SECOND DRAFT: CVV Release

["Joe Pezzillo" <jpezzillo@xxxxxxxxx>]

I added and changed based on the helpful feedback, using Ralph's 
punctuation and trying to incorporate Alan, Neal and Kell's suggestions 
as you'll see below -- perhaps not to everyone's satisfaction, but 
hopefully enough to reach consensus.

Last chance for feedback, and yes I know that it's too long at 619 
words. We can edit it next week for posterity on the site, but I feel 
we should release it today to be relevant, and since we're not paying 
by the word anyway to post it to a wire service, what do we care how 
long it is? ;-)

-Joe

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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

December 12th, 2003

CITIZENS FOR VERIFIABLE VOTING
contact: Joe Pezzillo, Spokesperson, Citizens for Verifiable Voting,
http://www.coloradovoter.net
	      303-938-8850 jpezzillo@xxxxxxxxx


NEWS: CITIZENS BLOCK PURCHASE OF ELECTRONIC VOTING SYSTEM

Boulder, Colorado - Citizens for Verifiable Voting , an ad hoc group of
concerned citizens in Boulder County, Colorado, has convinced the local
County Clerk's office to delay the planned purchase of a new voting 
system
that would have included the controversial Direct Record Electronic 
(DRE)
vote recording computers and, instead, the County Clerk has adopted the
citizen's declaration that only a Paper Ballot will provide an adequate 
level
of voter confidence for the upcoming 2004 Election.

"We're extremely grateful to the County Clerk's office for clearly
taking our concerns into consideration and for announcing a position
that appears to be entirely consistent with the citizens' requests for
a paper ballot," stated Joe Pezzillo, spokesperson for the group, who 
was in
attendance at the County Clerk's announcement. "We're also grateful
that we are demonstrating that active and engaged citizens can and do
make a difference, and can stop the purchase of inherently insecure DRE
systems."

County Officials present also emphasized the importance of the security 
of the vote and the voter's confidence,
with Nancy Jo Wurl commenting on the fundamental "Constitutional right 
to a fair and accurate Election."

Indeed, the citizens of Boulder County have been active and engaged and
conducted their own independent process including: four large public
meetings with more than a hundred total attendees; extensive outreach
and education to citizens and the media resulting in repeated press
coverage and including a 100% collaboratively produced website and
active public e-mail list; preparing a Citizen's Resolution calling for
paper ballots that received the written endorsement or support of all
four of Boulder County's political parties; meetings with County
Election officials; legal research and correspondence of clarifications
with the Secretary of State and vendors; direct contact with 
legislators including work to secure
Rep. Udall's co-sponsorship of HR2239, the Voter Confidence Act;
collecting hundreds of physical signatures on petitions; and a formal 
presentation
to the Boulder County Commissioners.

The ten-minute presentation -- which included specific legal
explanations of the Help America Vote Act (HAVA) showing that DREs are
NOT required to be purchased (as is widely and mistakenly believed) --
makes the Citizen's case for voter-verifiable, full-text, physically
marked PAPER BALLOTS used with a fully disclosed election system,
with Pezzillo saying bluntly at one point "Paper
Ballots equals Voter Confidence, no Paper Ballot equals NO voter
confidence."

The full presentation is available via streaming media from the
Citizens for Verifiable Voting website at http://www.coloradovoter.net,
which also hosts an archive of the group's activities, research, and
documents, including the mailing list.

Among CVV's next steps is to prepare materials to help Citizen
Activists mobilize their local communities around this and other issues
related to Electronic Voting. And as CVV has demonstrated, active and
engaged citizens can have a substantial impact on this issue when they
get involved and take some basic steps.

As Pezzillo emphasized, "There's more work to do on this issue, from 
insisting
on full disclosure of voting systems to preventing the 
disenfranchisement
of voters through the electronic pollbook, but we are glad to have 
overcome this hurdle today."

Concerned Citizen Activists should contact CVV at the contact info
above, via the mailing list, or via the Electronic Frontier
Foundation's (EFF) organizational efforts on this issue, see:
http://www.eff.org/Activism/E-voting/.

For voters in the State of Colorado, a statewide group has been formed
to address a broad range of Electronic Voting issues, including
touch-screens, the ePollbook, and election law reform. Join their
efforts online by visiting their website at
http://www.countthevotecolorado.org


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