State Board of Elections takes action
March 26,2004
Sue Book
Sun Journal

Board ensures that technology can't be used to alter elections

The State Board of Elections took action in New Bern Thursday to further ensure that electronic voting technology cannot be used to alter elections in North Carolina.

The five-member board voted unanimously to limit which voting machines can be purchased by the state's 100 counties until federal standards are in place and banned any general maintenance or software modification to voting equipment for 25 days preceding any vote without specific State Board of Elections approval.

Since absentee voting precedes election days by 50 days, voting machines can't be touched without state board approval for 75 days prior to an election day.

State and county elections officials were already on guard because of questionable 2000 election results in Florida and Georgia and on notice with changes required by the 2002 federal Help America Vote Act that is expected to outline electronic voting standards by 2005.

But state board Chairman Larry Leake told 375 county elections officials meeting for a two-day training seminar at Riverfront Convention Center, and later the state board, that information recently brought to light regarding the Georgia vote has shaken his belief that present technology can guarantee the election process will not be circumvented.

Leake has been a member of the state board since 1992 and chairman since 1996 and characterized himself as a former leading opponent of optical scan equipment, used with paper punch card or marked ballots, and a leading proponent of electronic voting equipment such as direct recording electronics.

"I still believe that is the technology of the 21st Century but I think it very likely that before we have full and complete confidence in that equipment many changes will come," said Leake.

Leake said recent information released on the Georgia electronic voting controversy outlines a number of points at which electronic voting is vulnerable to corruption.

"It may be that there is no such thing as the perfect piece of electronic equipment but I now believe there is a way they can make the machines better and they have to."

"Part of our purpose is to instill confidence in the outcome for the winner and the looser. Until we reach that point, we've got to keep searching," he said.

He said he thinks the state board of elections must ultimately have its own technology experts aboard. "I do not want us to automatically assume that a technology guru knows best."

"I am unequivocally opposed to Internet voting because we can not absolutely control its authenticity," he said in an interview.

Leake's move to limit which machines can be purchased by counties until HAVA specifications are in place cut out at least one vendor displaying wares at the seminar.

AcuPoll, with ties to Charlotte-based Source Technologies, has not yet submitted its equipment to the Independent Testing Authority, deputy director Johnnie McLean told the board.

HAVA provides money for states to replace punch card voting systems. Thus far, $7.9 million plus interest has gone to link North Carolina's elections offices with a state electronic system and about $2 million has gone for county voting machine improvements.