Panel named to voting gear for state


    A group of 13 Utahns is now charged with recommending how to spend $20.5 million to buy new voting equipment.
    The state Elections Office on Thursday named members of its Voting Equipment Selection Committee. The group will help decide the details of what voting gear the state should buy in the switch from punch-card machines to electronic balloting.
    It will not be an easy decision: Several computer experts have criticized touch-screen machines as vulnerable to hackers and problematic because most do not offer any paper record.
    Utah plans to change from its current punch-card system to an electronic form by 2006 as called for in the federal Help America Vote Act legislation prompted by Florida's chad fiasco in 2000.
    The committee will be headed by state Chief Information Officer Val Oveson.
    Other committee members are Box Elder County Clerk Luann Adams, Salt Lake County Councilman Steve Harmsen, Davis County Information Technology Director Mark Langston, Weber County Clerk Linda Lunceford, state Director of Information Technology Neil Peterson, Salt Lake County Clerk Sherrie Swensen, Iron County Clerk David Yardley, Division of Services for the Blind and Visually Impaired Director Bill Gibson and Disability Law Center Disability Advocate Liz McCoy.
    Thomas Burr