Our Opinion: Ensuring your vote counts
County should drop bond election plans to focus on ballot security
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Pima County must refrain from seeking voter support for a huge bond issue until after its election system has been replaced.
A trial has just shown that the county's Diebold-GEMS election system could be accessed and the vote count manipulated.
That finding came courtesy of the Pima County Democratic Party, which filed a lawsuit after the county rebuffed its requests for data from past elections to ensure election security.
Now the county plans to spend $5 million on a new election system and another $5 million or so to clean up its haphazard elections office.
The systems likely won't be ready in time for the 2008 general election however, County Administrator Chuck Huckelberry reports.
That's cause for worry, given that 2008 will be a presidential election year.
Also, suspicion among Pima County residents now is extremely high, with many questioning whether the Regional Transportation Plan really won voter approval in May 2006.
General skepticism already drives voter perception, leaving turnout lower than desired. Specific skepticism from this case surely will linger long after the November election.
Thus the very idea of piling on a bond issue request for $700 million or so belies all good sense and reason.
Rather than waste time agonizing over whether to float a bond issue before voters, the county should be making every effort to ensure utmost security for the November 2008 general election.
That is, after all, the year in which Americans choose the next leader of the free world.
The accuracy and security of that vote is paramount; the bond issue should wait.
Trial testimony showed that common software can be used to hack into the county's Diebold-GEMS elections system and doctor election results.
Although an Arizona attorney general's investigation turned up no evidence of past vote tampering, system testing by Colorado-based computer consultant iBeta uncovered "fundamental security flaws" that render vote validation "impossible due to the ease of data and log manipulation."
That finding spurred Huckelberry to order many changes, including cameras to monitor equipment storage areas, online streaming video from election night ballot counts and only partial passwords for staff to access elections equipment.
The new measures all are well and good, but the county now must complete as many security improvements as possible before the election - and provide local voters with continual updates on the progress of that work.
A high-priced bond issue now would only increase voter mistrust of our election system. What we need is strict county attention to the task at hand: securing our next vote.
Well fellow Tucsonans, we're back were we stated, at the Pima Board of Supervisors, (BoS) evidently the county is planning an appeal.
Mari Herreras with the Tucson Weekly is 100% correct; the real fight is now on for Jan 8th meeting of the Pima Board of Sups.
Please, write BoS, call them and be there at the meeting Jan 8th.
Tell BoS it over!
They had their day in court!
The "Mayhem and Chaos" defense lost and to "Get over it"!
Tell them, "We the People" all seems to agree that elections should be free, fair, accurate, trustworthy, and transparent!
I've yet to meet anybody who admits to being opposed to free, fair, accurate, and trustworthy, transparent elections.
At least till now!
Four out of the five Sups at this time with the exception of Supervisor Ray Carroll, who is the only one that truly stands with honest transparent government and elections.
Call BoS, write BoS, let’s hold them accountable, and be with us Jan 8th.
What we do dose make a difference, especially if we maintain our civility.
Be the media and tell others.
John R Brakey AUDITAZ@cox.net
Hot Mini Clips of Trial and from here link to all the others
Pima County Election Integrity Trial Testimony of Bryan Crane
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=7304338799617243809
Link to iBeta report; http://www.electiondefensealliance.org/files/iBeta_Election_Forensic_Report_Pima_Co.pdf
Trial Testimony Chuck Huckelberry, he is the bureaucratic head cheese in Pima County government. http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-4175279576759012912
The testimony of James Barry is mainly to illustrate that the Pima County government had a deep, vested, and motivated interest in the outcome of the RTA election. http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=1282511168148207359
them all.