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Re: letter to the editor, 11/11

Avante is the only vendor that currently prints a BALLOT. The only one. Are you listening?

My last few emails about this the Avante system has been about PAPER BALLOTS. You guys (and gals) are skimming. Read the meat.

Avante can output to any printer that we like and any layout that we like. Since they already are producing scannable ballots for absentee voters, it is cake for them to make their DRE print scannable ballots.

Every other vendor, including Hart says flat out that they cannot and will not produce a voter verifiable paper ballot. They LIE and say it is not HAVA compliant.

It is a nice pipe dream to suggest to the commissioners that they not purchase any DREs, however you better consider a good PLAN B.
I say that we look to the one DRE vendor that can and will work with the county to provide what the county wants. Avante is more than halfway there.

Pissy Paul Tiger

Alan Crandall wrote:

Kell,
Avante Paper is not spooled. Each ballot receipt is cut and a separate piece of paper in the printer ballot box. They made a point of making this part of their presentation that I attended. They said to be wary of Sequoia or any other vender that spools paper because you may be able to figure out which ballot goes with which person if combined with a time stamp or video of the polling place.
It is not ink it is a thermal print which is flimsy but no ink involved. I agree with the systems currently on the table Avente is the best but it is still sup standard to our goal of a full printed ballot that is then optically scanned for the tally.
Alan Crandall
-----Original Message-----
*From:* kellen carey [mailto:kcarey636@xxxxxxxxx]
*Sent:* Wednesday, November 12, 2003 11:37 PM
*To:* BCV
*Subject:* RE: letter to the editor, 11/11

Paul,
You're sorta right: Avanti is the only vender who showed us an already operating and functioning voter verifiable paper ballot. But it falls short in a few important respects:
1) Paper is spooled -- meaning any handcount would be extremely problematic because each separate ballot would have to be cut/separated from ajoining ballots.
2) Paper is about as flimsy as the cheap toilet paper used in gas station bathrooms, meaning it won't handle much handling by hand counters.
3) Ink deteriorates rather rapidly (either due to the paper type or the ink or both).
4) What it prints out isn't the complete context of the ballot, only what you voted for or against. That is, it just says "County Issue For" and "Sherriff Jones" w/o the other options in context.
5) The print is so dang small you have to have a magnifying glass to read it. Not a terrible thing, since Avanti actually supplies a magnifying glass. But imagine several hundred hand counters with several hundred magnifying glasses. Do-able but, really, can't we do better?
6) As long as Colorado disallows recounts by any method other than the the original tabulation method, the Avanti spooled paper ballot is utter useless -- except maybe ass (pardon the pun) toilet paper.
kell

*/Paul Tiger <tigerp@xxxxxxxxxxxx>/* wrote:

    It appears to me that Avante has the upper hand. They do produce a
    paper
    ballot, and it can be the primary ballot method. Their system puts
    a 2D
    (blocked bar code) at the top of each ballot, and that can be read
    by any
    scanner, not just theirs. They can also be hand counted, because
    they print
    out the voters selection.

    Avante is the only vendor that can do this without modifications
    to their
    system. Everyone else would have to re-write software and add on new
    hardware.

Paul Tiger

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