Supporters of paper trail for e-voting launch ad campaign

 By FOSTER KLUG
Associated Press Writer

March 18, 2004, 5:35 PM EST

BALTIMORE Supporters of a paper trail for electronic voting machines ran full-page advertisements Thursday in newspapers in Maryland and Florida calling for a tangible record of each ballot cast in the November election.

Ads in The (Baltimore) Sun and The Palm Beach Post show a touch-screen computer from Diebold Election Systems, the Ohio-based company that makes Maryland's machines, sprouting monster fangs, its screen displaying a time bomb and reading, "System Error! Vote Data Lost."

Diebold and Maryland elections officials say the machines are safe and have never recorded an inaccurate vote.

The Maryland ad implores state Delegate Sheila Hixson and Sen. Paula Hollinger _ key Democratic members of committees considering paper trail legislation _ to support their cause.

"There's such an easy, reasonable, inexpensive solution to this problem," said Ben Cohen, co-founder of Ben & Jerry's Ice Cream and president of TrueMajority.org, the advocacy group funding the ads. "Just have the machine print out a receipt, just like an ATM does."

Supporters want a "voter-verified paper ballot," meaning each voter would get a copy confirming the way they had voted, which they would then turn over to a poll worker.

David Bear, a Diebold spokesman, said the company's machines have built-in printers, used to print a paper audit of the election at its conclusion. He said it's technologically possible for the machines to be modified to provide a piece of paper showing someone had voted, though it had yet to be done.

He added that there are no specific standards, either federal or state, about how proposed printers should function.

Bear also said Florida doesn't use Diebold's touch-screen machines. TrueMajority.org spokesman Matt Holland said the advertisements are directed at every company that makes touch-screen machines.

"The point is the machine, not the manufacturer," Holland said.

Officials in Nevada, Missouri, California, West Virginia and other states have said they support paper trails. And in the U.S. Congress, New York Sen. Hillary Clinton and New Jersey Democratic Rep. Rush Holt have supported efforts to document electronic votes on paper.

Hixson said Thursday that Maryland lawmakers didn't think they could put printers in each precinct by November. "We don't have time," she said.

Hollinger said lawmakers wanted to "at least put a printer or a couple of printers in each polling place" for the November election.

After the March 2 primary _ the first Maryland election to use all touch-screen machines _ state officials reported scattered problems, largely blamed on human error, but declared the election a success.

Maryland is spending $55.6 million to move toward an entirely electronic system. Linda Lamone, state elections administrator, said the state's 16,000 electronic voting machines performed well, and she anticipates they'll do so again in November.

Lamone also points out that the date listed on the computer screen in the advertisements is incorrect _ the election is Nov. 2, not Nov. 4.

Some experts, however, are concerned the machines might not be all they're advertised. Computer experts at Columbia, Md.-based RABA Technologies told lawmakers in January that the machines had two identical locks, which could be opened by any one of 32,000 keys.

Diebold's technology is "exactly the same as what's sitting on your desktop," said Paul Suh, a curriculum developer at Apple Computers and security specialist for truevotemd.org, a group opposed to the machines. "Are you willing to trust a system based on exactly the same (personal computer) technology to record your votes?"

Supporters of a paper trail say software needed to print out a paper record of a voter's intent could be installed in a few days. They say costs would be "nominal," something state elections officials say isn't true.