Enough Voting Machines?

By KEITH EPSTEIN and BRAD SMITH The Tampa Tribune
Published: Oct 30, 2004

  
TAMPA - It's a common question among Floridians waiting in long lines at early voting sites, and it might be asked as well come Election Day:

Do we have enough voting machines?

The answer depends on whom you ask, and where.

A little-noticed gap in Florida law gives local election supervisors wide discretion in making such decisions. That has resulted in unequal distribution of machines that could cause lengthy waiting times in some neighborhoods and counties but not others.

Some believe such inequities and lack of state standards may discourage minorities and poorer citizens from casting ballots and skew the votes of one party or the other, and should not be tolerated four years after Florida's 2000 electoral fiasco.

``That really does surprise me,'' said Rebecca Vigil-Giron, president of the National Association of Secretaries of State, when told of the void in Florida's law. Secretaries of state are the top election officials in most states, including Florida.

``Without a uniform standard the state determines is reasonable,'' Vigil-Giron said, ``how can you ensure that people will be treated equally within all communities?''

Denise Lamb, head of the National Association of State Election Directors, concurs.

``It's in every state's administrative code, or should be,'' Lamb said. ``Why? The obvious, common sense answer is that you want to have enough machines that people can vote.

``It's a big deal if you have voters standing in line for three hours, so they leave and they don't ever vote.''

Because not all voters share as much time or willingness to wait - some have work demands or transportation challenges, for instance - people with less money, in effect, might be the ones most discouraged from voting.

``Not everyone can stand in line for two hours. They may need to get to a job or children to care for,'' noted Sam Horton, president of the Hillsborough bureau of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People.

Despite Florida's rush to buy ATM-like touch-screen and optical-scan voting machines after 2000, the old statewide standard of one machine to every 125 voters was abandoned along with lever mechanisms and punch cards.

``Not needed,'' said Alia Faraj, spokesman for Florida Secretary of State Glenda Hood. ``The process works. The [local] supervisors are very aware of voter registration numbers and how many machines they need.''

Not necessarily, said Doug Chapin, direction of electionline.org, a nonprofit monitor of elections. It's becoming clear that elections offices nationwide are ``woefully understaffed, underfunded and don't have enough machines.''

Bay Area Goals

In Hillsborough County, election managers are trying to meet a goal of one machine for every 180 registered voters, though the reality may be closer to 1-for-242.

Pinellas County may come closer, to about 1-for-180, while Pasco County's may be further away, officials said.

The ratio should be about 1- to-200 or -300, said Vigil-Giron - though in her own state of New Mexico, the Republican- led Legislature insisted on 1- to-800 because of cost.

One week before early voting began Oct. 18, a scenario modeled by Dan Nolan - chief of staff to Hillsborough Elections Supervisor Buddy Johnson, and a former war- gamer at U.S. Central Command - anticipated 91,000 absentee and early ballots before Election Day.

Now, Hillsborough officials expect 140,000 voters taken out of the mix early. That could be one of every four voters.

``There will always be waits and lines on Election Day. That's the way of the world,'' Nolan said. ``But early voting has significantly reduced the volume of people.''

Johnson is so pleased with early voting, in fact, that he intends to recommend expanding it to other locations such as public schools. By law, it can happen only at public offices and libraries, which generally are viewed as neutral, secure territory.

Wide Latitude

Not all early voters have been as pleased as Johnson. At least two locations had waits of one to three hours Friday.

Still, Ronald Rhym, 47, a Brandon salesman waiting at the end of a lengthy queue at the Falkenburg Road elections center, figured an hourlong wait was better than risking the crowds on Election Day.

``It's going to be worse on Tuesday,'' he said.

Like other local supervisors in Florida, Johnson enjoyed wide latitude in how many machines to assign to each of his early voting sites and to 359 precincts on Election Day.

For early voting, four machines each went to public libraries in rural Ruskin and on Nebraska Avenue, in the heart of one of Tampa's minority neighborhoods.

Meanwhile, the Jimmie Keel library in middle-class north Tampa received nine machines. The Jan Platt library in south Tampa and the Election Service Center on Falkenburg Road near Brandon started out with eight machines each.

When turnout exceeded expectations, Johnson added one to four machines at almost every location.

Hillsborough spent $13 million on its touch-screen voting system under Johnson's Democratic predecessor, Pam Iorio, the current mayor of Tampa. On Election Day, the Republican Johnson plans to deploy 2,579 machines out of a total 3,500.

Lack Of Standards

The reasons not all machines will be used?

One demonstration machine must be placed at each precinct. An additional 10 percent of available machines are set aside in case of breakdowns or disasters. As many as 100 are broken at the moment.

The number of machines varies by precinct, ranging from two at Precinct 250 on North Armenia Avenue, which only has 7 registered voters, to 18 at Precinct 947 in a subdivision of Riverview that has 4,312 registered voters.

Johnson noted the lack of a standard machines-per-voter ratio under state law. That's different from 2000, when Florida mandated one machine per 125 voters. The restriction was eliminated during election overhaul afterward.

That makes for a hit-or-miss process based on track records in previous elections.

The lack of uniform standards, though, may not be surprising, given the dearth of research support.

How long should the average voter wait? How quickly should a voter be able to cast a ballot? How many different machines should be deployed given the numbers and differences among populations?

Voting machine research lags far behind its commercial cousin, studies supporting the use of automated tellers, for instance.

``The science of elections administration is very much in its infancy,'' said Chapin of electionline.org. ``No one has done analysis of how long it takes voters to use certain machines, and what's too much and what's too little.

``Things will get better when voting is treated more like the customer service industry.''

Lack Of Space

Another common problem appears to be lack of space in which to put machines. State law carries no provisions for space allocated for balloting, except for requirements that voter privacy is respected.

Finally, there is one more challenge. No law bars a voter from dawdling in a voting booth, although pollworkers can ask a voter to leave after five minutes.

Many Florida jurisdictions have long ballots this year, involving eight proposed constitutional amendments. To speed voters in Pinellas, pollworkers hand out copies of amendment issues for people to review while waiting in line.

Nolan said most voters are taking from three to five minutes in Hillsborough. Johnson estimates the average at eight to 10 minutes.

``It can be done in 40 seconds,'' he said.

Hillsborough pollworkers have been instructed to ask, gently, if the voter needs help after 10 minutes, Nolan said.

On Friday, Hillsborough's canvassing board began processing absentee ballots at the Election Service Center.

The scene was reminiscent of 2000, as a phalanx of dark- suited lawyers representing each political party stood by, scrutinizing the process of opening envelopes.

Verification of ballot signatures is the responsibility of the board, which this year involves County Commissioners Tom Scott, a Democrat, and Jim Norman, a Republican, as well as James Dominguez, a nonpartisan judge.

They are meant to base decisions on research and recommendations by elections officials. Friday, they looked at the absentee ballot envelopes, accepting or rejecting the envelopes based on whether signatures matched those on file.