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Politics

Key battle for voter paper trail goes to court

Sarasota County officials have concerns about the drafting of a referendum question on the security of touch screen machines.

By ALISA ULFERTS
Published September 11, 2006

Six years after most of the furor over butterfly ballots, pregnant chad and razor-thin recounts was laid to rest, a ghost of the 2000 presidential election still haunts election officials in parts of the state: the paper trail.

Spectral sightings began after 15 counties - Sarasota, Pinellas, Hillsborough and Pasco included - purchased computerized, ATM-style voting machines following the adoption of new rules that unify how Florida's 67 counties conduct elections. Counties could pick from a handful of voting machines, some touch screen, some not. The touch screen machines tabulate votes electronically. So far, so good.

But some fear that votes cast on the machines could disappear into an electronic Never-Never-Land, and a paper trail is a safety net that offers assurances of outcome and a deterrent to hackers.

To officials in the counties that use the machines, however, a paper trail is an expensive, retrofitted security blanket providing comfort not justified by the costs.

The two sides spent eight hours in a Sarasota County courtroom last week. Paper trail advocates asked the judge to let voters decide if they want to pay for new voting equipment that uses voter-verified paper ballots. County officials questioned the constitutionality of the referendum question the advocates drafted.

Sarasota wasn't the epicenter of the 2000 election controversy, yet is the site of the latest battle in the aftermath - a fact that speaks to how strongly many Floridians still distrust the election process.

"What we're doing is a landmark for Florida," said Kindra Muntz, chairwoman of the Sarasota Alliance for Fair Elections, or SAFE.

They worry about what would happen if another election were to be decided by recount in counties that have the machines. Elections officials say the touch screen machines can be programmed to print out a total, but paper trail advocates say the paper quality is poor and there's no way for each voter to verify the accuracy of his or her vote.

"It's like a roll of toilet paper," Muntz said.

Other groups, including some in the Tampa Bay area, are agitating for a paper trail, but none so loudly or so urgently as SAFE, which faces a deadline this week to get its measure on the local ballot.

* * *

For Muntz and other members of SAFE, the issue was simple: no one could guarantee, to their satisfaction, that the touch screen voting machines Sarasota County purchased could not be rigged or verified.

So SAFE began collecting signatures to ask the county to use a machine such as the optical scanner, in which voters receive a paper ballot and a marker to record their votes. Once the ballot is completed, the paper is run through a scanner that checks for irregularities and then deposits the ballot in a locked box. SAFE also wants random audits of the machine results.

They got enough signatures and submitted them to Supervisor of Elections Kathy Dent, who certified their authenticity. Muntz's group submitted its referendum question, and asked the county to hold a special election on the issue as the County Charter requires.

County commissioners refused to act. Instead, they sued SAFE late last month and asked a judge to rule on the constitutionality of the issue. They said the county could lose federal election funds if it placed the matter before voters.

"The SAFE amendment ... will prevent the county from providing the required access for disabled voters," Deputy County Attorney Frederick J. Elbrecht argued in court papers. Elbrecht said that the state hasn't certified any machines that meet all of SAFE's demands and are accessible to disabled voters.

County officials also have said that they held public hearings before they purchased their electronic, touch screen machines, and no one raised questions of security or voter-verified paper then.

The deadline to get the SAFE measure on the Nov. 7 general election ballot is Friday , but Elbrecht said the last scheduled County Commission meeting is Wednesday .

Muntz says using some form of voter-verified paper, that can be stored and used in a recount, is the only way to ensure voter trust in the outcome of elections. She doesn't accept some elections officials' assurances that the touch screen machines could just be outfitted with a printer, because the voter still wouldn't be assured that what was showing on the printout was the same thing the machine had in its electronic memory.

"It's like going on a cruise with the life boats attached to the boat," Muntz said. There should be a way to verify votes that's independent of the touch screen machine, she said.

Arlin Briley, an organizer of the Election Reform Coalition of Pinellas County, said his group considered a ballot initiative last year, but decided that county rules governing petitions made that impractical. Once the elections are over, Briley said, the groups that are part of the coalition will again focus on getting a voter-verified paper trail for Pinellas.

"That was identified as the top priority of our coalition," Briley said.

[Last modified September 11, 2006, 05:24:44]