In the recent study of Cuyahoga County’s (Ohio) experiences with the implementation of new voting machines in their recent primary, issues associated with the voter authorization and machine memory cards were identified as sources of confusion and problems. And recently the National Academy of Science electronic voting committee issued a report alerting election officials to plan for contingencies and problems this fall.

So this morning I had a sense of deja vu, when I read in the Washington Post that voters in Montgomery County (MD) were not able to use electronic voting machines this morning, not because of issues with voter authorization cards themselves — but because election officials did not deliver cards to the 238 precincts in the county. According to this story, voters were being told to use provisional ballots instead, but in many cases there were not sufficient quantities of provisional ballots available.

Memo to election officials: plan for contingencies!