Ohio's Election Problems Not Limited to Lucas County
Nov 11, 2005, 05:06 AM 

WTOL News

 TOLEDO Election boards in some Ohio counties are irate and embarrassed by vote-counting delays that held up results for hours, and state officials said Thursday they will try to find out what went wrong. Machine problems were blamed in some counties, lack of training in others as 44 of Ohio's 88 counties used touch screen or optical scan systems for the first time.

"It doesn't seem to have been a disaster, but clearly there were some problems," said Daniel Tokaji, an Ohio State University expert on election law and voting machine law. "With any transition, there are going to be some glitches. The message I really want to send is we need to rely on careful analysis rather than seat-of-the-pants judgments."

Lucas County was last in reporting, releasing final results about 9 a.m. "The problem in Toledo was after the polls closed," said Carlo LoParo, spokesman for Secretary of State Kenneth Blackwell. "It wasn't the voting process."

Instead of having each precinct hand deliver the machine cartridges to the board of elections, the county used rovers who picked up from several precincts, causing delays. "The votes were tabulated correctly. The problems were simple management issues," LoParo said, such as disseminating results. "They apparently didn't test their election night Web site until election night, and when they turned it on, it didn't work."

Elections leaders say some unexpected twists with new voting systems forced them to balance accuracy with the public's right to know. "We consider the vote sacred. We want the vote to be accurate. It that means the vote takes a little more time, so be it," said Lucas County Elections Director Jill Kelly.

The new touch screen voting machines used in Lucas County contain a memory card which stores vote totals for the day. Roving employees assigned to pick up the cards from 1,600 machines at 495 precincts had traveled to multiple locations before delivering the cards to the elections office at Government Center. The final memory cards were delivered to the Board of Elections office just before midnight Tuesday.

"I'm not saying the "rover" system is bad. It didn't work as well as we wish it would have is because we needed more. We had 52. We now feel that isn't a sufficient number," said Kelly.

Did the delay in returning memory cards to the elections office open the door to possible vote fraud? "None of the votes were ever unattended or ever put in a situation where there could be fraud," said Board of Elections member Garrick Johnson.

Elections leaders have also been criticized for closing the elections office for the day late Wednesday morning after tallying the final unofficial results. "I made that decision. Some of these staff members had worked 24 hours. Jill and Mike hadn't gone home for a couple days," said Board of Elections chairperson Rita Clark. "A lot of counties close their office the day after elections because they know their employees have worked so hard," said Jill Kelly.

Councilman Michael Ashford expressed outrage at the fact that some voters did not vote early Tuesday morning because elections workers forgot crucial steps in turning on the new voting machines. "They did a poor job of organizing, management and follow through. For them to make an excuse about violating people's right to vote is inexcusable," said Ashford.

When asked if the delayed vote totals and problems opening voting machines Tuesday morning had shaken confidence in the Lucas County Board of Elections, director Jill Kelly said "I see absolutely no reason why the voters should lose faith in the board of elections. We didn't let the voters down. State law says elections need to be fair and accurate, not speedy. They had a fair and accurate election."

In Scioto County, counting wasn't finished until about 4:30 a.m. Wednesday. "When things go as poorly as they did, the board of elections will face a lot of criticism, and in this case I think it's unfair," board chairman Steve Mowery told the Portsmouth Daily Times. He said some machines were not tested sufficiently, and some absentee ballots were too wide to process and had to be trimmed with scissors.

North Canton-based Diebold Inc., which made the machines, and Dayton Legal Blank Inc., which supplied the ballots, accepted blame for the delays. "We want to make sure we understand the problems and the process as well as you do," said Bob Urosevich, Diebold's director of strategic planning. "It was a surprise to us that it went so poorly."

David Keeler, president of Dayton Legal Blank, said five other counties Brown, Crawford, Jackson, Jefferson and Marion had difficulties with absentee ballots. He said the difference in the width of the ballot that caused the problems was about four human hairs and it was a result of human error. Dayton Legal Blank supplies ballots and services 85 of Ohio's 88 counties.

All 41 of the new touch-screen systems, and Scioto's optical scan machines, were from Diebold. Two optical scan systems are from Omaha, Neb.-based Election Systems & Software. A few counties reported minor problems in a mostly smooth election.

In Wood County, which didn't post final results until 6:23 a.m., deputy director Debbie Hazard said workers at four polling places inadvertently chose the wrong option on the machines, preventing voting machine memory cards from being automatically uploaded.

In Montgomery County, where final results were reported at 6:43 a.m., some poll workers said they did not know how to tabulate the memory cards. Some board employees had to be rousted from bed at 4 a.m. to return to the polling places and retrieve the missing cards.