Commissioners to pledge money for ballot printers

By George Bennett, Palm Beach Post Staff Writer
Friday, January 30, 2004

WEST PALM BEACH Palm Beach County commissioners appear ready to extricate themselves from an elections lawsuit by pledging $2.5 million for ballot printers to go along with the county's paperless touch-screen voting machines.

If commissioners OK the money Tuesday, U.S. Rep. Robert Wexler, D-Delray Beach, said he would the commission as one of the defendants in a lawsuit that seeks to force the county to add a ballot-by-ballot paper trail to its voting machines.

Wexler would continue to press his suit against county Elections Supervisor Theresa LePore and Florida Secretary of State Glenda Hood.

Wexler claims touch screens are illegal because they don't produce tangible ballots and therefore don't allow a manual recount as state law requires in close elections.

A paper trail also would be a safeguard against machine errors or fraud, he says.

County commissioners have endorsed the paper-trail idea twice this month, but were included in Wexler's lawsuit because they approve money for the elections office.

Wexler has spoken with several commission members in recent days about a settlement that would them from his suit.

Commissioners asked staff Thursday to draft a resolution for Tuesday's meeting pledging the money for ballot printers.

Wexler says the money could come from $85.8 million in federal election aid that Congress recently approved for Florida.

The commission's approval of money for ballot printers would be contingent on Hood's office certifying the equipment.

No vendor has submitted a ballot printer to the state for certification.

Sequoia Voting Systems, which made Palm Beach County's touch screens, has said it is developing a printer that could be ready for certification soon.

Hood's office declined to comment Thursday.

LePore has been critical of a paper trail in the past, but seems to have softened her position.

"If Theresa LePore has a machine that is certified by everybody and is in Palm Beach County and ready to go, she has no problem with such a machine.... The problem is, it doesn't exist," said attorney Bernard Lebedeker, whose firm is representing LePore.