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The software utility, eVote and the eVote clerk, injects true democracy and deliberation into our real-world landscape.

Friday, February 25, 2005

Texas E-voting Forum Open to the Public

Texas E-voting Forum Open to the Public

Public Comment Welcome at February 28 Meeting About E-voting
Machines

Texas - The ACLU and EFF recently won a preliminary
injunction in their lawsuit against the state of Texas
concerning whether its voting technology certification
meetings should be open to the public in accordance
with the Texas Open Meetings Act. As part of this
victory, Texas will hold its first-ever open public
meeting discussing proposed voting systems.

The meeting will take place on Monday, February 28,
from 8:30 a.m. until noon, in the 2nd floor conference
room of the Rusk Building (208 East 10th St., Austin).

"We're hoping that this meeting will open the door to
more public access to the voting systems selection
process in Texas, and will support reform efforts
being made in the Texas legislature," said Dan Wallach,
a professor of computer science at Rice University
and an expert in voting system security issues.

"Elections need to become more transparent across the
board," added Matt Zimmerman, staff attorney for EFF.
"Not only does election technology need to permit
voters to verify their votes, the process for
selecting that technology needs to be open to public
scrutiny. While this is a small step forward, and much
work remains to be done, it is nevertheless an important
step for the voters of Texas."

For the full press release:
http://www.eff.org/news/archives/2005_02.php#003362

Thursday, February 10, 2005

Touch screens in Allegheny County on Feb 27, 2005

Touch screen voting is coming to Allegheny county. Machines are stopping by for a visit this month.

The local elections department has pushed for years, in good faith, to get e-voting. It's hard for them to pull back, especially when they have to meet the HAVA requirements by '06. (For a historical view of the progression and a sense of the money involved, see first (1999) then 2001 and 2003
All e-voting is not equally bad. Let's do all we can to stave off the worst choices.

The Allegheny County Democratic endorsement vote on Sunday, Feb. 27, 2005 is going to use the machines. The vote is where the Dem committee folks decide which candidates will be the "officially endorsed" Democrats, and which will either drop out of the race or run as unendorsed candidates. This is part sales event and function, to convince the Democrats to support buying the machines in question.

Go with a balanced, intelligent information on touch-screen voting (in particular, calling for an auditable paper trail and a "this is your vote" receipt).

Location/Date: 10 amd to 5 pm, IBEW Hall, on Hot Metal Street, between Carson St.
and the Mon river.

If you have concise information that would make a good touch-screen voting information sheet (or if you have such a sheet already prepped) please put it in
and announce it
to the group.

Ideal: One-page (or front & back), self-contained (not dependent on URL's), large-type, includes checklist of what good machines must provide. (Note that "stay with what we have" is probably illegal as of 2006 under HAVA.)

(Content reposted and edited slightly from another source.)