First off, the National Academies of Sciences project, “A Framework for Understanding Electronic Voting”, is likely to issue a report soon (the project had an approximate start date of 9/01/2004, and according to the NAS website “A final report will be issued at the end of the project in approximately 12 months from the start date”) … we will keep readers of our blog posted about the release of this report as we learn more!

Secondly, the current “Commission on Federal Election Reform” (better known as the “Carter-Baker Commission”) is poised to release their final report soon. According to the FAQ on their website, “The final report is scheduled for release in September 2005”). We will also keep Election Updates readers posted about this upcoming report. Based on comments made by Commission Executive Director Robert Pastor at the American Political Science conference last week, the Commission’s final report is likely to contain a series of specific, and possibly provocative, recommendations on voting technologies and election procedures.

Last, as discussed in our third podcast, our evaluation of the current situation in Congress is that the prospects for “opening up HAVA” are slim. Based on discussions with some Congressional staff last week, and with a wide variety of folks in Washington who routinely monitor election reform efforts, there does not seem to be much interest in Congress in revisiting or amending HAVA, at least until there is a stronger consensus that there has been sufficient time learn what does and does not work in the HAVA.