Voting Machines Malfunction: 5,000 Votes Not Counted In Kansas County

An anonymous reader writes A malfunction in electronic voting machines in Saline County, Kansas, left over 5,000 votes uncounted. That's roughly one-third of the votes cast. Counting those 5,207 votes didn't change any outcomes in this case however. “That’s a huge difference,” county Chairman Randy Duncan said when notified by the Journal of the error. “That’s scary. That makes me wonder about voting machines. Should we go back to paper ballots?”

Comments

Yes. Next question?

[bfwebster]

Seriously, the rush to electronic voting after the 2000 Presidential election was just a bad idea all the way around -- and, frankly, most IT people with any experience were saying so. It is vastly, vastly harder to change physical media than to change electronics.

Re:"Should we go back to paper ballots?"

[reve_etrange]

I've worked as an "elections inspector" (actually the head worker at one polling place) in California a few times, and this is pretty much the system used by most counties here.

There are a few ways for voters to mess up the scanner, but in general if there are voting errors the ballot will be rejected and a new ballot card will be issued. It's possible for them to jam the machine, and we need special permission or a higher-level election worker to open it up to clear. There are a series of numbered, zip-tie-like seals which are applied in various places to ensure tampering is detected. In addition to the ballots, there are detailed logs on the memory cartridge, which are printed out in duplicate as "receipts" from the machine itself.

All in all, I think it's a fairly low-tech, low-risk system.

Re:"Should we go back to paper ballots?"

[tlambert]

The only issue is the paper waste and that can be alleviated by recycling the paper ballots after a set amount of time (I hope they keep them for at least two years but I don't know how long they do).

(1) Paper *DOES* "grow on trees"...

(2) There's no problem farming quick-growth trees to supply the pulp, even if you needed to, which you typically don't

(3) Paper recycles into methanol relatively easily, if you aren't interested in recycling it into paper. Yes, I know, this makes ADM sad, since they want us all using ethanol instead of methanol, so they can sell more corn

(4) Making ADM sad should be a long term goal anyway

Re:I always insist on paper for vote

[dirk]

Except they still have to be on the voter rolls. It isn't like without voter ID laws anyone can just walk up and say "I want to vote here". There is still voter registration that happens. Unless you know a specific voter and their polling place for each of those people you just picked up, you aren't going to get anywhere at the polling station.

The fact is that most of the voter fraud happens not at the polls but with absentee ballots. Of course the republicans don't want to touch those because they are used by old people and soldiers, which are their bread and butter.