[EM] CORRECTING Black box voting repost re how HAVA imploded

[Abd ul-Rahman Lomax]

At 09:39 PM 2/1/2007, Brian Olson wrote:
>My current favorite solution for practical elections is hand counted paper
>ballots with computer data entry (on common desktop PCs, not special
>machines). It would take a person 30-60 seconds to enter a ballot into the
>computer.

I've made the following proposal for public elections.

The ballot is designed to be scannable with reasonable accuracy. Like 
the multiple-choice tests that have been optically scored since long 
before PCs.

Each ballot would be coded, in batches as large as a precinct, after 
being cast, to allow identification of each ballot by precinct and a 
unique number. The code could be added with a sticker, but it might 
be better to use a stamp or a printer to add the code. The batches 
would not be coded excapt in batches large enough, and by appropriate 
procedures, to make identification of a voter with a ballot impossible.

Ballot images would be public information and would be openly accessible.

There would be an official scan, the raw images from this would be 
made available. However, election observers could also scan the 
ballots or at least obtain images of them. (After the ballots are numbered.)

Consider the implications: optical recognition technology is 
sufficiently ubiquitous that a decent automated analysis of ballots 
could be made independently by many different means. However, it 
would also be quite practical for visual counting to be done *of the 
images*, by anyone; the results could be tabulated in a way that 
makes controversies about the meaning of a ballot reviewable; this is 
one reason why the ballots would be coded, so that results of various 
analyses could quickly and easily be compared.

The official results would include not only the total counts, but a 
ballot-by-ballot determination of what each vote was that was 
counted. And each ballot that was invalidated, for whatever reason.

Essentially, the counting process would take place in public, not 
only watchable by a few observers, but by anyone interested, at leisure.

The "scanners" could simply be fax machines. No special equipment 
would be necessary. The *analysis* could require special or 
customized software, but it is quite possible that there are 
off-the-shelf solutions, that could convert a ballot into a standard text file.

I believe that ballots appropriate for this are already being used in places.

The "official" scanning and results need not require any new 
equipment. I've never understood the fuss over new election equipment 
as being anything other than a boondoggle. Quite simply, hand 
counting is not difficult enough, and counting is needed infrequently 
enough, that the kind of spending which has been poured into election 
equipment is little short of insane. How much per vote is being 
spent, and how much would it cost to count ballots by hand?

There are standard keypunch procedures, developed years ago, for 
obtaining high accuracy by using multiple operators and comparing the 
results. With coded ballots, noncontroversial ballots could quickly 
be identified and attention focused only on controversial ballots, 
which would normally be a relatively small percentage. What happened 
in Florida in 2000 was that *every ballot* was counted by a whole 
group of people, one ballot at a time. I don't believe they did 
independent batching. Highly inefficient and not verifiable.