(Ohio) First all-electronic election marred by problems

[sabra]

http://www.cleveland.com/election/plaindealer/index.ssf?/base/news/1146645262236420.xml&coll=2&thispage=1

First all-electronic election marred by problems
Votes not all in on first all-electronic election

Electronic voting in Cuyahoga County began with a thud, with results of most races unknown late Tuesday while an army of election workers prepared to use the most old-fashioned of voting technology - a hand count - to tally thousands of votes.

Glitches with optical scan machines prevented the planned counting of 17,000 absentee ballots. Workers planned to begin hand-counting votes on the ballots at midnight and expected to be at it for hours. And because new touch-screen voting machines did not function properly at first in some polling locations, voters had to fill out paper ballots, which also were to be hand-counted early today.

With the paper ballots accounting for such a substantial percentage of all votes cast Tuesday, the winners in many county races could not be called.

"An investigation will take place over the next couple of weeks" to find out the cause of the problem, said Bob Bennett, chairman of the Cuyahoga County Board of Elections. "Everyone's vote will be counted . . . but we're not going to get the results in a timely manner."

[Pab Sungenis]

1. Read: "we need more time to put the fix in."

Although the idea that some of the districts abandoned the touchscreens for paper ballot and hand count is encouraging.

[onehandle]

2. Works fine here in Georgia.

Just ask Max Cleland and Roy Barnes.

[AndyTiedye]

3. I Am Sure Mr. Blackwell Was On Top Of It

[AngryOldDem]

5. I'm sure he was....

...he won, didn't he?

[paparush]

4. How about they write their votes on bricks and throw them at Bennett