Please help me figure out strategy to make hcpb work for real

[diva77]

 If people were summoned for ballot counting as they are for jury duty, I think it could work.

I'm sure there are far more precise posts as to what would be required (please post links if anyone knows of any), but here is what I figure roughly:

A precinct has 1000 voters approximately, and you need 8 (?) people present to conduct hcpb, that means that you'd only need to show up once every 125 elections.

It takes approximately 15 minutes to process 200 ballots by hand per race (this was recently documented in CA), so that means if you have, for example a ballot with

9 state races
2 national races
1 Party central committee
8 judicial races
1 school race
3 county races
2 state measures

That is a total of 26 races. If you assume 1000 voters show up (highly unlikely with the increase in absentee voting--numbers more likely to be under 200) that would mean

75 min. per race X 26 races which equals 32 hours needed to count in the most labor intensive situation possible. So perhaps 4 shifts of people could be summoned for
duty as a better cya plan. That means you would be expected to serve once every 31 elections. Still not bad. No maintenance of machinery required other than food and shelter.


Must also address HAVA requirement for an accessible device in every polling place.

[GuvWurld]

1. See the Democracy For New Hampshire Website

They have a comprehensive how-to for hand counting methodology, including videos.

http://www.democracyfornewhampshire.com/node/view/2648


Good thread. I've tried to start ones like this several times in the past. I hope this goes further than where we've been able to go before (cue Star Trek theme).

[Wilms]

28. Wonderful images.

How beautiful.

Thank you.

[diva77]

45. thanks for link. I have their hcpb dvd. excellent resource!

[WillYourVoteBCounted]

2. it would help if you addressed the cost issue too

If you could address the cost issue after you address the
amount of time needed to get results, I think you could do well.

I can't help with the cost issue, because the counties in
NC that used to hand count were so small, (7,000 voters and less).

However, if you could do a simple cost study of say -
2 medium to large counties that use hand counted paper ballots
2 medium to large counties that use optical scan voting
and
2 medium to large counties that use direct record machines

and then compare the cost per registered voter per year,
then that would solidify your argument for hand counted paper ballots.

What this would require is getting the following info, hopefully from within
the same state:
ask the study counties for their last 6 years net annual expenditures
ask the study counties for their number of registered voters for last 6 years.

Then plug the numbers into a excell spreadsheet like this:



I got the info for my cost study by emailing either the County
Election Directors or by emailing the County Budget office.

For more on how I did my cost study, take a look at this -
http://www.ncvoter.net/affordable.html


Cost is one of the most helpful arguments if you are addressing
skeptical decision makers and politicians.

[diva77]

25. great idea. will look into acquiring that info

[WillYourVoteBCounted]

36. if you get the data, I will help you with it if you need it

Just ask the County Registrar or Election director for their
"Net Annual Expenditures" from their reported budget.

Get the same 6 years of data for each county.
Get the registered voters for those exact same years.
Make sure you have the same voting system per county for the 6 year period.

*It helps to provide links or emails to back up everything you put
in your cost study, or you have an in-valid study.

Try to find counties with at least 35,000 voters up to 150,000 (or higher) voters
to get a decent survey.

The smaller the county, the higher the cost per voter is going to be,
because of the election director's salary.

The larger county will be more cost effective.
So try to find some large counties.

If you can get counties from within the same state, that would be helpful.

See this at Voters Unite, where I got the idea for my cost study:

Rosemarie Myerson, a voter in Sarasota County, took the initiative to study the operating expenses of her county's elections office for a period of 6 years and compare those costs with the operating costs of the elections office in her neighboring county, Manatee.
The results of her study are startling. She has generously allowed VotersUnite! to post her report and addendum. She has also provided guidelines you can use to replicate her study and a sample request for information. http://www.votersunite.org/info/costcomparisoninforequest.htm
Main article here -http://www.votersunite.org/info/costcomparison.asp


I reported my results differently than Rosemarie, I reported the net annual
cost per registered voter, and she instead reported cost per 10,000 registered voters.

I naturally liked my own report better.
Here http://www.ncvoter.net/affordable.html

*on edit - It is important to compare the ANNUAL costs.
If you compare HCPB to DREs just based on the cost of 1 election, HCPB
will lose.
You have to look at the ANNUAL costs.

Also, you may have to figure the net yourself, the counties may send you
the gross expenditures and also the revenue, and you will have to subtract out
the revenue yourself.

[WillYourVoteBCounted]

3. you will like this by Doug Jones

*I don't think that there is any reason that US ballots
could not be perforated.***

I should note that the Swiss approach to processing multi-race
paper ballots solves this problem!

When the Swiss print multiple-races on one ballot intended to be
hand counted, they perforate the paper (heavy paper, light card),
and before counting, they tear the ballot into sub-ballots, one
per race.

They're generally careful to make the sub-ballots
different sizes so that misplaced sub-ballots are trivially
evident.

Then, the sub-ballots of each race are sorted into piles
by how they voted, and then the piles are either counted (or
in rare cases, weighed. Weighing the piles avoids almost all the
problems with clerical errors in counting, but it does rely on the
extreme uniformity of paper size and weight for each sub-ballot.)


Doug Jones
[e-mail]

http://gnosis.python-hosting.com/voting-project/December.2003/0209.html

[diva77]

27. it took me a while to visualize what in the heck he was talking about but

I think I get it now. So positively simple and efficient! I wonder if it significantly reduces counting time of usual sort, stack and count method? Seems to me they oughta count the perforated pieces, then weigh 'em as check 'n balance too.

[WillYourVoteBCounted]

4. the Swiss Voting System shown to Boulder Colorado

*I have always wanted to see what this does, but didn't check into it because
it looked like you have to pay for the information. Maybe thats not correct.*

The Swiss Voting System Freedom of Voting® StandardsFile Format: PDF/Adobe Acrobat - View as HTML
paper ballots he has received or if possible of voting electronically. Assuming that ... counted by hand or with a money counting machine. ...
http://www.swissvs.org/pdf/SwissVS_Compatibility_Guidelines.PDF

Here is more that has been discussed about the Swiss system.
It sounds to me that the "ballots" are still counted by machine, but
it is completely different. (there is no interpretation of the ballots,
each voter gets a ballot for each item on the contest.
How would that work in the US?

Swiss voting leader visits Boulder

By RICHARD VALENTY Colorado Daily Staff Writer
Sunday, January 2, 2005 8:36 PM MST

It's not that waiting until Nov. 5 to learn the basic results of the Nov. 2 Boulder County election caused the end of the world, but local citizens and officials alike will be watching the county election process closely and offering suggestions for some time to come.

On Monday, Beat (pronounced bay-at) Fehr, president of Swiss Voting Systems (SVS) will visit Boulder from Basel, Switzerland to demonstrate how to conduct an election using a paper-ballot, hand-counted system. Some locals believe the Swiss system would be cheaper and simpler than the highly technological systems used now or proposed for future use in the U.S.

Joe Pezzillo, a local citizen activist, was opposed to a possibility that Boulder County might use Direct Record Electronic (DRE) touch-screen machines in 2004 and opposed the county decision to purchase the "Ballot Now" system from Hart InterCivic. Pezzillo and a loose confederation of activists known as Citizens for Verifiable Voting (CVV) "won" the first battle and lost the second.

[kster]

22. I like the different color ballot

would make, it easier to count the ballots



Colored ballots combined with this

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=203&topic_id=425015

[Febble]

5. I'm a bit concerned about this

I mean I'm all for handcounted ballots, being a Brit/Canadian and all, but we don't do it at the level of the polling station. We do it at constituency level (about 30,000-40,000 voters), and our tellers are highly skilled and responsible people (bank tellers, usually), and supervised by television cameras, members of the public, and bipartisan scrutineers.

I don't see how you'd get that degree of oversight at precinct level, and it wouldn't take much imagination to corrupt a system like that. The thing is - elections have been stolen since long before electronic ballots were invented. Hand-counted paper is no guarantee against corruption. It strikes me you'd be vulnerable to ballot-stuffing and ballot-theft all over again.

My point being that it's not hand-counted paper ballots per se that makes our elections largely corruption free (but not entirely - ballot theft is a problem, and ballot sale may become so) but the fact that we have a very secure chain of custody, we count right away, and the whole process is done under public gaze. This is possible because the counting unit is sufficiently large that it's a big occasion, especially as because we vote for actual constituency candidates the actual candidates are present at the count, all ready in their Sunday best to make their speeches when the result is announced. You need to consider the whole package, I think.

[WillYourVoteBCounted]

6. r/e bank tellers

I like the idea of bank tellers, because they are used
to the idea of paper.

And used to staying until the job is done, the drawers balance
etc.

Yes, the chain of custody is essential, and that is where
HCPB are interfered with.

Not sure I understand why taking the ballots to a central location
would be better, since that extends the chain of custody.

In NC, that would require a change in law - currently our ballots
are "counted" at the voting location (such as it is).

The big kicker we had in NC is that there were not enough poll workers
and for some reason it wasn't done in shifts.

These folks were still counting halfway through the next day,
and its hard to find people who can and will work 24+ hours straight.

And politicians and newspapers have been trained to think that speed = good.

[Febble]

10. You are right that transporting ballots to the count

is a weak link, but I think is outweighed here by the greater oversight of the count itself. The way it works is that ballot boxes are signed and sealed in the presence of bipartisan witnesses (and numbered, in huge black numbers) at the polling station, and transported by car. If a box goes missing (and it occasionally does) then people know it's missing.

Then the boxes are ceremoniously unsealed, again in front of witnesses at the count.

Speed is not a problem - we know our results by morning - but does have a security benefit because - apart from that car journey - the ballots are constantly watched. There is a move to postpone our counts till next day, and people are worried that oversight may be lost. I suppose I'm saying that we benefit from the excitement, and the public involvement in the counting process. The less time that elapses between voting and counting, the less opportunity for stuffing and theft.

So speed is not only for newspapers - I think it's part of the recipe that makes our system work. Our real vulnerability, ironically, is postal ballots - vote sale, forced votes, and stolen ballots.

[kster]

23. Could get a rough count before the ballots leave the polling place

that would prevent stolen or lost boxes along the way, and also give the media the quick count, they are always looking for, if we use these.





http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=203&topic_id=425015

[Wilms]

29. If anything, an exact, not a rough count.

I had the idea we wanted precinct counts, results posted on the door. Febble is wary. And I think I understand why.

If we count at the precinct, we should do random audits of precincts to keep them honest.

[kster]

32. Absolutely, With the see thru ballot box

if you do a "QUICK" count by looking at the numbers on the clear boxes, and the precinct has 10,000 voters, and the paper ballots add up to 17,000 when counting at a glance, you would want to red flag that precincts clear ballot boxes for a comparison.

[diva77]

33. A precinct is limited to approx. 1000 voters (just clarifying in case

anyone was spooked by the 10k and 17k numbers)

[kster]

34. Ooops, Thanks..By the way, Great thread......NT

[diva77]

38. thanks! and BTW, how much are you chargin' for those

Clear Automatic Paper Ballot Counter / ballot transporter / and ballot storage boxes ?

hmmm...need a more catchy name fer those

:D

[WillYourVoteBCounted]

37. how would that work in straight ticket except for Pres and non partisan?

Our ballots are extremely complicated, and they have non partisan contests in
the middle, and President is considered non partisan in NC

[WillYourVoteBCounted]

7. there wasnt a chance of a snowflake in a hot place in NC

in NC, there wasn't a chance of a snowflake in hades of forcing
our counties to go to HCPB.

The best we could do is preserve HCPB as a "voting system" so that
it is on the table as an option.

It may be possible in some of these smaller states for people
to get this through in some counties, but the huge obstacle
is finding enough poll workers and getting it done
as quickly as our automated counterparts.

I know that accuracy should trump speed, but these are the arguments
presented by the decision makers.

Most elected officials believe that the machines must work, or
they wouldn't have been elected.

To say the machines can't be trusted is almost like the politicians
admitting that their election was illegitimate.

Hence the opposition.

With good audits, good chain of custody, get the vendors out of the
equation, it might be possible to have a good system.

Not auditing the elections is insanity, and right now we have 38 states that
have no audits at all. Nothing.

In my state, I hope that we can have some open source code,
free software, no licencing fees, paper ballot based optical scan,
and ballot definition files made publicly available.

IF HCPB can present a logical argument, they might have a chance in some
localities.

While some people worry about HCPB, I am worried about fending off
"independent verification systems".

[Wilms]

30. Good stuff. Thanks. n/t

[diva77]

40. poss. talking pt./documentation to combat resistance to hcpb

(someone sent this info. to me)

according to MIT/CalTech study of voting machine technologies in 2001:

"The central finding of this investigation is that manually counted
paper ballots have the lowest average incidence of spoiled, uncounted,
and unmarked ballots."  
http://www.hss.caltech.edu/~voting/caltech_MIT_Report_Version2.pdf

(am unable to obtain report from this link/ anyone else have it?)

[Wilms]

41. This link works.

http://www.hss.caltech.edu/~voting/CalTech_MIT_Report_Version2.pdf

[diva77]

42. thanks, Wilms!

[WillYourVoteBCounted]

53. Here is a copy of the 2001 Cal Tech MIT, NC and VA undervotes

Here it is, lots of good things at Dr. Moore's site:
(Justin presented testimony to our legislature and also advised them)


2001 CalTech MIT
http://www.cs.duke.edu/~justin/voting/docs/CalTech_MIT_Report_Version2.pdf

Study in NC and VA, note the undervote is low for President,
but there is a higher undervote for lower contests, something that
will bring you opposition from politicians if they notice that.
(Dont point out lower contests in your presentation, but expect that
it could be brought up).

An analysis of undervote rates broken down by technologies.
http://www.cs.duke.edu/~justin/voting/totals.html

An analysis of undervote rates in Virginia broken down by technologies.
http://www.cs.duke.edu/~justin/voting/va-totals.html

[GuvWurld]

8. The Whole Package

Febble has a good point that I would say needs to be reframed only to remind us all that whatever kind of proposals we work up, we must also be prepared to persuasively present them to people who have not routinely been warm to our ideas. Every aspect of the election needs to be accounted for to some degree to anticipate the questions we will face. The financial component is always huge. Logistics, required manpower, available space, cooperation of the media - these are all part of the equation.

That said, it seems to me like Febble's core suggestion would require an even more rapid move toward "vote centers," as I've heard have been proposed or enacted in some places where the number of precincts gets reduced. I always thought that was a bad thing, but perhaps in this context, it could be part of the means to a greater end. If this isn't the only way to get from where we are, to where you suggest we need to be, Febble, please elaborate on how proposed changes might account for switching from our current precinct arrangement and intendant counting difficulties, to the larger counting environment you propose.

[Febble]

11. Well, I wasn't exactly proposing

anything, just describing what happens in the UK, where it works pretty well. As I said, the transport from polling station (analogous to your polling place) to the constituency count (constituencies are of more standardized size than your counties) is a weak link, but one that is rarely a problem, although I do remember a ballot box going missing once in a remote Scottish constituency where the polling place was many miles from the count.

But the other thing to bear in mind is that our constituencies are a real constitutional unit, so there are real candidates waiting to know the result - their livelihoods for the next four or five years will depend on it. The results are not announced until all candidates are satisfied with the count. In other words, the end of the count is not up to an official to determine, but the actual candidates.

So voting centres would be very different in two important respects - we don't vote at our counting place - we vote as you do, locally. Counting places in urban areas are local too, but in rural areas may be further from the count. But secondly, our constituencies are constitutionally meaningful units, and that is part of what confers the transparency to the system. In effect, each candidate consents (on behalf of their voters) to the result before it is announced. And they traditionally thank their voters (and apologise to them) if they lose.

But the other thing is that our elections are way simpler. There is usually only one race, sometimes two, rarely more. Where there is more than one race, the ballots are printed on different coloured paper, and separated at the count.

[GuvWurld]

12. OK, so here is how to be more helpful

Febble, this is for everyone, not just you.

When we do a thread like this, we need posters to approach the discussion from a place of "yes, and." This facilitates creative collaboration. It wards off arguments and digressions by placing each of us in a default position of acceptance of each other's ideas. And then it gives us room to build, upwards, sideways, whatever, so that even a disagreement appears respectful and keeps the conversation on track toward shared goals. It could even be as direct as, "yes, and this would work better because..."

Notice how I took Febble's earlier post and put it into this kind of a context? Even though she didn't explicitly say vote centers, and now I see, from her clarification, that she wasn't even proposing that or anything at all, I still took her ideas and put them into context as if they were intended to advance the dialog toward consensus (how best to develop a hcpb system, or proposal for such). I said that I previously thought vote centers were a bad idea, but I could go along with the conversation based on that premise to see where it would lead us for a consolidated counting location.

Let's not lose sight of what the OP is asking. "Yes, and" is our friend.

[autorank]

14. This is particularly immportant on this thread.

Excellent point. This is one of the most creative, practical and outstanding ideas I've heard lately. It needs to be approached collaboratively.

I fully endorse this approach.

[Febble]

15. Yes, and....

I completely agree.

[troubleinwinter]

9. Bank tellers...

I did not know that!

Several days ago, a friend asked me to explain the issue of 'all hand-count' vs. 'opscan/random recount/audit.

Here is what I said to her:

"You used to work in a bank and it had coin-counters, right?"

"Right."

"Suppose a guy comes into the bank with five buckets of quarters. You dump one bucket into the coin-counter, and write down the count. Then do the same with the other buckets, each time, writing down the count. Now you hand-count one random bucket and compare with the machine count. If they match perfectly, you can have confidence that the counting machine is working well. If they don't match, you know you have a problem.

Now suppose, out of the blue, you tried to tell the bank manager to throw away the coin-counters altogether and count ALL buckets of quarters by hand ALL the time. What would the bank manager say to that idea?"

"Uhm... I think the manager would say &$##**!?%$ and the horse you rode in on!!!!"

[autorank]

13. Now this is creative and would help restore confidence. K&R for diva77

As I read this, I thought of several reasons you might not select people at random. I'm fond of the British use of volunteer bank tellers for tabulation.

Any efficiency objections would be outweighed by the amazing Benefits of public participation and public confidence. I'm also a fan of mandatory voting, as they have in number of countries, but I don't think it would apply here. However, mandatory participation in the essential acts of governance is well established. Expanding that to vote tabulation is an excellent idea. "The count" would be one that would carry great weight with me. Wonderful idea

Now here is the prequel--do the same for poll workers. There is a shortage, people who volunteer get tired of it after a while and drop off. Meganmonkey, an expert on this area, said that there are shortages of up to .5 poll workers at times. How needless. Just add them to the list.

You don't have to vote to support the election process by taking or counting votes any more than you have to commit a crime in order to serve on a jury. It's a civic duty.

This is one of the most original and brilliant ideas I've heard regarding elections.

This is also an idea that could go into legislation or be amended to legislation and mandated for all federal elections. Great stuff diva77, you've started a movement:

Citizen Handled & Totaled Paper Ballots: It's about f'ing time!!!

[diva77]

20. I can't take credit for the idea; I'm glad you support it!! I've heard

that idea bandied about in election protection circles since 2005; not sure who originally came up with it. Your idea to extend it to pollworkers and other "essential acts of governance" is brilliant!

[autorank]

21. I think we're both about ready to be discovered by MENSA;) n/t

[kster]

16. K&R

[Stevepol]

17. Vote Pad is certified for handicapped in WI and I think soon in CA.

Vote Pad is less expensive than the computers that can handle the handicapped and it is non-computer based.

I believe there are other methods available as well, which could handle the handicapped, and even if voting machines are used for the handicapped, that's only one machine perhaps for each county with a day set aside for handicapped voting.

Satisfying HAVA is not really a problem. The problem is that the vendors convince the elections people that machines are necessary to satisfy HAVA, and reporters are too lazy to find out for themselves.

[GuvWurld]

18. Vote-PAD not a sure thing for CA certification

Bruce McDonnald, who assesses technology for Secretary of State McPherson, apparently is not fond of Vote-PAD, according to Humboldt RoV Carolyn Crnich. It also appears to many people that the testing procedures and requirements are stacking the odds against Vote-PAD. If you want to support Vote-PAD, one thing to do is attend the hearing in Sacramento on Aug. 9.

[kster]

26. I agree, and also WillYourVoteBCounted suggested color ballots

Colored ballots along with these boxes



and vote pad for handicapped



http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=203&topic_id=425015

This is the kind of thread I enjoy!

[GuvWurld]

19. Kick (eom)

[diva77]

24. How does one find out the administrative costs of jury duty? do you

contact county counsel or some other dept.? Seems every state and every county has its own jury duty info. site; am a bit confused

I assume that pollworkers and handcounters should get similar pay for their services rather than pay similar to jurors (all though it's all nominal)

[Wilms]

31. In LA County poll workers are payed a lot more than jurors.

Don't know of the rates for each in smaller jurisdiction more likely to use HCPB.

Not that costs should scare us off entirely.

[GuvWurld]

35. Kick (eom)

[diva77]

39. Any legislative or legal experts out there? What would it take legally or

legislatively to implement hcpb plan? I think I am about to be excoriated for asking this question.

:yoiks:

[WillYourVoteBCounted]

43. well get ready for alot of work

it takes years to get this done -

You need a sympathetic lawmaker, either your rep or a colleague's rep
(if yours is not interested)

You need to provide
-sample language for the legislation
-reports and expert testimony
-qualified and credentialled experts to testify to the lawmakers
-names of those likely to oppose HCPB (like election officials, etc)
-it would help if you could provide a cost study analysis, since you will be
asked to explain/prove that this will cost less than electronic voting
(be prepared for e-voting election directors to provide bogus info, they did
it to us all of the time)
-you should be able to show a large amount of support for the legislation,
perhaps with significant numbers of signatures on a petition

You may end up with a study committee bill at the most, or your legislation
put in the rules committee to die.

Then, if your state has a Carteret style meltdown, they may actually
pull your "study" bill out for review.

Be prepared to have experts to do panel presentations across your state,
and be prepared for oppositions' arguments against you.

Above all, your arguments must be non partisan to succeed.

You will need republican and democrat votes to pass legislation.

I would expect that your worst enemies will be the election officials in all of
your counties and at the state level, and the voting machine vendors,
both parties have lobbiest, and you probably won't.
Political hacks, i.e the guys who run politicians campaigns - they won't
like HCPB, because it is slow and they fear their opponents stuffing the ballot boxes.

It might be easier to launch a county by county effort to switch to HCPB
than to try to get it legislated.

Or you can try to do that simultaneously.

You will need the support of citizens,
political party chairs
Board of Elections Members
County Commissioners
State Lawmakers

You will need to start a major letter writing and op/ed campaign.

IT is not likely that anyone is going to get HCPB legislated,
as elected officials believe the system works - it got them where
they are today.

However, you could maybe launch a campaign that gets at least some counties to
switch over.

[diva77]

44. Many thanks for your detailed answer! Watch out, HARD WORK AHEAD!!!

[WillYourVoteBCounted]

47. Please get the financial data soon as possible

the problem is, you need 6 years net annual expenditures while
the study counties used HCPB.

Most HCPB has already ceased, and if you could get
years 1999-2004 would be best.
(that gets you two presidential elections as well)

IF you can find LARGE counties who hand counted
from 2000-2005 that would be ok too.

*But hurry, because this data will be extremely difficult to
get before long.

I am not sure, but I think the state of Maine maybe used
to have all HCPB, and Texas probably had some.

But if you can compare voting systems (including HCPB)
within ONE state, the study will come out better.

However, if you get more than one state, it might work.

I knew that this wouldn't be a political possibility in my state,
so we didn't research it.
Also, again, our 3 HCPB counties were extremely small, so the cost per
voter would be double or triple of that on electronic voting or optical scan.
That is because you have one election director and their salary that
is serving less people than a county 20-50 times larger.

[OnTheOtherHand]

48. in TX, look at DeWitt and Young

apparently the only two counties with (barely) more than 10,000 registered voters that (according to verifiedvoting.org) used HCPB in 2004.

[WillYourVoteBCounted]

49. that's too low

at that rate, you end up with it costing the voters 2-3 times
more than e-voting or optical scan.

To get the cost per voter amount down, you need a larger county
like at least 35,000 voters.

Agh.

[OnTheOtherHand]

50. right, for cost-comparison purposes

-- you probably could find a similarly small county that has gone to op-scan, and compare that, although I'm not sure how meaningful the results would be.

But the problem is, several of us believe or strongly suspect that HCPB doesn't scale well because of complicated ballots, variety of ballot styles, number of precincts, etc. Unfortunately, there don't seem to be any mid-size -- never mind large -- counties hanging on to HCPB so that we can actually compare. Damn uncooperative of them. ;)

[WillYourVoteBCounted]

51. doesn't have to be recent, just 98 - 2004 time or older

if someone would get that, would be good.

[OnTheOtherHand]

52. the residual vote gods and goddesses wd probably know

i.e. the CalTech/MIT folks who have studied residual votes going back to 1988 or earlier. If folks are otherwise stymied about how to go about finding a reasonably large HCPB county at some point in the last 20 years.

[Febble]

46. Well, I can't help thinking that a helpful first step

would be legislation that ensures that manually countable paper ballots are mandated nationwide. :hide:

[WillYourVoteBCounted]

54. I'm posting this in the event that someone is serious about this

I notice a bunch of HCPB threads
by people using outdated or incorrect information,
by people who have not stated any sort of strategy,
and by people who have made no attempt to get legislation
and who have never counted paper ballots by hand.

It is hard to take them serious.

However, I believe Diva might actually be serious,
so here is a great article about the Washington state recount,
which in essence provides an idea of a hand counted (after the fact)
election.

I don't think all contests were counted, though - just the governors.
That takes much of the complexity away, but still - here is the process

Counter for a day finds few bugs in recount process

Danny Westneat / Times staff columnist


Lindsay McClellan is sitting across from me, sifting through a 4-inch stack of ballots, when she says the words that could change the course of state history:

"We've got a smudge."

I've been hired to count votes in the governor's race. We are sitting at a cramped folding table under fluorescent lights, one of 80 three-person teams that are counting, one at a time, King County's 898,574 votes.
more here......
http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/nationworld/2002123626_danny18.html

[eridani]

55. I was part of that as well

It took about three weeks to recount a single statewide race. The protocol was excellent (having been revised after some cheating attempts by Republicans), and the result was that two opscan machine counts and the one hand count were within 0.01% of each other, far better than the 0.1% that had been documented for handcounts and 0.2% for opscans previously. Furthermore, the handcount added votes to each of the three candidate's tallies, which is the right direction for opscan errors.

It's pretty hard to imagine how to scale up the process to count ballots for every race in the state, however.

[diva77]

57. interesting about the cheating attempts -- can you describe what those

attempts consisted of, exactly?

[eridani]

59. See the Seattle Weekly article

http://www.seattleweekly.com/news/0501/050105_news_recount.php

So the sudden flurry of over-votes identified by GOP counters that day was curious. Based on the voter-friendly interpretation of the rules, the incidence of over-votes should have been quite infrequent. Instinctively, I began to read aloud the candidate name for all over-votes identified by my GOP partner, so the observers would be made aware of how the game was being played: Designate as many Gregoire votes as you can as over-votes in an effort to get them thrown out.

Clearly, there was no concern for voter intent in this blatant practice. "Let me guess, it's a Gregoire vote," I'd say in vain hope of shaming my partner. Even smudges and stray spots of ink from other ballots were seen as fair in the GOP's over-votes game. It began to arouse the suspicions of observers. In an election as tight as this one, it was entirely feasible that such a strategy could make the critical difference between winner and loser. Within a day, the election officials got hip to the scheme and instructed all ballot counters to henceforth refer all over-votes to the canvassing board. In essence, the entire over-vote category was abolished. Clearly, this measure—along with the burden it imposed on the canvassing board—would not have been needed had the GOP refrained from conducting such an underhanded tactic.

Another time, the strategy was apparently "make a fuss." A notable handful of Republican ballot counters were suddenly speaking loudly and often about the evil and corrupt nature of the big "D" and, by extension, the small "d"—the democratic process itself. At one point, my partner, the Sean Hannity look-alike, demanded to speak with the supervisor's supervisor about a disagreement we had over the determination of a single ballot. As described above, in such cases the procedure was simply to send the ballot in question to the canvassing board. However, my über-partisan partner stubbornly refused, instead trying to bully me to surrender. For nearly 20 minutes he managed to harangue the "Democrat-controlled canvassing board" and the stupidity of women—generally and one in particular—without taking a breath.

By the time Carlos Webb, assistant superintendent for voter registration, was on the scene, it was anticlimactic. The show was over. The real objective—draw a crowd of observers behind the yellow rope adjacent to our table and, above all, the media—had been achieved. Less than five minutes after Carlos made his pronouncement, repeating what the recorder and the first-tier supervisor had already said, the Sean Hannity look-alike quietly placed a mark in the line on the tally sheet for the canvassing board and moved on. Mission accomplished.

[diva77]

58. great article! thanks for info.

$12.70 per hr per counter

240 counters

898,574 votes total

5,544 votes during a nine-hour shift

makes 616 ballots per hour at $38.10/hr. per 3 man team =

total cost for 1 hcpb race: $55,245

does that sound right (am a bit hazy at moment!)

[WillYourVoteBCounted]

61. HCPB costs more on election day than electronic voting

Its the net annual cost to the county that might help your case.

Counties typically pay for election directors salaries,
tech support,
printing
delivery
repair
mailing
etc.

If you compare the cost of hand counted paper ballots on election day
to electronic voting on election day only, HCPB will have a higher cost.

This is how election officials persuade the public that its
cheaper to have paperless DREs.

Already been through this before.

Learn from someones experience.

The only way HCPB becomes cheaper is IF you show the net annual expenditures
of a HCPB county and compare them to the net annual expenditures of a
electronic county.

HCPB COSTS MORE ON ELECTION DAY, but is likely to be cheaper on a total net annual basis

AGH!

Although I have been denigrated by some fans of HCPB, they don't realize we did this
homework years ago. Its an old battle.

[eridani]

56. If you really want handcounts

--find the small political subunits in your state (counties or towns with 2000 or fewer to count) and implement the process there.

[WillYourVoteBCounted]

60. Chuck Herrin testimony to NC Legislature

January 07, 2005
Minutes to North Carolina's Joint Select Committee on Electronic Voting, regarding
Chuck Herrin's testimony

Presentation on Security of Electronic Voting Systems

Sen. Allran introduced Chuck Herrin, an information technology auditor and professional hacker.

Chuck Herrin began his presentation by informing the committee of his certifications and memberships. He advised the committee that his presentation was in two parts: (1) on security and audit processes and (2) on software currently in use in the electoral system.

Mr. Herrin stated that there are weak points in any process and these weak points are the key target points for exploitation. For example, false insurance claims, bank robbery, election fraud, identity theft, mail fraud, wire fraud and accounting fraud exploit weak points in the process. However, knowledge of weak points leads to controls such as manual record checking, dual controls, limits on check size, etc.

Mr. Herrin advised that risks could never be eliminated, only reduced. Process analysis is used to determine attack points with emphasis on extra monitoring and impact reduction – such as maximum check amounts with only one signature. Controls such as physical security, dual control over paper money, manual posting, manual review and awareness of threats, knowledge of weak points, and many sets of eyes are required to deter fraud. Regardless, fraud still takes place anytime there is something to gain such as money, power or influence. Mr. Herrin stated that in business, fraud is constant. While risk assessment and cost/benefit analysis can minimize the risks, it is more difficult for voting than business. Voting is a public function and votes cannot be quantified in dollars. System integrity is not merely a factor in elections – it is the factor.

Mr. Herrin said that fraud it not a technical problem, it is a people problem. Computers cannot solve “people problems.” Computers are designed, built and operated by people and any computer system or software can be exploited by anyone who understands the logic. Mr. Herrin stated that resistance to fraud is achieved by limiting the possible impact of an individual or small number of perpetrators. Hand-counted paper ballots are the most reliable and auditable method available.

Mr. Herrin commented on the advantages of hand-counted paper. Paper is inexpensive, reliable and tamper resistant. Paper does not require there is no technical training or maintenance and avoids problems with “bugs” or hackers. The impact of fraud is reduced due to the time required to effect many changes, the existence of a lasting record to resolve disputes, and paper is trusted by voters.

Mr. Herrin demonstrated to the committee how easy it was for him to change the vote totals in some vote tabulation software.

Mr. Herrin concluded his presentation by stating that he did not trust systems with computers because he breaks into computers for a living. He also stated that he didn’t trust anything except paper ballots and counting them by hand. (Attachment VIII, The Effect of Computers on the Integrity of Vote Tabulation)

http://www.ncvoter.net/downloads/JSC_Minutes_010705VCI.doc
or in html
http://64.233.187.104/search?q=cache:bXYYblXPYS4J:www.ncvoter.net/downloads/JSC_Minutes_010705VCI.doc+%22chuck+herrin%22&hl=en&gl=us&ct=clnk&cd=3

Here is CHuck's powerpoint presentation to our state legislature:
http://www.chuckherrin.com/GEMSDemo.pps

Here are some arguments you will hear from opponents of HCPB,
and some suggested rebuttals - this will need some reworking:

http://www.ncvoter.net/Silver.html

[kster]

62. Kick..nt

[kster]

63. Hope this will help you

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=203x445245