text of NJ mandatory VVPB audit bill- please crtique

[FogerRox]

S507 GILL
2
AN ACT providing for audits of the results of elections and 1
supplementing chapter 61 of Title 19 of the Revised Statutes. 2
3
BE IT ENACTED by the Senate and General Assembly of the State 4
of New Jersey: 5
6
1. a. Notwithstanding any law, rule or regulation to the contrary, 7
the Attorney General shall appoint each year an independent audit 8
team. It shall conduct random hand counts of the voter-verified 9
paper records in at least two percent of the election districts where 10
elections are held for federal or State office, including the offices of 11
Governor and member of the Legislature, and for county and 12
municipal offices selected by the Attorney General. Hand counts 13
shall also be made of the results of at least one voting machine in 14
one election district in each county where elections occur each year. 15
The number and composition of the audit team shall be at the 16
discretion of the Attorney General, except that at least one member 17
shall have verifiable expertise in the field of statistics. 18
b. The independent audit team shall conduct an audit of the 19
results of an election in accordance with the following procedures. 20
(1) No later than 24 hours after the final vote count after an 21
election, the Attorney General shall determine and then announce 22
publicly the districts in the State in which audits shall be conducted. 23
(2) With respect to votes cast at the election district on the date 24
of an election other than by provisional ballot, the independent 25
audit team shall count by hand the voter-verified paper records and 26
compare those records with the count of such votes announced by 27
the county boards of elections. 28
(3) With respect to votes cast other than at the election district on 29
the date of the election, or votes cast by provisional ballot on the 30
date of the election that are certified and counted by the county 31
board of elections on or after the election, including votes cast by 32
military service voters and overseas federal election voters, the 33
independent audit team shall count by hand the applicable voter- 34
verified paper records and compare those records with the count of 35
such votes announced by the county boards of elections. 36
(4) The selection of the election districts and county and 37
municipal elections to be audited shall be made by the Attorney 38
General on a random basis using a uniform distribution in which all 39
districts and county and municipal elections have an equal chance 40
of being selected, in accordance with such procedures as the 41
Attorney General deems appropriate, except that at least one voting 42
machine in one district shall be selected for an audit in each county 43
in the State. 44
(5) As soon as practicable after the completion of an audit 45
conducted pursuant to P.L. , c. (C. )(now pending before the 46
Legislature as this bill), the Attorney General shall announce 47
S507 GILL
3
publicly and publish the results of the audit and shall include in the 1
announcement a comparison of the results of the election in the 2
districts, as determined by the independent audit team performing 3
the audit, and the final vote count in the districts as announced by 4
the county boards of elections. 5
(6) No county shall certify the results of any election that is 6
subject to an audit performed pursuant to P.L. , c. (C. ) 7
(now pending before the Legislature as this bill) prior to the 8
competition of the audit and the announcement and publication of 9
the results thereof as required by paragraph 5 of this subsection, 10
except to the extent necessary to permit the State to make a final 11
determination with respect to any controversy or contest concerning 12
the appointment of its electors for President or Vice President of the 13
United States prior to the deadline established in section 6, Title 3 14
of the United States Code. 15
(7) If the Attorney General determines that any of the hand 16
counts conducted under P.L. , c. (C. )(now pending before 17
the Legislature as this bill) show cause for concern about the 18
accuracy of the results of any election in the State, or in a county or 19
a municipality, or with respect to a particular election, the 20
independent audit team may conduct hand counts under this act in 21
such additional election districts as the Attorney General considers 22
appropriate to resolve any such concerns. 23
24
2. This act shall take effect on January 1, 2008. 25
26
27
STATEMENT 28
29
The purpose of this bill is to establish a procedure for the 30
mandatory audit of election results each year in randomly selected 31
voting districts in the State. The audit would be conducted by an 32
audit team appointed by the Attorney General, who would also have 33
discretion as to the number and composition of such a team but it 34
must include at least one member who has verifiable expertise in 35
the field of statistics. It will conduct random hand counts of the 36
voter-verified paper records in at least two percent of the election 37
districts where elections are held for federal or State offices, 38
including the offices of Governor and member of the Legislature, 39
and for county and municipal offices selected by the Attorney 40
General. Hand counts will also be made of the results of at least 41
one voting machine in one election district in each county where 42
elections occur each year. 43
Under the bill, the Attorney General will determine and then 44
announce publicly the districts in the State in which audits will be 45
conducted within 24 hours after the final vote count for an election. 46
Votes cast by electronic voting machines, provisional ballots 47
absentee ballots and military and overseas federal election voters 48
are to be included in the audit. If the Attorney General determines 49
S507 GILL
4
that any of the hand counts show cause for concern about the 1
accuracy of the results of any election, the independent audit team 2
may conduct hand counts in such additional election districts as the 3
Attorney General considers appropriate to resolve any such 4
concerns. 5
The bill takes effect on January 1, 2008, which is the date by which 6
voter-verified paper records must be operational on electronic 7
voting machines used in this State, pursuant to P.L.2005, c.137. 8

[FogerRox]

1. the first part I put in bold is good

"that at least one voting 42
machine in one district shall be selected for an audit in each county 43
in the State."

-but there is no increased audit rate in a close race-- bad

the 2nd bold emphases-

show cause for concern about the 1
accuracy of the results of any election, the independent audit team 2
may conduct hand counts in such additional election districts as the 3
Attorney General considers appropriate to resolve any such 4
concerns

ARG-" may conduct hand counts in such additional election districts" This section needs a complete re-write- to include a weel defined trigger mechanism.

[flashsmith]

2. Random needs to be defined

Ohio had many issues with the definition of random. Each district randomly choose precincts that they knew they hadn't diddled with the results. They should pick the precincts using a NJ lottery machine or something like that.

Also, there should be a limit on the amount of warning. Don't want to give the precincts too much time to fix the books.

[Wilms]

3. kick

[FogerRox]

4. from an email exchange: NJ activists on Nia Gills bill

In an audit, the % sample has to be high enough and purely random "

This "purely random" is problematic. Election Reform groups across the country have pretty much come to the conclusion that in a purely mathematical sense, we dont want "purely random".
Think: Representative, selected in a purely random manner.
Purely random could end up auditing only in South Jersey, a one in a million shot, but in a purely random selection, the odds are it WOULD HAPPEN.

"The closeness of the race does not really change this. "

Yes it does. There is an existing body of work that indicates this is so. I will dig up some cites for you. In the Mean time-

Race 1: 998 to 1002. The margin is 4 votes.
Race 2: 500 to 1500. The Margin is 1000 votes.

A static %, say 2% will audit:
Race 1: 40 votes
Race 2: 40 votes

Lets assume I hacked both races.
Race 1: I switched 5 votes
Race 2: I switched 1001 votes.

AS a tool, a certain %, say 2%, is far more likely to find the problem in race 2. Yet if race 1 was a local race for Town Council- with maybe only 2500 votes cast, why not hand count the entire race? Do it Election night. Get it right the first time. This is what would instill confidence in the system. If the Losing candidate witnesses the hand count of all 2500 ballots-- the Candidate KNOWS THEY LOST. There can be no question of the results, at that point. I think 10 people could hand count 2500 paper ballots in an hour, easy.


"An audit is not a recount. If a race is really close then there needs to be a recount, and candidates have a right to demand this under current law "

I would contend the public & the candidates have the right to have confidence in the results, the first time. If a losing candidate doesnt have confidence in his or her loss, what is the purpose: is it to instill a lack of confidence in the voting system? If a race is really close it needs to tallied right the first time. This is what will instill confidence in the system. Google "recount", you will find that last November there were literally 100's of recounts across the country, because of a lack of confidece in the results. Isnt this a scenario we wish to avoid?


Truthfully, I don't know if 2% is enough to be reliable. But politically, if we want more than that, we'll have to give strong evidence that 2% is not sufficiently reliable. Any statisticians out there?

Most states seem to use a static 3% audit, I would consider that to be a nation wide benchmark. IIRC Holts bill does use 3%. S55 in Conneticut uses one machine in each polling place--IIRC- and can appraoch as high as 8% to 12% depending on the voting machine disbursement.

Let me stress this one more time. A static % audit is fine, except in closer races. Its akin to an astronomer needing a larger telescope to see more detail on the moon.

1) Automatic Audit picked by Lotto ball, statewide. Say !%
2) Automatic Audit picked by Lotto ball, each county. Say 1%
3) Any race, the closer the results, the more it gets audited, up to, say 10% or 15%.Though I would settle for about 6% or 7%.

Items 1 & 2 would total 2% statewide. This provides for a bit more representation than Nias Bill does, she provides for one machine per county, as some counties have 900 machines while a small county may have only 100 machines. This is very unrepresentative.

Under my version, Essex, with about 700 voting machines would get 1% or about 14 machines audited. While a small county like Warren with 100 machines would get 1% or one machine audited. In the above, it should be assumed that each voting machine serves about 100 voters. There is no reason that Essex should have the same audit rate as Warren, but Nias bill does say exactly that.

Summary-

NIAS BILL -

1) Mandates the same minimum audit rate of one voting machine in each County.
This is not representative of the differing population sizes in each county.
2) Appllies the same audit tool ( a static % audit) to mathematically differing situations,
this will create a lack of confidence in the results in close races. This may also create an eviroment ripe for contention and lawsuits.
3) Completely lacks a Tigger event, that mandates a full hand count of all ballots.

If the procedures are spelled out in well defined language-- that makes it less likely that anyone can game the system- RE: the NJ AG. Though Richs point about the NJ AG has to be seriously considered.

Thanks-
Roger Fox

[FogerRox]

5. if you havent yet read this from Kathy Dopp: its a good one-

http://uscountvotes.org/ucvAnalysis/US/paper-audits/Paper_Audits.pdf

Also I have re-read a bunch of stuff-- I would add that there is a good case to audit VVPB at a higher % in smaller jurisdictions. Auditing at a higher % in a close race IMHO makes sense too.

There is so much to this-- I guess I am still refining my own thoughts on this topic.

[OnTheOtherHand]

6. yeah, the absence of a trigger event

or, for that matter, a tigger event (grin) is a big problem. I don't mind giving the AG discretion to call for a wider recount, but the AG shouldn't have unlimited discretion not to.

(By the way, we always need to keep in mind that if the recount can be hacked, then the recount becomes a means of election theft in its own right. It needs to be as secure as possible.)

[FogerRox]

7. kick for Gary Beck

[Peace Patriot]

8. Typo...

(6) No county shall certify the results of any election that is 6
subject to an audit performed pursuant to P.L. , c. (C. ) 7
(now pending before the Legislature as this bill) prior to the 8
competition of the audit....

-----

competition = completion?

------

Suggestion...

(5) As soon as practicable after the completion of an audit 45
conducted pursuant to P.L. , c. (C. )(now pending before the 46
Legislature as this bill), the Attorney General shall announce ...

Shouldn't it be, "as soon as practicable...but no later than..."? Ken Blackwell could make it next year, that it was "practicable," and not even feel an iota of shame.

Needs some consultants on this, as to what's "practicable," but I'd sure put a limit on it. No later than 3 days? 7 days?

----------

I'd go for a 10% audit. I think 2% is way too small--with black boxes that can switch millions of votes, at the speed of light, leaving no trace. Everybody wants speed, speed, speed! WHY? Speed is not important. Only accuracy and verifiability are important. Speed kills--people, and democracies!

I know 2% is better than most. Calif has only 1%. But I'm still not happy with it. I think we need a BIG audit--at least for the next few elections. These systems have to be PROVED accurate. None of it must not be presumed to be accurate. I figure the margin needed by Democrats to overcome electronic fraud--the automatic advantage to Republicans--at 5% to 10%. So a 10% recount would be best.

Why not propose it? Then maybe it'll get cut to 5%. It can't hurt. (Republican strategy: Be outrageous. Go for the whole shooting match--eternal war, no taxes on the rich, total mayhem in the marketplace, repeal female voting, put Christ in the Constitution, loot all natural rescources, bankrupt the poor-take their houses, etc., etc. If they can do it, we can demand a 10% recount.)

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Now if we could only get the war profiteering corporate news monopolies to stop "calling" elections before all the votes are counted, recounted/audited and verified!

[Peace Patriot]

9. Kathy Dopp's tables seem to show a dramatic improvement in the chances

of finding a corrupted vote count, with a 5% audit (over a 2% audit.)

[FogerRox]

10. of course-

i think the benchmark for other legislation is about 3%-- we should be able to make a good case for at least that.

[garybeck]

11. 2% is not enough

i'm not a statistician but my gut says 5% minimum.

[FogerRox]

12. yes- I ve been told that around 5%-6% it statrts to get meaningful

[garybeck]

13. I've been showing your draft to Vermont folks

we have all paper ballots with no audits. your draft will be useful to our efforts. thanks.

[FogerRox]

14. I hope to re-write the bill-- I will forward you a copy when I'm done