Dispute veers to absentee approach

BALLOTS: An election group urges Inland voters to avoid using touch-screen systems.

11:29 PM PST on Thursday, February 19, 2004

By JIM MILLER / Sacramento Bureau

Absentee ballots

Number of absentee ballots requested for the March 2 election:

Riverside County:

about 140,000

San Bernardino County: about 125,000

Last day to request absentee ballot: Feb. 24 .

* Absentee totals include

vote-by-mail precincts.
?

SACRAMENTO - Escalating a dispute over the reliability of touch-screen voting machines, a non-partisan election group Thursday urged voters in Riverside, San Bernardino and several other counties to obtain absentee ballots for the March 2 election.

Kim Alexander, president of the California Voter Foundation, said counties have done too little to ensure the accuracy of electronic voting, though more counties than ever will use the technology next month. Thursday's warning was the first by the decade-old organization, which works to increase voter participation.

"If people are not confident that an election is secure, they will no longer be confident of the results," Alexander said, calling the current system "faith-based voting."

Inland election officials said the group's advice needlessly alarms voters and might delay election-night vote counts. Riverside County has used its touch-screen system since 2000, and the technology will make its countywide debut in San Bernardino County next month.

"Anyone going around creating fear, fostering uncertainty about the democratic process, is doing no service to democracy," said Scott Konopasek, San Bernardino County's registrar of voters. "They've taken it across the line. The debate is no longer constructive. It's taken a destructive turn."

Also Thursday, state senators Ross Johnson, R-Irvine, and Don Perata, D-Oakland, introduced legislation requiring counties to provide voters with a paper receipt verifying their touch-screen votes. The law would take effect Jan. 1.

Earlier this month, Secretary of State Kevin Shelley directed county registrars with touch-screen systems to adopt strict security measures.

Shelley, a Democrat, wants paper ballot records as well as state experts to test county voting machines the day of the election.

Ten county registrars, including Konopasek and Riverside County's Mischelle Townsend, wrote a letter asserting that Shelley was overstepping his authority and that the counties had adequate safeguards.

Townsend reports no problems with the touch-screen voting to date.

The counties' response to Shelley spurred the voter foundation's recommendation, Alexander said.

Shelley spokesman Doug Stone said, "We're very sensitive to Kim Alexander's concerns. If voters feel more comfortable, they should vote absentee and we would encourage them to do so."

About 9 percent of voters lived in counties with touch-screen voting systems for the Oct. 7 recall election. Electronic voting systems now cover more than 40 percent of voters.

Konopasek and Townsend contend that paper ballots are more prone to voter error than voting electronically.

A surge of voters ping off absentee ballots March 2, the deadline for turning in the ballots requested by Feb. 24, will delay results for Inland races, they said.

Reach Jim Miller at (916) 445-9973 or jmiller@pe.com