivated, yet we are skeptical how much it alone can accomplish.

Basil Smikle also argues for “national uniformity in voting and registration with technologies and systems w use in our everyday lives.” He supports online and same day registration, :ATM (touch screen) voting, compulsory voting, and national voter registration databases. Nobody has made a case or a touch screen that is convincingly safe and they are expensive and lead to long lines. Compulsory voting does not sound like a good idea. But maybe it is time to consider a national ID and database – he makes a good point that lots of information is available on each of us already.

Esther Fuchs makes the case for more information available to voters. Not just where to vote but information about candidates to help make voters aware of what and who they are voting for. She gives the example from New York of WhosOnTheBallot.org “users find polling place information, a sample ballot tailored to their district…For each candidate at every level of government,the site provides links to nonpartisan information and the candidate’s Web site and social media” Good idea, maybe the candidate information would be best left to multiple “nonpartisan” sources rather than the government.

Paul Gronke makes the case for uniformity in early voting and reform of the election calendar. We agree that early voting periods should be relatively short and close to uniform nationwide. He correctly identifies the higher risks of mail-in/absentee voting including a higher risk of fraud and disenfranchisement. We believe that early voting can be safe, fair, and convenient, if we are willing to pay for it.

Joseph Lorenzo Hall makes the case for paper based voting as safer, more reliable, and economical. When scanners fail the paper ballots are ready. For touch screens there should be paper backup, but that is seldom the case and such redundancy adds to costs. Touch screens are expensive and lead to long lines when machines fail or we have a very popular elections. He also argues for government support of systems using a multisteakholder design process – sounds good, yet we need to see the resulting system, multiple evaluations of it, and who is and is not at the table.

We add the words of presidential election law expert Edwin B. Foley quoting President Obama for the title “By the way, we have to fix that”<read>

Are we looking forward to the Good, the Bad, or the Ugly in election reform? At this point we cannot tell. The most likely scenario is more of the same, little change, or expensive half steps forward or back. Lets hope and work for better than that.

Soon we will continue the “debate” with our top suggestions nationwide and for Connecticut.

What We Worry? What Could Go Wrong On Election Day?

America’s elections are run entirely on the honor system. What could possibly go wrong?

Detroit News op-ed: BenDor and Stanislevic: What could go wrong on Election Day? <read>

We worry that the nation will end up with no confidence in the election results, regardless of who wins.

That’s because we have no systematic way to detect malfunctions in the voting machines or tabulators on Election Day…

We worry that there could be widespread fraud in the sending of voted military and overseas ballots by fax, email or other vulnerable internet methods…

We fear that close elections will go to the courts without any prospect of credible numbers. This is because of two widespread conditions that preclude complete, meaningful recounts: no paper ballots and no manual counts….In states that do allow a hand recount, like Michigan, the burden is often on the apparent losing candidate, not only to pay for the recount, but also to bear the stigma of “poor loser.” The voting public has no say.

We lose sleep over the prospect of the ultimate disenfranchisement of thousands of voters…

America’s elections are run entirely on the honor system. What could possibly go wrong?

And from the New York Times some “bad news/it could be worse news” if we had the risky National Popular Vote Agreement: Disruption From Storm May Be Felt at the Polls <read>

Some New Jersey voters may find their hurricane-damaged polling sites replaced by military trucks, with — in the words of the state’s lieutenant governor, Kim Guadagno — “a well-situated national guardsman and a big sign saying, ‘Vote Here.’ ” Half of the polling sites in Nassau County on Long Island still lacked power on Friday. And New York City was planning to build temporary polling sites in tents in some of its worst-hit neighborhoods.

Mayor Bill Finch of Bridgeport, Conn., with Secretary of the State Denise Merrill at the Longfellow School, a closed polling place.

The aftermath of Hurricane Sandy is threatening to create Election Day chaos in some storm-racked sections of New York, New Jersey and Connecticut — and some effects may also be felt in other states, including Pennsylvania, where some polling sites still lacked power on Friday morning.

Disrupted postal delivery will probably slow the return of absentee ballots. And with some polling sites likely to be moved, elections officials were bracing for a big influx of provisional paper ballots — which could delay the vote count in places.

Weary local elections officials vowed that the vote would go on. “Come hell or high water — we had both — we’re voting on Tuesday,” William T. Biamonte, the Democratic commissioner at the Nassau County Board of Elections, said in an interview…

With turnout projected to be down in all these states, Mr. Obama could see his share of the national popular vote reduced.

A Tale in two Courant Editorials

Where we disagree with the Courant, is that we believe ballots deserve the same level of protection as money and supplies, that the need for verification applies equally to private employees, public employees, and public officials. We are not so sure of trust part of ‘trust but verify’, we would ‘verify sufficiently to deter and trust’.

Two editorials dated Friday, one published on Sunday and one on Monday show the different appreciation some have for money and democracy, the different level of trust some hold for private employees vs. public officials.

Sunday, the Courant provides advice to the Hartford Charter Revision Commission on their trust in public officials, saving public money, and the value of elections: What’s Good, Bad In Hartford Charter Proposals <read>

•Registrars of Voters. Making this office more professional cannot happen soon enough, although it is not clear if it can be done by charter or if a change in state law is necessary.

The city’s first problem is that it has too many registrars, due to a quirk in state law. The law says the candidates for registrar of voters who garner the highest and second-highest number of votes win the posts. But if a major-party candidate — Democrat or Republican — is not among the top two finishers, that candidate must also be named a registrar.

That happened in Hartford in 2008, when the Working Families Party candidate outpolled the Republican. So both of them and the Democrat all became registrars. Registrars make $80,000; with staff and benefits each costs the city about $200,000 a year.

Now guess what. The registrars say they don’t have enough money to run the fall election and need another $115,000.

This is why people get frustrated with government. In the computer age, towns get by with one nonpartisan registrar; Hartford certainly doesn’t need three.

One way around it might be to make the job appointive, or make it a civil service job in the town clerk’s office, perhaps with part-time registrars from the political parties. The charter commission needs to pick a solution and put it forward.

We are surprised that the Courant does not clearly understand that changing a state law mandating the number of, and election of registrars would require a change in state law. At least they are recognizing that more and more as a possibility as they continue a long string of editorials recommending reform. We are even more surprised that given the many scandals in Connecticut by elected and appointed officials that they would prefer to have elections run by a single politically appointed official. As we have said before, the better solution is to “Do for Elections what we have done for Probate”, regionalize, professionalize, economize. Others have made the case as well.

The editorial run today is about embezzlement in private agency, the Waterbury YMCA. We generally agree with this editorial, especially its final paragraphs: Boys & Girls Club Theft A New Height Of Lowness <read>

The case should stand as a warning to anyone involved with a nonprofit organization. Here, as is often the case when a theft is discovered, the culprit is a trusted longtime employee. Mr. Generali had been associated with the club for more than 30 years. Last year, Donna Gregor, the bookkeeper at the Mark Twain House and Museum in Hartford, was sent to prison for 42 months for embezzling more than $1 million from the museum over eight years, a theft that could have put one of the state’s leading cultural institutions out of business.

The lesson is, in the words of Ronald Reagan in another context, trust but verify. Most embezzlements involve a perpetrator with incentive and without conscience, plus a lack of adequate internal controls, which creates the opportunity to steal.

To avoid it, say accountants who work in this area, have at least two people watching the money in every accounting cycle.

Big Bird and Charlie Rose know what the CT Legislature does not!

See Charlie Rose interview Dr. Barbara Simons, co-auther of Broken Ballots. <view >

Big Bird and Charlie Rose now know that Internet voting, email voting, Virgina elections, and inadequately audited elections – do not merit our trust.

See Charlie Rose interview Dr. Barbara Simons, co-auther of Broken Ballots. <view >

Big Bird and Charlie Rose now know that Internet voting, email voting, Virgina elections, and inadequately audited elections – do not merit our trust.

Unfortunately the Connecticut Legislature completely trusts the internet with our votes.

In 2011 the Legislature was about to pass online voting despite the science, ignoring our testimony. Fortunately, they stopped, but only after the Secretary of the State, Denise Merrill convinced them to only require a report on online voting, resulting in a symposium with nationally know computer scientists and a former sports reporter and team mascot Secretary of State from West Virginia.

In 2012, we could have told them that email voting over the internet was even more dangerous, but there were not public hearings – they stuffed email voting into a campaign finance reform bill. Passed by both Houses, we warned the Governor about email voting and the unconstitutional provisions of the bill, claiming voters could waive our right to a secret vote. The Governor vetoed the bill, partially because of email voting.

Perhaps our Legislature will understand this clip from Charlie Rose,

Registrars trade complaints, official and unofficial

Is it voter suppression? Laziness? or Trumped up conflict? In any case, it does not serve voters and democracy.

It is hard to argue for the current system when these conflicts breakout, even harder to argue for the election of a single partisan registrar in each municipality.

West Hartford registrars are trading complaints, officially with the State Elections Enforcement Commission, and in the newspaper: State Investigating Complaint By West Hartford Democratic Registrar – Alleges Misconduct By GOP Registrar <read>

The state elections enforcement commission is investigating a complaint filed by the town’s Democratic registrar of voters that alleges misconduct by the Republican registrar, according to Joshua Foley, staff attorney and spokesman for the commission.

In her Sept. 10 complaint, Carolyn Thornberry claims that Eleanor Brazell violated state laws by not providing state-mandated supervised voting at nursing homes, specifically St. Mary Home, West Hartford Health and Rehabilitation and Atria Hamilton Heights…

State law requires that in “institutions” — including residential care homes, health care facilities for the handicapped, and nursing homes — where voters have difficulty getting to polling places,

a Democratic and a Republican registrar, or moderators from both parties, must supervise while voters fill out their absentee ballots. The ballots must also be collected at a designated time, according to state law.

The process allows a group to vote in one location at one time, according to Av Harris, spokesman for the secretary of the state, and eliminates the need for the voters to mail their ballots to the town clerk.

“This situation is serious … your continued recalcitrance has cost several elderly their right to vote,” Thornberry wrote. “In the professional work of a Registrar of Voters, there is nothing worse.”

In her complaint, Thornberry said that she found out during her first year as Democratic registrar that supervised balloting was arranged at certain institutions in town, but not at St. Mary Home or West Hartford Health and Rehabilitation.

State statutes require registrars to supervise balloting at institutions if more than 20 residents are electors or, for institutions with fewer than 20 electors, if an administrator from the institution makes a timely written request, according to the complaint…

State law requires that in “institutions” — including residential care homes, health care facilities for the handicapped, and nursing homes — where voters have difficulty getting to polling places,

a Democratic and a Republican registrar, or moderators from both parties, must supervise while voters fill out their absentee ballots. The ballots must also be collected at a designated time, according to state law.

The process allows a group to vote in one location at one time, according to Av Harris, spokesman for the secretary of the state, and eliminates the need for the voters to mail their ballots to the town clerk.

“This situation is serious … your continued recalcitrance has cost several elderly their right to vote,” Thornberry wrote. “In the professional work of a Registrar of Voters, there is nothing worse.”

In her complaint, Thornberry said that she found out during her first year as Democratic registrar that supervised balloting was arranged at certain institutions in town, but not at St. Mary Home or West Hartford Health and Rehabilitation.

State statutes require registrars to supervise balloting at institutions if more than 20 residents are electors or, for institutions with fewer than 20 electors, if an administrator from the institution makes a timely written request, according to the complaint.

The deputy registrars said they were told by Brazell and the former Democratic registrar that supervised polling wasn’t required at the facilities because they were designated polling places, Thornberry wrote.

The law does not distinguish between institutions that are used as polling places and those that are not.

Thornberry claims that administrators at St. Mary Home “shared their frustration about ‘begging’ the Office of the Registrar in past years to schedule supervised balloting and the registrars’ refusal to do so.”

Thornberry’s letter to the state elections commission says “it has been a struggle to assure effective operations and legal compliance due to the conduct of” Brazell.

“While we do differ in personality and work style, my only concern is the continuing pattern of irregularities and resistance to correction and change,” Thornberry wrote. “This is not a partisan issue.”

Thornberry wrote that Brazell failed to train election workers as required by law, did not re-certify moderators once their certifications had lapsed, and would change voter information without following the proper procedures.

Thornberry also also claimed that Brazell removed voters from the registry when mailers informing them of a change in polling places were sent back to the office marked undelivered.

In an email to town officials, town council members, the secretary of the state’s staff attorney and others dated Aug. 2 — more than a month before Thornberry filed her formal complaint — Brazell depicted a work environment full of threats and door-slamming, and said Thornberry’s “accusations are all lies.”

“She threatens me bullies me & the folks in the front office causing 2 of them to leave due to her bullying & a hostile work environment. She has made a mess of this office,” Brazell wrote in the email. “How long is the Town going to ignore her behavior? She is very unprofessional. I did not start this nonsense.”

Is it voter suppression? Laziness? or Trumped up conflict? In any case, it does not serve voters and democracy.

In our experience most registrars maintain good working relationships with their counterparts from opposing parties. Some form an effective, cordial team. Sometimes there is a political undercurrent which can occasionally get out of hand, possibly aggravated by genuine differences, or personality conflicts. This situation is not unique, see:
WFSB: What It Takes To Be A Registrar – Politics Play Out In Registrar’s Office
Hartford Registrars: Fighting Disrupts City Office
Bridgeport Registrars: Dustup, Charges, Investigation
Registrar Nomination: Surprise Change Results In Dustup
New Registrar and Two Databases add to campaign dustup

It is hard to argue for the current system when these conflicts breakout, even harder to argue for the election of a single partisan registrar in each municipality. We say “Do For Elections What We Have Done For Probate”