Election Updates

Sometimes, the title of a story says it all.

More from the wacky state of Maryland on the fight over early voting. Seems that local officials designated the American Legion post as an early voting center without notifying the Legionnaires.

They'll do it, as long as they are reimbursed for $4000 in lost beer sales!

In all seriousness, the story has useful updates on the ongoing controversy between Governor Ehrlich and the supporters of early voting.

IFES and the UN issued a report on the cost of elections and how they can be estimated. A UN article on the report states:

"CORE: A Global Survey on the Cost of Registration and Elections" illustrates comprehensively how to make the voting process more affordable, transparent and legitimate, explaining what measures need to be put in place, from voter registration to ballot-box security, and at what price, before the very first ballot is cast.

The report contends that the cost of elections have two components: costs associated with the actual conduct of the election and costs associated with maintaining security and providing a stable environment in which democracy can take place.

It was necessary to understand the most effective use of resources, what they were being spent on, and how to improve expenditure, she emphasized. The report highlighted two types of costs: core costs, which existed in any country; and integrity costs, which included maintaining security, ensuring that voters could get to the polls without being intimidated, and making sure that electoral observers could carry out their work. The press release for the report notes that:

The cost estimates [for elections] could be broken down into three categories, she continued. In stable democracies, such as the United States and countries in Western Europe, the cost averaged $1 to $3 per vote, per election. In consolidating democracies like Mexico, El Salvador, Lesotho and the Russian Federation, the cost rose to about $4 to $8 per vote cast. The most expensive were post-conflict situations, which required investment in voter registration and infrastructure. For example, the average cost per vote was about $12 in 1990 Nicaragua; about $45 per vote in 1993 Cambodia; and about $20 per vote in Afghanistan.

One of the report’s main lessons was that integrity costs were highest in the post-conflict States, she said, adding that security costs fell dramatically with reconstruction, and in subsequent elections. But, the core overall cost of elections in many countries was still rising slightly, due to, among other things, new technology, the increasing number of elections and the growth of professional, institutionalized electoral commissions.

There is an interesting statement in the report that gives you a sense of the costs associated with elections in war-torn countries. The UN article notes:

CORE said the 30 January 2005 election in Iraq, which took place after over a year and a half of temporary administrations following the fall of former President Saddam Hussein, cost $180 million. This included taking 3.3 million kilograms of election material, such as polling kits, ballot boxes and voter lists, to and from more than 5,000 polling centres in the midst of severe, continuing conflict.

The bottom line is that elections have an array of costs not normally associated with merely the purchase of ballots!

For those of you who are keeping track of such things, the EAC has released their final report on the audit of Calfornia's HAVA spending woes. I wrote about the final determination of how much HAVA funding that California needed to return to the federal government (about half a million) and how much needed to be reallocated in California for improving election administration (about $2.5 million). This report has some useful summaries of the audit process and the history of the HAVA funding problems in California, for those who are interested in reading more about this problem.

I recently received an email message from a voter in West Virginia, describing the following process when they voted using optical scan ballots:

When we got the ballot we were given the ballot and a small stub that we had to turn in at the end to the ballot taker. Actually what he did was take the small stub, tear off a perforated section of the ballot, and, using a large needle and heavy thread piece them together with other like pieces of paper! WEIRD!

Weird indeed, until I received this email, I had never heard of this procedure.

My first check was to find out if this is official West Virginia state procedure, and it seems to be. If you look at the materials provided on the West Virigina Secretary of State's website on optical scan voting procedures, this odd procedure is discussed in a number of places in the powerpoint file.

As best as I could determine, this procedure is meant to guard against ballot-box stuffing. The idea is to keep close track of the number of ballots cast, to insure that there are not more ballots in the box at the end of election day then were issued throughout the day of voting.

But there is a serious downside to this procedure. If the ballot box is configured so that ballots are piling up inside the box in something roughly approximating sequential order, it might be possible to link back up individual identities with voted ballots after the election. There are a couple of ways to provide additional safeguards of ballot secrecy with such a procedure, for example making sure that ballots do not stack up on sequential order, "stringing" on multiple strings, or doing something like just periodically shaking the ballot box to make sure that the voted ballots are mixed to an ordering that is not sequential.

In any case, this is clearly an odd procedure. I'll be more than happy to post any useful information that readers pass along about this --- or other similar procedures.

The Caltech/MIT Voting Technology Project (VTP) has rolled out a new and revamped website. In addition to a thorough reorganization of the materials that have always been on the VTP website, the goal is to make the VTP website more usable and timely.

So yesterday, I spent the day hanging out in Multnomah County with Paul Gronke, watching people vote in a vote-by-mail election. And yes, as you will see when we put up photos, it is possible to observe a VBM election! However, the highlight of the trip was the tour of the County elections offices with John Kauffman.

Now I knew by reputation that John is a smart and progressive guy, but what lurks on the second floor of the elections offices was....well, amazing. First, however, I should note that VBM in Oregon means that the ballots are mailed to the voter. However, voters can and do return ballots at drop off locations, including at the county elections offices. Voters can also come to the elections office to request assistance or to vote provisionally. So while we were there, Paul and I saw dozens and dozens of voters dropping off ballots both inside the office in a ballot box on the front counter and outside the offices in the ballot drop box.

So near the end of the tour, John takes Paul and I upstairs. The second story will be the location of the county's disability accessible voting system once the state procures a new accessible system. The space is specially designed for people with disabilities and is accessible via an elevator.

When we get up to the space, there are 10 people sitting at a table talking. Who are these people? Interpreters. Now Multnomah County is not a covered jurisdiction for language minorities under the Voting Rights Act. But there these people are, waiting if there is a need for an interpreter to help a voter with ballots in Spanish, Vietnamese, Russian, Sign Language, and Chinese. The county does not do this because they have to; instead, they do it because they think it is the right thing to do.

Los Angeles County does something similar through its Community Voter Outreach Committee. I wrote about this process as part of a report for The Century Foundation and the National Commission on Federal Election Reform. The interesting thing about LA is that the County leverages the interest groups so that they will help the County identify poll worker needs in both covered languages and those not covered by the Voting Rights Act. For example, when the Cambodian population started to grow in Long Beach, the county hired more bilingual poll workers who spoke both English and Khmer (and related dialects).

So what is in the Attic in Multnomah County? Help for those who need it.

I received the following information via email today from the EAC:

I wanted to bring to your attention our release today of the Election Assistance Commission's Help America Vote College Pollworker Program. This program, quite successful in 2004, will build upon the successes and research of the EAC to encourage more students to ease the strain local election officials face on election day. This year, we will be encouraging our successful grant recipients to utilize a manual we are developing to further test how we recruit, train, manage and evaluate college pollworkers.

The grant announcement was released today, and colleges, universities and nonprofits are eligible to apply. Because of the short term funding of the grant, awards are between $8,000-20,000. Please encourage any appropriate organizations or institutions to apply for this grant. ...

Grants.gov Website Announcement: http://www.grants.gov/search/search.do?oppId=9462&mode=VIEW

Application Instructions: http://www.eac.gov/docs/GRANT%20ANNOUNCEMENT2006.pdf

You can examine material available at our 2004 College Pollworker site at: http://www.eac.gov/coll_poll.asp

It's becoming increasingly apparent that due to equipment failures (Arkansas), new state laws requiring paper trails (California, Washington), technical glitches (Illinois), or pressure from groups such as Verified Vote and blackbox voting, election reform over the next two years may actually mean a dramatic move back to pencil and the paper ballot.

Tomorrow, Thad Hall and I are going to explore the Multnomah County elections process, and by implication, the voting by mail process across Oregon.

I've invited Thad so that he can understand the administrative procedures which are employed in Oregon. We can speculate on how applicable these may be nationwide.

The absolutely gorgeous weather, crystal blue Oregon sky, and the availability of spring skiing has nothing to do with his visit.

For those interested, Multnomah County has also prepared a video detailing the election procedures: http://www.co.multnomah.or.us/dbcs/elections/ (click on the link just below "Elections Division").

I'm sure Thad will post his reactions in a few days.

Thad, have you turned in your permission slip?