Freeholders to case votes for a ballot box: With technology evolving, county rushes to comply with regulations

Wednesday, August 24, 2005

By ERICA ZARRA
of The Montclair Times

With the September deadline fast approaching, a decision has not yet been made by Essex County in the battle of the ballot box builders, especially as the electronic voting machine once considered the frontrunner may not meet new state requirements in time for the 2006 elections.

Montclair activists have alerted the N.J. Attorney General?s Office that the Sequoia machines, which currently account for 64 percent of electronic voting systems statewide and were openly favored by Essex County Superintendent of Elections Carmine P. Casciano, have not been retrofitted to comply with the latest government election standards.

A new state law mandates that by 2008, all electronic election machines must include voter-verifiable printed receipts, which enable citizens to double-check their ballots before officially casting them. This aims to reduce questions should a recount be needed.

Ballot boxes must also comply with the Help America Vote Act (HAVA), which mandates that all electronic models have a paper recount, disability access, and multiple-language capabilities.

A machine that lacks these functions could be disqualified from consideration.

?Given the new information that citizens have given us, we are working on this and are waiting to hear back from the attorney general,? Casciano told The Times. ?I am open to what people have to say because this is an important decision.?

Montclair voting activist Katherine Joyce said the Sequoia Advantage is not in the 2002 National Association of State Election Directors? catalog of certified machines, which was last d in July.

Joyce and other activists assert the Sequoia lacks an upgraded voter-verifiable paper trail and certain handicapped accessibility features.

?This is not just citizens? opinions. The Sequoia is not on the [state election directors] list,? said Joyce, who spearheaded a voting machine demonstration on July 27 at the Essex County headquarters in Newark.

Casciano said the Sequoia model meets the 2002 federal accuracy standards and has a paper trail, but voters do not see an actual receipt.

?We are looking into which federal requirements are mandatory and which are voluntary. That is still unclear,? Casciano said.

Joyce said she worries that if next year?s federal elections are conducted on non-2002-certified equipment, then results could be vulnerable to challenges and disqualification.

?There is also the matter of numbers. We don?t want to lose state funding,? she said of state funding to partially reimburse county governments that purchase electronic voting machines.

As the clock ticks, the Essex County Board of Chosen Freeholders is feeling the pressure of this extremely expensive purchase. The county may lose millions of dollars in federal reimbursements if it fails to comply with federal guidelines. The freeholders have already set aside $7.5 million for the purchase of 700 electronic voting machines, of which $4 million will be refunded by the state through HAVA funds.

Retrofitting about 700 Sequoia Advantages with a paper documentation device is expected to cost an additional $1.4 million.

Sequoia manufactured more than half of all electronic ballot boxes in New Jersey. If the machines are not HAVA-compliant, this could set off a statewide scramble to find upgraded electronic models for approval next month and installation by January 2006.

?There will be a potential catastrophe if an uncertified machine is chosen,? said South Orange resident Richard Janow, a New Jersey Institute of Technology professor who authored a Sequoia certification challenge that was sent to state officials on behalf of Essex County activists, including those from Montclair.

?It?s a national problem that, if not corrected, could lead to a gigantic number of lawsuits and disorder,? Janow said.

He is also concerned that technologically upgrading the estimated 7,000 existing Sequoia machines is infeasible by January 2006.

?We need to delay deadlines, do more research, and look at different machines before this implodes across the country,? Montclair voting activist Trina Paulus said. ?It is a major decision. There is so much more to be discussed. Why is the state rushing??

This is the latest in New Jersey?s continually changing election machine requirements, which has made it difficult for Essex County freeholders and citizens to deduce which model is best ? or even compliant with the evolving law.

While Casciano will not an upgraded electric machine until next month, he said he has ?fallen in love? with the Liberty Elections Systems? Liberty Vote, which meets federal requirements but has only been used in Europe and still must present itself to the state for approval.

?It?s user-friendly, similar to the voting machines people are used to,? Casciano said. ?The Liberty is compact, just 65 pounds, and will not break easily.?

The Avante Vote-Trakker, another ballot box manufacturer that participated in the July exhibition, has neither federal nor state certification, and has never been used in an election, but is modeled after a smaller version operated in several states, including New Jersey. Last year, the Vote-Trakker was denied state certification because it lacked accreditation from one of the federally recognized independent testing labs.

However, the Avante Vote-Trakker does have an integral feature that its competitors lack: a paper trail function.

Still, Casciano is not a fan.

?I don?t like anything about the Avante,? he said. ?It?s just a couple of boxes on a cart and it broke down for the first hour of the demonstration.?

Casciano intends to make a ion in September so the electronic voting machines can be in place in Essex County by Jan. 1, 2006.