| Date |
Problem Type |
State
|
Vendor
|
Description
|
| 11/4/2009 |
Machine malfunction |
TX |
Hart Intercivic |
Galveston County. The election management system reported that all votes had been counted, when less than half had been counted. Officials thought this was because the system was based on 121 precincts, rather than the 40 super-precincts (voting centers) used in the election.
Story
Archive.
|
| 11/5/2008 |
Machine malfunction |
CO |
Hart InterCivic |
Boulder County. Ballots are scanned by a Kodak scanner and the images are read by the tabulation system. The system was misreading some ballots because of a vertical streak on the image. The county speculates that this streak was caused by dust on the ballots, possibly coming from the creases after the mail-in ballots were folded.
Story
Archive
Story2
Archive2
Note: This problem also occurred in Yakima County, WA in 2004. Story
Update 9/19/2009. After further investigation, "County Clerk and Recorder Hillary Hall released a report Friday that said the problem was an incompatible device driver installed on scanning machines. The incompatible driver disrupted communications between the scanners and ballot-counting software from Hart InterCivic."
Story
Archive
Story2
Archive2
|
| 11/4/2008 |
Machine malfunction |
KY |
Hart InterCivic |
Kenton County. The Kenton County Board of Elections has halted voting on the eSlate electronic voting machines (supplied and maintained by Harp Election Services) because they are not properly recording straight-ticket voting. Voters complained that straight-ticket voting in the State Senate race between Republican incumbent Jack Westwood and Democrat Kathy Groob was not being counted.
Story
Archive
Update: A judge ordered the county to shut down 108 eSlate machines. The malfunctions could affect the tightly contested state Senate race.
Story
Archive
Story2
Update 11/9/08: Poll workers had continued to allow voters to use the machines so the county had to separate out the straight party votes. In an unusual display of accountability, Harp Election Services accepted responsibility for misprogramming the machines, and Kenton County Clerk Rodney Eldridge accepted responsibility for not checking the operation of the straight-party selections on the machine before the election.
Story
Archive
|
| 10/29/2008 |
Machine malfunction |
TX |
Hart InterCivic |
Galveston County. Vote-flipping on the eSlate electronic voting machine. Straight-party Democratic vote switched to Republican presidential candidate.
Story
Archive |
| 10/26/2008 |
Machine malfunction |
TX |
Hart InterCivic |
Brazoria County. Vote-flipping on the eSlate electronic voting machines. Straight-party vote flipped the vote for president. In other cases, a straight-party vote didn't select the president.
Story
Archive
One voter selected straight-party Democratic, then selected Obama for President separately, and McCain was selected instead.
Story2
Archive2 |
| 10/22/2008 |
Machine malfunction |
TN |
Hart InterCivic |
Knox County. The eSlate electronic voting machine displays only the first three letters of the selected candidate's name on the review screen. So, people voting for Obama found that the review screen said they voted for "Electors for BAR". This is particularly egregious since another candidate for president is Bob Barr, so voters aren't sure who they are voting for.
Story
Archive |
| 10/20/2008 |
Machine malfunction |
TX |
Hart InterCivic |
Harris County (Houston). Vote-flipping on the eSlate. Some voters voted straight-ticket Democrat then discovered that the electronic voting machines indicated they had voted for John McCain in the presidential contest.
Story
Archive
Story2
Archive2 |
| 5/19/2008 |
Machine malfunction |
TX |
Hart InterCivic |
Cass County. Flawed ballot programming from Hart InterCivic allowed voters who were not in District 1 to vote for the District 1 city council seat. Although only 41 residents of District 1 were signed in to vote, the number of combined votes received by the District 1 candidates was 198. The only way to remedy the situation is to have one of the candidates file suit to have the election overturned.
Story
Archive |
| 3/6/2008 |
Machine malfunction |
TX |
Hart InterCivic |
Travis County. Only one of about nine eSlate polling machines was working properly. A technician discovered that the machine responsible for printing out access codes for voters was broken. Voting resumed about 10 a.m. after the machine was shut down and replaced with a new one.
Story
Archive |
| 2/27/2008 |
Machine malfunction |
TX |
Hart InterCivic |
Travis County (Austin). eSlates were not "connected to the system" and had to be rebooted after one voter noticed an error message telling her "Reconnect to system to record vote."
Story
Archive |
| 2/17/2008 |
Machine malfunction |
CO |
Hart InterCivic |
Testing discovered that the eScan optical scanner continues to have the problem that led to its initial decertification in the State. It fails to detect and count marks on the ballot consistently, leading to inaccurate results.
Story
Archive
Colorado Voting Systems Testing Board Report |
| 11/7/2007 |
Machine malfunction |
OH |
Hart InterCivic |
Hamilton County. Some of the memory chips (probably "memory cards") from the eScan optical scanners were "giving false readings."
Story
Archive
|
| 11/7/2007 |
Machine malfunction |
PA |
Hart InterCivic |
Blair County. eSlate voting machines weren't accepting votes. It took most of the day to resolve the programming problem.
Story
Archive |
| 11/6/2007 |
Machine malfunction |
PA |
Hart InterCivic |
Bedford County. None of the eScan optical scanning machines were working at any of the polling places. "Election commissioner Peg Koenig planned to visit all 40 precincts in the county to reprogram machines."
Story
Archive
|
| 6/19/2007 |
Machine malfunction |
PA |
Hart InterCivic |
Bedford County. "Peg Koenig, director of elections in Bedford County, said there was a memory card problem in voting machines on Election Day. Koenig said the Northern Bedford County School District had a massive write-in campaign that was much larger than expected. She said the memory cards in the e-scan voting machines became so full that the machines spit the ballots out." Commissioner Mike Shaffer lost the Republican primary by eight votes to Michael Herline. The entire Republican primary election results will be recounted. The article suggests that the ballots will be recounted by machine.
Story
Archive |
| 5/16/2007 |
Machine malfunction |
PA |
Hart InterCivic |
Blair County. eSlate e-voting machines. "Palmer Brown went to vote early Tuesday at the Catfish District of Blair Township, the Reservoir Church, the voting machines were not working. The only thing that came up when he tried to cast his ballot was 'old election data.' "
Story
Archive |
| 5/15/2007 |
Machine malfunction |
TX |
Hart InterCivic |
Denton County. "The county's voting machines were programmed to print the totals by precinct because of the amendment, but it didn't give totals for Flower Mound's two council races, two alcohol propositions and 10 charter amendments."
Story
Archive |
| 11/17/2006 |
Machine malfunction |
CO |
Hart InterCivic |
Montrose County. Machines broke down in all seven vote centers. Montrose Pavilion was the worst, where 11 out of 12 eSlate electronic voting machines broke down. Insufficient paper ballots were available, so poll workers made copies, which the scanners failed to read.
Story
Archive
Story2 |
| 11/12/2006 |
Machine malfunction |
TX |
Hart InterCivic |
Nacogdoches County. Eight eSlate electronic voting machines malfunctioned on election day. One broke down while a voter was using it. Vendor technicians were called to fix it.
Story
Archive |
| 11/9/2006 |
Machine malfunction |
KY |
Hart InterCivic |
Bell, Bullitt, Breckinridge, Henry, LaRue, Livingston, Marion, Pulaski, Union, Warren, Wayne, Webster and Woodford Counties. Scanners used to read absentee ballots weren't working properly.
Story
Archive |
| 11/9/2006 |
Machine malfunction |
KY |
Hart InterCivic |
Scott, Woodford, Bourbon, Boyle, Bullitt, Daviess, Grant and Nelson Counties. Trouble combining totals from the old Danaher 1242 machines and the new Hart InterCivic eSlate machines caused headaches and long hours for election officials. Democratic House Speaker Jody Richards yesterday called the new electronic voting machines "horrible."
Story
Archive
Story2
Archive2 |
| 11/9/2006 |
Machine malfunction |
KY |
Hart InterCivic |
Vote-switching on the Hart InterCivic eSlate e-voting machine was reported to the Attorney General. The eSlate is not a touch screen machine.
Story
Archive |
| 11/9/2006 |
Machine malfunction |
PA |
Hart InterCivic |
Lancaster County. A third of the county's 232 polling stations experienced malfunctions on the Hart InterCivic eScan ballot scanners. In many cases, the memory cards were test cards, not set up for election results.
Story
Archive |
| 11/9/2006 |
Machine malfunction |
TN |
Hart InterCivic |
Knox County. Circuitry in a Hart InterCivic eSlate fails, calling into question over 2600 e-ballots. Knox County Election Commission Chair Pamela Reeves explains what happened to the machine. "Apparently, what it did was it smoked. I don't know what caused it to smoke, but it was literally smoking. So they unhooked it at the time. Of course, we don't read the votes and we didn't know there was a problem until we went to read the votes Tuesday night."
Story
Archive |
| 11/8/2006 |
Machine malfunction |
TX |
Hart InterCivic |
Tarrant County. Vote-switching. Some voters said they selected gubernatorial candidate Democrat Bell and the eSlate machine switched their vote to Republican Perry. The eSlate is not a touch screen machine.
Story
Archive |
| 11/8/2006 |
Machine malfunction |
TX |
Hart InterCivic |
Medina County. 420 people lost the opportunity to vote in the US Senate race, which was "inadvertently omitted" from some ballots (presumably on the eSlate).
Story
Archive |
| 11/7/2006 |
Machine malfunction |
CA |
Hart InterCivic |
Orange County. eSlate voting machines in over 30 heavily Democratic precincts are not working and at most of these locations there are no paper ballots available as backups.
Story
|
| 11/7/2006 |
Machine malfunction |
PA |
Hart InterCivic |
Lancaster County. Undefined malfunctions of eSlate machines, voter confusion over how to use them.
Story
Archive |
| 11/7/2006 |
Machine malfunction |
TX |
Hart InterCivic |
Harris County (Houston). Three of the seven E-Slate voting machines at Lockhart Elementary school weren't working properly since the polls opened at 7 a.m. Two were inactive, one was "misnumbering itself." Technicians arrived 2-1/2 hours later.
Story
Archive |
| 11/5/2006 |
Machine malfunction |
KY |
Hart InterCivic |
Calloway County. Vote-switching on the review screen of the Hart InterCivic eSlate. Straight-ticket Democratic votes were switched to Republicans in all the contested races.
Story |
| 11/2/2006 |
Machine malfunction |
TN |
Hart InterCivic |
Sullivan County. The control device (Judges Booth Controller - JBC) for Hart InterCivic eSlate voting machines shut down after 10,000 ballots were cast in early voting. The JBC would hold no more ballots in its memory. Voters waited while the county replaced the machine. Officials don't expect this problem on election day since no precincts have 10,000 voters. Story Archive |
| 10/26/2006 |
Machine malfunction |
TX |
Hart InterCivic |
Travis County (Austin). Hart InterCivic eSlate chops off the last part of candidate names on the review screen. This is the same problem that occurred on the machines in Virginia. Officials have complained to the manufacturer for two years, yet they insist the votes are counted correctly.
"But it does require additional voter diligence in an already complicated special election. For instance, if voters want to double-check that they've picked the Republican or Democrat of their choice, it won't be obvious from the summary screen. A voter would have to know that "William E. 'Bill' " is Democrat Bill Moody, a Supreme Court Place 2 candidate. The summary screen doesn't list party affiliation."
Story
Archive |
| 10/24/2006 |
Machine malfunction |
VA |
Hart InterCivic |
Alexandria, Falls Church, and Charlottesville. The review page on the Hart InterCivic eSlate (electronic voting machine) cuts off the last part of the candidates' names, as well as their party affiliation. For example, James H. "Jim" Webb appears as James H. "Jim", while James T. "Jim" Hurysz appears as James T."Jim". Officials attribute this to a larger font size. These jurisdictions have had this problem since purchasing the machines in 2002.
Editor's note: The eSlate does not allow voters to adjust the font size on the screen (as required by 2002 federal standards), so they are unable to read the last names of many candidates on the review screen where they confirm the accuracy of their votes.
Story
Archive
Falls Church officials say they complained about the problem a year ago and Hart InterCivic did nothing to fix it.
Story
Archive |
| 11/10/2004 |
Machine malfunction |
CO |
Hart InterCivic |
Boulder County. Some of the scanners (Hart Intercivic) were not functioning during part of the count. In addition, ballots had to be counted by hand because the barcodes weren't printed correctly "The programming of the scanners might also be to blame for not letting machines read bar codes that were off by an amount so tiny that it was not visible to the naked eye."
Story
Archive |
| 11/2/2004 |
Machine malfunction |
CA |
Hart InterCivic |
Orange County. Neal Kelley, chief deputy registrar said that during the first half of the day they had handled only sporadic glitches.
Story
Archive |
| 11/2/2004 |
Machine malfunction |
TX |
Hart InterCivic |
Harris County. Six of the 11 eSlate voting machines are down at Cullen Missionary Baptist Church in southeast Houston. The precinct judge says technicians have come out twice to repair them, but were unsuccessful.
Story
Archive |
| 11/2/2004 |
Machine malfunction |
TX |
Hart InterCivic |
Harris County. At least six of the E-slate voting machines weren't functioning when voters first arrived at a S.E Houston polling place. People (were) coming in at 7:30 and not leaving until 9. All 11 E-slate machines are working now, but it took three technicians to come out to the site and fix the problem. Officials told Eyewitness News it should have just taken one technician to do the repairs. There is still no word on what exactly was wrong with the equipment. Several other precincts were having problems with the E-slate machines as well.
Story
Archive |
| 10/22/2004 |
Machine malfunction |
TX |
Hart InterCivic |
Travis County. Voters who vote a straight party Democratic ticket see their presidential votes have changed to Bush on the review screen. Officials say the voters have caused this by pressing the wrong button on the second screen of the eSlate machine. Story Archive |
| 10/21/2004 |
Machine malfunction |
TX |
Hart InterCivic |
Tarrant County. Machine froze when voter entered voter access code. Story Archive |
