Excellent article. A significant issue is raised.  We will need to carefully review the results of the post-election audits and the recounts. If the machines regularly fail to accurately count votes with an accuracy well within the mandatory recount level of 0.5% then we will need to set the recount trigger at a significantly higher level.
Despite the rollout of high-tech voting machines in all towns and precincts, errors still turned up during recounts in Wallingford, Southington and elsewhere. In both of those towns, all of the Town Council candidates saw their totals change once the paper ballots had been examined by humans and not just by the optical scanning machines.
Some candidates lost more than one-half of one percent of the total votes cast, which is the threshold for a mandated recount in a close race.
The election results didn’t change, but the system was shown to have flaws.
Also read comments by Rep Lawlor, Andy Sauer of Common Cause, and yours truly:
but at least one voter advocate would like to see that increased. “The chance of an error or fraudulent behavior even being detected is two to four percent in a local race,” said Luther Weeks, executive director of CTVotersCount.org, based on his analysis. “I personally am not satisfied with (that).
“Weeks said he doesn’t expect fraud to happen, but that the standard should be raised in such a way that the state has a one-third chance of catching it if it does. Audits cost pennies per vote, he said.
Read the entire article <read>
