County set for voting, Burgess declares

Miami-Dade County Manager George Burgess cut short a vacation to allay fears that the county's electronic voting machines would cause problems in upcoming elections.

BY CHARLES RABIN for the Miami Herald    06 August 2004

Responding to mounting pressure from voting advocacy groups and some county leaders, Miami-Dade County Manager George Burgess returned from a long-planned vacation Thursday to declare that his staff is doing all it can to prepare for the upcoming elections.

''I'm the county manager and I don't shy away from responsibilities,'' said Burgess, surrounded by county staff at election headquarters in Doral.

Burgess originally planned to return from Maine on Aug. 13. But in recent days, new questions have arisen about the county's touch-screen voting machines and the performance of the elections office as it prepares for the Aug. 31 primary.

Last week, Miami-Dade elections officials said they had lost most of the data files from the 2002 elections in two 2003 computer crashes, but then later announced that the audits had been found on a computer.

Also last week, Miami-Dade Elections Supervisor Constance Kaplan told commissioners that the office did not look into a number of ''undervotes'' in the 2002 primary because it was not required to do so. ''Undervotes'' are ballots that register no vote.

The developments prompted Commission Chairwoman Barbara Carey-Shuler to call this week for immediate measures to restore the public's confidence. And Mayor Alex Penelas asked the elections department to study whether using optical scanning machines instead of the electronic machines was viable for the Nov. 2 election.

Miami-Dade's Office of Audit and Management and the Office of Inspector General have agreed to oversee the county's election process.

The manager said Thursday that he had total faith in his staff while he was away, but came back because ``the public needs to understand how much we care. The democratic right to vote is too important to tinker with.''

`STATE OF THE ART'

Burgess said he has confidence in the county's voting system. ''You're in [an elections headquarters] that's state of the art. The fact that we've been able to absorb and change is something we should be proud of,'' he said.

Kaplan, Burgess and Audit and Management Director Cathy Jackson addressed the undervote issue, including a Herald report Thursday that a state review of the 2002 primary showed more than 44,000 votes were not counted across Florida through undervotes, overvotes and absentee ballots. Overvotes are ballots containing more than one vote.

They said there is no way to overvote on an electronic machine because there are no extra buttons to push, and that if someone undervoted, it meant they chose not to vote.

''It appears these are situations where someone consciously chose not to vote,'' Burgess said.

Said Kaplan: ``An undervote is a choice. It does not mean it's a lost vote.''

Added Jackson: ``People, because of long lines, may have signed in, and not voted.''

But the American Civil Liberties Union renewed its call for an independent audit of the electronic machines before the Aug. 31 primary.

''State officials are undermining voter confidence by stubbornly resisting steps to ensure the accuracy of touch-screen voting machines,'' said Florida ACLU Director Howard Simon.

`BOLSTER CONFIDENCE'

Additionally, two Democratic leaders in the Florida Legislature on Thursday sent a letter to Gov. Jeb Bush asking him to ''bolster confidence'' in voting by ordering the 15 counties that use touch-screen machines to offer voters the option of using optical scanners on election day.

Sen. Ron Klein and Rep. Doug Wiles also asked that every voting machine in Florida be tested before the election. Both Klein and Wiles maintained at a Tallahassee press conference that they believe that touch-screen machines work accurately, but voters should get a choice.

''The governor of Florida should at least give voters the option of using a paper ballot,'' said Wiles.

A spokeswoman for Secretary of State Glenda Hood called Wiles and Klein's press conference ''unfortunate'' and said the Democrats were making their request for political reasons.