Category: CT Skulduggery and Errors

Registrars mess up, City (taxpayers) pay fines, eventually

“Justice delayed is justice denied.” What could be worse?  Perhaps “Justice delayed and fines transferred to the victims.”

In 2014 the Registrars in Hartford failed to provide check-off lists to polling places in time for voting to begin at 6:00am.   From the stories of the public and explanations from officials at the time, it seems pretty clear it was not a simple error or comedy of errors.

Editorial
The pollbook delay went beyond incompetence. These conclusions and fines should not take close to three years.  The well-compensated registrars should be paying the fines not the City.

“Justice delayed is justice denied.” What could be worse?  Perhaps “Justice delayed and fines transferred to the victims.”

In 2014 the Registrars in Hartford failed to provide check-off lists to polling places in time for voting to begin at 6:00am.   From the stories of the public and explanations from officials at the time, it seems pretty clear it was not a simple error or comedy of errors. <read>

From the Courant:  City Fined $9,600 For Election Day Problems – Investigation Critical Of Registrars Of Voters <read>

The state Elections Enforcement Commission has fined the city of Hartford $9,600 for the 2014 Election Day snafus that left many people, including the governor, unable to vote when polls opened.
The state’s investigation found that the three Hartford registrars of voters didn’t finish preparing the official voter registry lists until a half hour before polls opened and, because of that, 14 polling places opened late or without the proper voter lists needed to check off names…
Even after polls closed, the registrars had issues. The investigation found that there was a 2,035-vote discrepancy in the number of ballots cast for governor versus the number of people check ed off as having voted. There also was a 93-vote discrepancy in absentee ballots.
After a second count, the absentee ballot disparity was corrected, but there was still a 1,542 difference in votes for governor that was never resolved.
The investigation is critical of all three Hartford Registrars—Republican Sheila Hall, Democrat Olga Vazquez and Working Families Party Urania Petit—but was particularly harsh toward Vazquez, who was tasked with getting the voter rolls ready.
“Ms. Vazquez’s wantonly poor decision-making reflected either a too casual approach to her work, or a serious deficiency in her ability to do the job,” the report concluded.
Vazquez was in charge of getting the voter registry lists to the moderators at each of the 24 polling places. But the books weren’t sent to the printer until only a few days before the election, and the registrars didn’t cross absentee voters off the lists until only two days before the election. They didn’t
complete that task until 5:30 a.m. on Election Day—a half hour before polls were to open.
The investigation made it clear the delay was primarily Vazquez’s fault.
“Starting with a misreading of the election calendar concerning when she needed to print the list—an inexcusable mistake by a registrar with her experience—she appeared to miss opportunity after opportunity to avoid the slowly unfolding calamity that rolled into the public eye on the morning of Election Day,” the report concluded.
Our Editorial
The pollbook delay went beyond incompetence. These conclusions and fines should not take close to three years.  The well-compensated registrars should be paying the fines not the City.
Also victimized are the voters of the State and candidates for State Office who depend on every municipality to conduct fair and accurate elections.

Why Signatures and Checking Them Matter

A vigilant Registrar in New Haven pursues suspicions.  From the New Haven Independent  Judge Hopeful Submits Forged Signatures <read>

Americo Carchia Wednesday said he’s considering whether to end his campaign for probate judge and vowed to cooperate with any potential criminal investigations after learning that he had submitted petitions with forged signatures to qualify for the Sept. 12 Democratic primary ballot.

A vigilant Registrar in New Haven pursues suspicions.  From the New Haven Independent  Judge Hopeful Submits Forged Signatures <read>

Americo Carchia Wednesday said he’s considering whether to end his campaign for probate judge and vowed to cooperate with any potential criminal investigations after learning that he had submitted petitions with forged signatures to qualify for the Sept. 12 Democratic primary ballot.

Carchia turned in petitions on Aug. 9 with the names and alleged signatures of over 2,000 registered New Haven Democratic voters putatively supporting having his name appear on the Sept. 12 primary ballot against party-endorsed candidate Clifton Graves Jr. He needed 1,852 certified signatures to qualify; the Registrar of Voters office found 1,982 signatures to be valid — based on the names and addresses and birth dates listed matching those of registered Democrats. So Carchia made the ballot

One of those signatures belonged to Andrew Weiss, a Yale student listed as living in Yale’s Arnold Hall. Weiss told the Independent by email Tuesday that he never signed a petition. In fact, he wasn’t even in New Haven during the two-week period at the end of July and beginning of August when the petitions were collected. “I was in Japan,” he wrote…

Democratic Registrar of Voters Shannel Evans Wednesday confirmed that she had filed the complaint with the SEEC after speaking with voters listed on the petitions who said they, too, had never signed. (SEEC spokesman Joshua Foley said the agency can’t confirm or deny receipt of such a complaint until the full commission meets and votes on whether to launch an investigation.)

Carchia was shaken as he received photocopies of all his petitions from the City Clerk’s office before visiting the Registrar of Voters Office to learn more about the approval process.

“I can’t be more numb right now. Look at these!” he exclaimed.

“I’m seething inside.”

He said someone who gives him political advice — he said he couldn’t remember who — had steered him to Yellow Dog Strategies. He said he trusted that the company knew what it was doing. “It was difficult” to find enough help to gather so many signatures in just a two-week window, Carchia said. He said he had no knowledge of corners being cut by the consultants.

This is why signatures are important and useful.  Its not that every forgery can be caught, yet when there are a lot of fraudulent polling place sign-ins, absentee ballots, or petitions those redundant signatures can raise suspicions or in other cases confirm suspicions.

Reminds us of 2004 in Ohio as recounted in the book Witness to a Crime, reviewed here.  One of several incidents in the book was multiple districts with sheets of added polling place voters signed in with similar signatures – signatures of an election supervisor in headquarters, not at any one of the polling places.

Unlike Ohio and many other states, Connecticut does not require voters to sign the check off lists at polling uplaces and does not require absentee vote counters to meaningfully check signatures.  As we too often say here, look for not evil, see not evil, find no evil.

Also outsourcing your campaign is not all its cracked up to be.

Voter Suppression is not just Southern, Intentional, and Advantageous to those in charge.

Typically the Justice Department goes after Southern states, alleging intentional voter suppression by Republicans against voters who would be expected to vote predominately Democratic. To me, it usually quacks like that duck. Not so in Connecticut, we apparently do it through incompetence at our “legend in its own line”, DMV.

Hartford Courant, Jon Lender: Officials Tense, Tight-Lipped On Feds’ Probe Of State ‘Motor Voter’ Program <read>

Typically the Justice Department goes after Southern states, alleging intentional voter suppression by Republicans against voters who would be expected to vote predominately Democratic. To me, it usually quacks like that duck. Not so in Connecticut, we apparently do it through incompetence at our “legend in its own line”, DMV.

Hartford Courant, Jon Lender: Officials Tense, Tight-Lipped On Feds’ Probe Of State ‘Motor Voter’ Program <read>

The U.S. Department of Justice’s April 15 threat to sue Connecticut over failures in its “motor voter” program — which is supposed to promote voter registration at Department of Motor Vehicles offices — resulted in a closed-door meeting this past Tuesday aimed at resolving the problem out of court…

But, for the moment, perhaps the most interesting thing about the “It shouldn’t take the threat of a federal lawsuit to get the DMV to do its job,” said Cheri Quickmire, executive director of the good-government advocacy group, Common Cause in Connecticut. “I am really disappointed that there’s even cause [to consider] this kind of action. The reality is that DMV has been supposed to do this … for a very long time.”

Sen. Michael McLachlan, R-Danbury, the top-ranked Republican on the General Assembly committee that oversees voter registration, said Friday that the “motor voter” program falls under DMV and Merrill’s office, and “I would say that both them are really responsible.” Complying with federal law should have been “really simple,” he said, if the DMV had paid more attention and Merrill’s office had “nudged” more.Here’s What CT Legislature Got Right And Wrong This Year

Outside of their remarks, only guarded comments could be elicited from taxpayer-funded communications aides who continually seek to put their bosses in the best light.

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.

Education “Reform” provides lessons for voting integrity

? What is more important to you? Democracy or the Education of our children?

Answer: <click>

? What is more important to you? Democracy or the Education of our children?

Answer: This is a trick question. Without an educated populace, we cannot have Democracy. Without Democracy we won’t have true, objective education.

Connecticut is engaged in “High Stakes Education Reform” at risk is a bit of our treasury and the entire future of our children and our Democracy. At the heart of choosing and succeeding is “High Stakes Testing”. At a minimum, if we cannot trust the tests, cannot trust the new or traditional educators, then all is lost.

A significant analogy for Elections and Education 

  • If we cannot trust election results or cannot trust election officials then all is lost.
  • In Connecticut election integrity is based on Paper Ballots
  • And Education Integrity is based on Paper Tests
  • Change the paper and you have changed the result
  • Both are dependent on the chain-of-custody

Yet,

  • Elections are a safer in Connecticut because of optical scanners – because the voted ballots are scanned in the view of officials from at least two parties, before they are stored.
  • Trust in Elections and Education will not be improved by computer voting or testing

A lesson for Elections from Education

Connecticut is in the midst of an eduction and education testing scandal, as summarized by the Hartford Courant <read>

Things appeared to be looking up at Betances. In 2011, only 19 percent of third-graders at the pre-K-to-3 school achieved the state’s reading goal, but in 2012, the number shot up to 74 percent, by far the most dramatic improvement by any Hartford school. Bonuses of up to $2,500 were awarded to teachers; school Principal Immacula Didier received a $10,000 bonus from the district, The Courant reported.

It wasn’t the jump in the scores that attracted the attention of state officials to this year’s reading test, it was a safeguard put into place because of a test-tampering incident at a Waterbury school in 2011. After that, the State Department of Education began checking the frequency and type of erasures on tests. This year’s survey flagged Betances with an abnormally high number of rubbed out and changed answers on the third-grade reading mastery test. Twenty-seven of 42 test booklets were over the norm for erasures, or about 64 percent. The next highest number in Hartford was 15 percent.

Further analysis found a disproportionately high number of erased answers changed from wrong to right. Investigators from the law firm of Siegel, O’Connor, O’Donnell & Beck, who also investigated the Waterbury case, followed up with interviews with teacher and students. Teachers were “very surprised” to see that certain struggling students were able to change two dozen or more answers, all or nearly all from wrong to right. One test had 31 erasures, nearly half the 64 bubble-answer questions. Some students interviewed said they didn’t believe they had made the changes they were shown in their test booklets.

A sad story for our children. Yet, the somewhat mitigating good news is that there is an effective Audit which detected the problem! We can only hope that the PBS NewsHour will run a prominent retraction of their story touting the miracle of Betances reading program.

Yet, in the additional bad news, are lessos for voting integrity:

The report says that Ms. Didier, Linda Liss-Bronstein, the school’s literacy coach and dean of professional development, and a custodian were the only school employees with keys to the secure storage closet where CMT materials were kept. The janitor said he never went into the closet. Ms. Didier and Ms. Liss-Bronstein had custody of the completed booklets and reviewed them for such things as stray lines or double answers before forwarding them to the central office, the report says. The report does not accuse them of changing answers.

What can we learn? (What will we learn?)

  • The chain-of-custody matters for all critical paper records
  • Perhaps we should guard our childrens’ tests and ballots like we guard our records in a safe deposit box or like a bank guards money
  • At least two people should be required to access critical paper records
  • All accesses should be logged and verified by a third party
  • Let us not rely on trust, let us verify and secure in order to trust
  • Keep valuable records under dual lock and key, in the custody of independent authorities
  • Consider vaults, guards, and 24×7 video surveillance

When it comes to elections we have a long way to go in protecting our ballots as demonstrated by this costly lesson.

What the Courant has not learned (or has forgotten)

On the plus side, schools around the state will be moving to computer-based testing over the next two years as the new Common Core curriculum is adopted. That will eliminate at least this kind of malfeasance.

Is this the same newspaper and Editorial Board that:

For more information and tales from Connecticut and around the country on the chain-of-custody, see: <Chain-of-custody index>

? How are ballots secured in your town, after the election? How are tests protected, before and after grading?

Nov 2012 Post-Election Audit Report – Flawed From The Start

Coalition Finds Continuing Problems with Election Audit and A New Flaw

Post-Election Audit Flawed from the Start by Highly Inaccurate List
of Election Districts

The report concluded, the official audit results do not inspire confidence because of the:

  • Lack of integrity in the random district selection.
  • Lack of consistency, reliability, and transparency in the conduct of the audit.
  • Discrepancies between machine counts and hand counts reported to the Secretary of the State by municipalities and the lack of standards for determining need for further investigation of discrepancies.
  • Weaknesses in the ballot chain-of-custody.

Coalition spokesperson Luther Weeks noted, “We found significant, unexplained errors, for municipalities across the state, in the list of districts in the random drawing. This random audit was highly flawed from the start because the drawing was highly flawed.”

Cheryl Dunson, President, League of Women Voters of Connecticut, stated,, “Two years ago, the Legislature passed a law, at the Secretary of the State’s request, which was intended to fix inaccuracies in the drawing. For whatever reason, errors in the drawing have dramatically increased.

Weeks added, “Some officials follow the audit procedures and do effective work. This year one town investigated discrepancies and found errors to correct in their election procedures – that is one value of performing the audits as intended.”

Without adherence to procedures, accurate random drawings, a reliable chain-of-custody, and transparent public follow-up, when discrepancies are reported, if there was ever a significant fraud or error it would not be recognized and corrected.
<More Details>

<More Details>

Coalition Finds Continuing Problems with Election Audit and A New Flaw

Post-Election Audit Flawed from the Start by Highly Inaccurate List
of Election Districts

 The report concluded, the official audit results do not inspire confidence because of the:

  • Lack of integrity in the random district selection.
  • Lack of consistency, reliability, and transparency in the conduct of the audit.
  • Discrepancies between machine counts and hand counts reported to the Secretary of the State by municipalities and the lack of standards for determining need for further investigation of discrepancies.
  • Weaknesses in the ballot chain-of-custody.

Coalition spokesperson Luther Weeks noted, “We found significant, unexplained errors, for municipalities across the state, in the list of districts in the random drawing. This random audit was highly flawed from the start because the drawing was highly flawed.”

Cheryl Dunson, President, League of Women Voters of Connecticut, stated,, “Two years ago, the Legislature passed a law, at the Secretary of the State’s request, which was intended to fix inaccuracies in the drawing. For whatever reason, errors in the drawing have dramatically increased.

Weeks added, “Some officials follow the audit procedures and do effective work. This year one town investigated discrepancies and found errors to correct in their election procedures – that is one value of performing the audits as intended.”

Without adherence to procedures, accurate random drawings, a reliable chain-of-custody, and transparent public follow-up, when discrepancies are reported, if there was ever a significant fraud or error it would not be recognized and corrected.
<More Details>

Did new elected Representative committ multiple voter fraud?

Elected initially to the Legislature last month, Christina Ayala, has been arrested for a hit-and-run shortly after the election, arrested for a domestic dispute, and then ordered to move to the district before being sworn in, is no under investigation for illegally voting and registering in that district. Also under investigation is her mother, the Registrar of Voters.

CT Post: Elections commission investigates Christina Ayala and her mom <read>

Elected initially to the Legislature last month, Christina Ayala, has been arrested for a hit-and-run shortly after the election, arrested for a domestic dispute, and then ordered to move to the district before being sworn in, is no under investigation for illegally voting and registering in that district. Also under investigation is her mother, the Registrar of Voters.

According to the registrar’s office, Christina lives at 604 Noble Ave. in the 128th District. Because of her address, she was allowed to vote there in the November 2011 general election and in this year’s Aug. 14 primary, the city’s special September election for school board, and in November’s general election.
However, when Ayala and her boyfriend were arrested for a domestic squabble two weeks ago, the police report stated they lived at 49 Hillside Ave in the 129th district. And when Ayala filed for a protective order, she told the court she lived at Hillside.
The same Hillside address was listed on a police report when Ayala was arrested the night after winning her August primary and charged with evading responsibility, failure to obey a traffic signal and failure to renew her vehicle’s registration.

Registrar error. Will candidate and public get same redress as similar fraud case?

We believe that the law should be followed, but in cases like this courts should normally rule in favor of candidates that do their part in complying with the law and clearly have the support required. Last year in similar circumstances, with allegations of fraud and a clear conflict of interest a court ruled in favor of the candidate

Update 07/03/2012: Candidate files to get on ballot  <read>

***********

A primary candidate got all the necessary petition signatures, but the registrar issued incorrect forms. New Haven Register: Goof sinks primary in 116th District serving West Haven, New Haven <read>

A mistake could cost a state representative hopeful his chance to get on the ballot, as the Democratic registrar of voters reportedly gave him the wrong paperwork to petition for a primary. The registrar, Michelle Hufcut, meanwhile, has withdrawn her candidacy in a primary for the Democratic registrar job, citing health reasons. David C. Forsyth, who is hoping to be the Democratic candidate for state representative in the 116th District, officially learned Thursday that he should have used petition forms from the secretary of the state’s office. Forsyth needed to collect signatures to bring an August primary against state Rep. Lou Esposito of West Haven, the party-endorsed candidate…

Prior to this year, 116th District candidates could use petition forms from the city registrar because the district was limited to part of West Haven. However, following the state’s redistricting earlier this year, the district now includes parts of New Haven, and candidates running for multitown districts must use petition papers from the secretary of the state office, according to Av Harris, spokesman for the office…

“The petitions … are not going to be able to get him on the ballot because they were invalidly issued by the registrar. … This is a pretty black-and-white issue because it’s a matter of state statute,” said Harris Forsyth said his lawyer has been in contact with the state and will help him in court.

We believe that the law should be followed, but in cases like this courts should normally rule in favor of candidates that do their part in complying with the law and clearly have the support required. Last year in similar circumstances, with allegations of fraud and a clear conflict of interest a court ruled in favor of the candidate: Bridgeport: Judge rules for primary challenge, delays primary two weeks

UConn Memory Card Report: Technology 82%-93%, Officials 19%, (Outrage 0%?)

We applaud Dr. Alexander Shvartsman and his team for developing the technology to perform these innovative tests, the diligence to perform the tedious tests, and the fortitude to report the facts.

We do not applaud the lack of cooperation of officials in the audit or the lack of official compliance with memory card procedures. We are left wondering if this is the level of compliance and cooperation when officials know their efforts will be disclosed: “What is their compliance when their actions are unlikely or impossible to scrutinize?” Can you imagine such numbers from any other technology or Government function? Where is the outrage?

The University of Connecticut (UConn) Center for Voting Technology Research posted its memory card report  for the November 2011 election: Technological Audit of Memory Cards for the November 8, 2011 Connecticut Elections <read>

We applaud Dr. Alexander Shvartsman and his team for  developing the technology to perform these innovative tests, the diligence to perform the tedious tests, and the fortitude to report the facts.

We do not applaud the lack of cooperation of officials in the audit or the lack of official compliance with memory card procedures. We are left wondering if this is the level of compliance and cooperation when officials know their efforts will be disclosed: “What is their compliance when their actions are unlikely or impossible to scrutinize?”. Where is the outrage?

Lets start with some good news.

We have had problems for years with bad memory cards which UConn calls “junk data”. Based on the questionable sample of bad cards sent to UConn, the estimate is 7.4% to 17.4% of cards were bad in the Nov 2011 election. This is similar to statistics generated in the Coalition post-election audit survey of officials. The survey showed a huge increase in the number of municipalities reporting bad cards in Nov2011, 90% with the previous high of 56% reported a year earlier <Coalition report page 26-27>.  Anecdotally many towns are hit with an overwhelming percentage of bad cards – we speculate that somehow the programming vendor, LHS Associates, receives batches of returned bad cards, LHS  installs new batteries and the cards tend to stay together, to be used in the next election for many or all of the cards programmed for unlucky municipalities.

The good news is that our memory card nightmare may have a cure in some future election, perhaps 2012 or 2013:

New non-volatile (battery-less) memory card was recently developed by the vendor. Our preliminary analysis of this card confirmed that it is completely compatible with AV-OS systems deployed in Connecticut. It is expected that a pilot deployment of the new cards by the SOTS Offce will occur in the near future. The use of the new card should eliminate the major cause of memory card failures.

No word on State Certification which would presumably be relatively easy, yet required before such cards could be used in an actual election.

At most 30.5% official compliance with pre-election audit requests

For the pre-election audit, the Center received 453 memory cards from 331 districts. Cards were submitted for two reasons per instructions from the SOTS Oce (a) one of the four cards per district was to be selected randomly and submitted directly for the purpose of the audit, and (b) any card was to be submitted if it appeared to be unusable. Given that cards in category (a) were to be randomly selected, while all cards in category (b) were supposed to be submitted, and that the cards were submitted without consistent categorization of the reason, this report considers all unusable cards to fall into category (b).

Among these 453 cards, 223 (49.2%) fall into category (a). 100% these cards were correct. These cards contained valid ballot data and the executable code on these cards was the expected code, with no extraneous data or code on the cards. We note that the adherence to the election procedures by the districts is improving, however the analysis indicates that the established procedures are not always followed; it would be helpful if reasons for these extra-procedural actions were documented and communicated to the SOTS Offce in future elections.

According to the report 331 districts sent 453 cards, but at most only 233 of those cards were not bad cards. Thus at most 233 out of 730 districts in the election, registrars sent in a card as requested by “instructions from the SOTS [Secretary of the State] Office”. How many of these cards were in fact “randomly selected”? There is no way for the public to be sure. So we start with a maximum compliance rate of 233/730 or 30.5%.

Without a full sample, without some assurance of random selection, the statistical significance of the report is questionable and there is clearly a formula for a fraudster to avoid the memory card audit.

Considering pre-election testing we are down to at most 18.4% official (registrar) compliance:

UConn reported that 89 of those 233 cards were not set to pre-election mode yielding 134/233 or 61.8% correctly set in election mode. Thus for 134/730 or 18.4% of districts, registrars complied with both the simple procedures of sending in one card per district and testing all cards, leaving them in election mode.

This is only the most predominant of several problems uncovered:

(b) Card Status Summary:

Here status refers to the current state of the memory card, for example, loaded with an election, set for election, running an election, closed election, and others.

134 cards (60.1%) were in Set For Election state. This is the appropriate status for cards intended to be used in the elections. This percentage is an improvement over the 2010 November pre-election audit, where 41.6% of the cards were set for elections.

89 cards (39.9%) were in Not Set for Election state. This status would be appropriate for the cards that either did not undergo pre-election testing or were not prepared for elections, but not for the cards that are fully prepared for an election. This suggests that the corresponding districts sent these cards for the audit without first fi nalizing the preparation for the election. This is not a security concern, but an indication that not all districts submit cards at the right time (that is, after the completion of pre-election testing and preparation of the cards for the elections).

(c) Card & Counter Status:

Here additional details are provided on the status of the counters on the usable cards. The expected state of the cards following the pre-election testing is Set for Elections with Zero Counters.

All of the 134 cards (60.1%) that were found in Set For Election state had Zero Counters. This is the appropriate status for cards intended to be used in the elections.

85 cards (38.1%) were in Not Set for Election state and had Non-Zero Counters. This is not an expected state prior to an election. This suggests that the cards were subjected to pre-election testing, but were not set for elections prior to their selection for the audit. This situation would have been detected and remedied if such cards were to be used on Election Day as the election cannot be conducted without putting the cards into election mode.

4 cards (1.8%) were found to be in Not Set for Elections state with Zero Counters. This is UConn VoTeR Center April 5, 2012, Version 1.1 9 similar to the 85 cards above. This situation would have been similarly detected and remedied if such cards were to be used on the election day.

Taking the above percentages together, it appears that almost all districts (60:1% + 38:1% = 98:2%) performed pre-election testing before submitting the cards for the audit.

(d) Card Duplication:

The only authorized source of the card programming in Connecticut is the external contractor, LHS Associates. The cards are programmed using the GEMS system. Cards duplications are performed using the AV-OS voting tabulator; one can make a copy (duplicate) of a card on any other card by using the tabulator’s duplication function. SOTS polices do not allow the districts to produce their own cards by means of card duplication.

Card duplication is a concern, as there is no guarantee that duplication faithfully reproduces cards, and it masks the problem with card reliability. Additionally, it is impossible to determine with certainty who and why resorted to card duplication.

There were 18 cards involved in duplication. 12 of these cards (66.7%) were master cards used for duplication. 6 cards (33.3%) were copy cards produced by duplication.

We manually examined the audit logs of all duplicated cards and compared the initialization date of the card against the date of the duplication. We established that most of the cards (16 out of 18) were most likely involved in duplication at LHS. 12 out of 16 were involved in duplication either on the day of initialization, or the day after. The remaining 4 cards were involved in duplication within 4 days of initialization, however they were tested and prepared for election at a later date (4 to 7 days after the duplication occurred).

Only two cards out of 18 were most likely involved in duplication at the district, as they were prepared for election within a few minutes after the duplication event was recorded. This is an improvement from prior audits.

Given the SOTS polices, the districts must not be producing their cards locally. If a district finds it necessary to duplicate cards, they need to make records of this activity and bring this to the attention of SOTS Office.

Post-election, audited districts complied 27.8%

The registrars for districts selected for post-election audit are “asked to submit cards that were used in the election for the post-election technological audit”, 20/73 or 27.8% complied.

For the post-election audit, the Center received 157 cards. Out of these cards only 20 cards were used on Election Day. Given that the small sample of such cards does not allow for a meaningful statistical analysis, we report our nding in abbreviated form. To enable more comprehensive future post-election audits it is important to signi cantly increase the submission of cards that are actually used in the elections.

Cards were submitted to the Center for two reasons per instructions from the SOTS Oce (a) the districts that were involved in the post-election 10% hand-count audit were asked to submit the cards for the post-election technological audit, and (b) the districts were encouraged to submit any cards that appeared to be unusable in the election. Given that cards in category (a) were to be sent from the 10% of randomly selected districts, while all cards in category (b) were supposed to be submitted, and that the cards were submitted without consistent categorization of the reason, the number of unusable cards are disproportionately represented.

Can you imagine such numbers from any other technology or Government function? Where is the outrage?

We all are used to thumb drives, functionally similar technologically, yet much lower cost. What is your experience? Do they fail suddenly 18% of the time, after working correctly for months or years? How about your cell phone or GPS, much more complicated than a memory card?

Recently Connecticut was outraged by 42 state employees charged with illegally obtaining food stamps out of 800 obtaining them. That is a 94.6% compliance rate, quite a bit higher than election official compliance here of 18.4%

Even the UConn Basketball Team does better,  with a quarter of the players graduating.  Milner School, subject to our Governor’s concern, had 23.5% of 3rd graders passing the reading test. But this is not like students failing tests, this is more like Boards of Education overseeing that the curriculum is followed less than 19% of the time.

Let us not forget that the most complex memory cards are not tested:

In addition to the four cards for each district, in mid size to large towns absentee ballots are counted centrally by optical scanners with memory cards that a programmed to count ballots for all districts in such towns. These are not included in the post-election audits required by law, and apparently not included in requests for memory card audits.

Sadly most of this is entirely legal

In Connecticut election procedures are not enforceable so there is no penalty for officials not following procedures. The entire memory card audit is based on procedures, not law.

Also check out some of the audit log analysis in the report

UConn inspected audit (event) logs on the memory cards, discovering several instances of where procedures were not followed and other questionable events.

The rules implemented in the audit log checker do not cover all possible sequences, and the Center continues re ning the rules as we are enriching the set of rules based on our experience with the election audits. For any sequence in the audit log that is not covered by the rules a noti cation is issued, and such audit logs are additionally examined manually. For the cases when the audit log is found to be consistent with a proper usage pattern we add rules to the audit log checker so that such audit logs are not flagged in the future.

Out of the 223 correct 6 cards, 54 (24.2%) cards were flagged because their audit logs did not match our sequence rules.

The audit log analysis produced 106 notifi cations. Note that a single card may yield multiple notifi cation. Also recall that not all noti fications necessarily mean that something went wrong | a notifi cation simply means that the sequence of events in the audit log did not match our (not-all- inclusive) rules.

Present, Past, and Future of Absentee Fraud in Connecticut

Absentee fraud may have changed the apparent winner in New Haven. The solution is not more absentee or mail-in voting.

While the Legislature is considering no-excuse absentee voting, we have a story of current likely and past documented fraud, with the Secretary of the State recommending even more risky main-in voting.

New Haven Independent story:  Voters Charge Absentee Fraud, Intimidation <read>

When college sophomore Shavalsia Sabb cast her first-ever ballot, she had no idea she would land in the middle of New Haven’s latest voting controversy.

Sabb, a Southern Connecticut State University student from Norwalk, said she voted for Audrey Tyson and Tom Ficklin in a Democratic ward co-chair election two weeks ago. She had never heard of them before. She voted by absentee ballot, even though she had no plans to be out of town and no reason to believe she couldn’t make it to the polls on election day.

Then she un-did her ballot. And decided this voting business wasn’t worth all the trouble.

“I didn’t really feel comfortable voting anymore the way it happened,” Sabb said in a conversation this week. The 20-year-old first-time voter said she felt misled and pressured by both sides in the election.

Sabb is among at least 10 Ward 29 voters—students and seniors—who either un-did votes or have filed affidavits with the State Election Enforcement Commission complaining of hanky-panky in the way that the Tyson campaign collected absentee ballots for the March 6 primary for two Democratic Town Committee ward co-chair seats.

Absentee ballots made the difference in that race. Tyson and Ficklin lost to their opponents when polling place votes were tallied on the voting machines. When absentee ballots were counted, they became the winners—Ficklin by one vote. A full 116 out of Tyson’s 256 votes came by absentee.

And at least some of the voters claim that her campaign tricked them into filling out absentees they either weren’t supposed to use, or else pressured them into voting for her against their intentions or wishes. State law requires that someone file absentee ballots only if planning to be out of town or otherwise physically unable to come to the polls; or because of military of poll-working duty or religious prohibition.

Two things to note here:

  • This may well have made the difference in the apparent winner of the election.
  • If we have no-excuse absentee balloting this would still be illegal voter intimidation, but likely more difficult to prove that there was in fact intimidation, while in this case it is clear that the voters were convinced to illegally apply for such ballots.

Sadly this is not the first time for New Haven (and Connecticut):

Aggressive collection of absentee ballots is an art form among New Haven Democrats. Charges of fraud and mishandling of ballots have sprung up regularly over the years. One City Hall supporter, Angelo Reyes, was found guilty of stealing absentee ballots in a 2002 town committee race, for instance. But usually evidence or accusations of fraud—including former Newhallville Alderman Charlie Blango’s admission last fall that his staff improperly collected them in a hotly contested aldermanic race—are met with shrugs and no follow-up, although officials did disqualify 15 ballots in that race. (Click here to read about that.) The concern is that with absentees, unlike at a polling station, campaigns can pressure people into voting for their candidate whether or not they want it.

Secretary Merrill and Senator Looney weigh in:

Secretary of the State Denise Merrill (pictured) said she has a couple of ideas of how to tackle absentee ballot fraud and get more people voting in the process. One step is to eliminate absentees altogether and let everyone cast votes by mail in advance of an election, no questions asked. There would still be polling places, but fewer people would use them….

Merrill supports a bill currently before the legislature to amend the state constitution to allow no-fault absentee, or mail-in, voting. Other states, like Oregon, allow people weeks to bring in ballots in person or mail them in; 80 percent of voters do so, she said.

She cited the controversy over SCSU absentee ballots in new Haven’s Ward 29 as a reason to make the change.

“This is what we’ve got to stop. We’re making liars out of people. A lot of people are thinking: ‘I may be out of town. …’ We have no way of knowing” if people filled out ballots truthfully, Merrill said.

State Senate Majority Leader Martin Looney said he’s “not convinced” about the no-fault mail-in ballot.

“You have a danger of losing the integrity of the ballot boxes,” he said. The process opens the door even wider to the possibility of employers or campaigns pressuring people to vote for candidates. “We fought 100 years ago for the secret ballot,” said Looney, who represents New Haven in the legislature.

“I would dispute that,” Merrill responded. “The fraud we’ve seen in elections is all absentee ballot fraud, people ‘helping’ [seniors and the disabled] fill out their ballots. That pool of people is already at risk.” She is supporting a separate measure to increase penalties for bribery, intimidation and other “real election fraud” to match the penalties for impersonating people at the polls.

Here we agree with Senator Loony. The point Secretary Merrill makes about all mail-in vs. Absentee voting fraud is a distinction without a difference. All mail-in would expose all mailed ballots to being voted by intimidation or mail box theft on the days they are all expected.  As we see from the two instances above it is not all filling out ballots for seniors.