Category: CT Law

Bysiewicz Prepared To Eliminate Manual Recounts

Update: The word “prepared” does not not necessarily imply “will”.   Apparently no decision has been made.  However, we now have a member of the GAE committee who has suggested machine recounts, the Secretary has mentioned it before, and the GAE leadership mentioned the possibility at the press conference announcing public hearings.  This remains a bad idea which we hope will be quickly rejected.

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The Secretary of the State of Connecticut is prepared to discontinue manual recounts in close races. In an e-mail to advocates, good government groups, and the leadership of the Registrar of Voters Association, Deputy Secretary of the State Lesley Mara wrote:

From: Lesley Mara [Deputy Secretary of the State]

Subject: Memory Card audit report

I have received questions from some of you regarding recounts. As you all know, our regulations regarding optical scan machines call for a review of every ballot in the event of a recount. Where all parties agree that a ballot is clearly and properly marked in a way intended to be read by the scanner, that ballot is put in one pile. All “questionable ballots” are placed in another pile and, of course, are hand counted. Those properly marked are run through a new scanner. This procedure was used most recently in the Courtney/Simmons recount.

The Secretary exercised her authority to specify another procedure this past November during the first statewide use of optical scan technology, given that we had not finalized all of the pieces we now have in place with [the University of Connecticut] UCONN (e.g., post-election audits of memory cards). Since November, we have spoken to legislators and election officials and UCONN and we are prepared to return to the original procedure. Of course, we welcome your thoughts on this issue as well when we meet tomorrow.

Continue reading “Bysiewicz Prepared To Eliminate Manual Recounts”

TalkNationRadio: Interview with Deputy Secretary of State Lesley Mara on Voting Machine Glitches: Breaking News re LHS Violations and State Elections

Another very informative show <read/listen>

Case Dismissed in Bridgeport – Reason Missed In Hartford

Update: Glitch in the Webmaster’s work, which is unaudited!!!: An earlier versions cut off part of the quote and the editorial comment making the point.

From the Channel 30 report:

A state Superior Court judge on Wednesday dismissed state Rep. Christopher Caruso’s lawsuit challenging the results of the Bridgeport Democratic primary for mayor.Caruso lost the Sept. 11 primary to state Sen. Bill Finch by 270 votes out of 9,000 ballots cast. Caruso, who said 22 violations affected the primary, sued. He said city election officials improperly prevented some voters from casting ballots and directed others to vote for Finch…

Secretary of the State Susan Bysiewicz said the judge’s ruling made it clear that all votes were counted accurately. “Judge (John) Blawie’s decision validating the results gives voters in Bridgeport, and across Connecticut, confidence in the election process, both in terms of the voting machines we now use and the procedures followed by local Registrars of Voters,” Bysiewicz said.

No. The votes were not counted against the paper. It does not validate the machines in Bridgeport, let alone the machines across the state. Absence of evidence of error is not evidence of absence of error. I have no reason to suspect a problem. Nobody has reasons to prove everything is ok.

Election Lottery

I cannot resist commenting on the idea expressed in the Courant today in the article A Proposal To Sweeten The Ballot Box ,with opposing positions by Dr. Mark Osterloh, ophthalmologist and political activist, and Susan Bysiewicz, Secretary of the State. <read>

Dr. Osterloh’s suggestion is to award a lottery prize of $1,000,000 to voters in an election. to be paid for from existing lottery funds. Secretary Bysiewicz opposes the idea. I am very much in agreement on this with Secretary Bysiewicz.

Yet, there is a lot that voting officials and the legislature can take home from the Lottery. If the lottery was run as secretly and with the lack of transparency of our current e-voting system then there would be public cries for reform; the lottery would become less popular; few would tolerate lottery officials auditing themselves; especially if suddenly politicians or lottery officials began to win frequently, contrary to the rules of probability and predictions of statistics.

Nationally and in Connecticut we are forced to tolerate a lack of transparency with voting. Since 2000 we have been subject to two national elections and several congressional, statewide, and local elections that defy statistics. In Connecticut elections are audited by the same officials that certify the equipment, write the procedures, and conduct the elections.

The way to generate public confidence in elections is to institute a sufficient audit. That is a prerequisite for increasing public participation. Voters and bettors have lots more to lose in our elections than they do in the lottery. We risk billions in taxes, yet, our proposal at CTVotersCount.org would cost the state less than a 1/3 of the cost of the proposed lottery prize.