Re: DRAFT CVV Testimony on CO HB 1296

[Nicholas Bernstein <Nicholas.Bernstein@xxxxxxxxxxxx>]

I think you know my opinion. I don't believe the group is going in the 
right direction on this.
It's one thing to say that we support all paper ballots for the 2004 
elections, it's quite another to say the we don't feel the legistation 
goes far enough.

N



Joe Pezzillo wrote:

> The Steering Committee has seen this, can I please get feedback from 
> the broader group before I depart for Denver? Thanks! -Joe
>
> ---------
>
> DRAFT
>
> Statement of Citizens for Boulder County Citizens for Verifiable Voting
>
> Thank you for the opportunity to present. I'm Joe Pezzillo from 
> Boulder, Spokesperson for the unaffiliated group Citizens for 
> Verifiable Voting.
>
> The public at large was awakened by the crisis in Florida in 2000 when 
> they realized they could not tell from the Election who had won. Now, 
> we are already seeing record turnout in both Political Party's 
> caucuses and primaries this Presidential Election year from voters 
> expecting a Trustworthy Election.
>
> Today, despite the passage of Federal Legislation and millions of 
> dollars spent on new voting technology, there is No Confidence from 
> The People of the United States in the Electronic Storage of Votes, 
> and that lack of confidence is not based on unfounded fears or lack of 
> understanding, but on the extensive research and analysis of Computer 
> Professionals, Security Researchers, Political Scientists, Academics, 
> Citizen Activists and Investigative Journalists.
>
> In Boulder County, we're gifted with many High Tech, Legal and 
> Elections experts, who have joined together in an ad hoc citizens' 
> group and collaboratively formed the group's core positions. We have 
> presented our research and conclusions to the County, in the Media, to 
> the four active Political Parties, and to a variety of local groups, 
> all of whom have offered some degree of support.
>
> Ultimately, the work of this all volunteer citizens group convinced 
> Boulder County, possibly Colorado's most technologically advanced 
> region, to reject Computer Voting and adopt a 100% Paper Ballot based 
> system for the 2004 election.
>
> This Citizen's group has studied this issue thoroughly and come to the 
> consensus position that to achieve Trustworthy Elections that embrace 
> Security, Verifiability and Reliability at their core, the central 
> component of every Election must be Voter Verified, Full-Text, 
> Physically Marked Paper Ballots with Hand-Counting of a statistically 
> significant random sample of ballots to verify any machine counts.
>
> We are concerned that the legislation before you as originally drafted 
> may not go far enough to protect the sanctity of the vote in Colorado 
> and our group would support stronger requirements. We ask that you 
> adopt the proposed friendly amendments to secure paper ballots as the 
> official record of the voter's intent because the changes will improve 
> the law and the elections process.
>
> We know that you will hear vigorous objections to this legislation 
> even in its weaker form, and ask you to consider Trustworthiness as 
> the most important aspect of any Election and to remember that 
> Trustworthy Elections are both the Citizen's Right and Requirement. To 
> those who would object to the Citizen's Requirements for Trustworthy 
> Elections on any grounds, especially those who cite dollar costs and 
> savings, we can answer only that the cost of holding Trustworthy 
> Elections is the price of having Democracy and Justice.
>
> Recently, our nation's best and brightest scientists and most rigorous 
> and thorough engineering processes backed up by billions of dollars of 
> taxpayer money weren't able find a serious computer flaw until it was 
> too late. It's one thing to put a machine on Mars that doesn't work 
> and can be fixed remotely, it's another to trust any such device to 
> protect our Democracy.
>
> ###