The following NEWS was released and published to our BLOG at
http://coloradovoter.blogspot.com
It is time for the Colorado Secretary of State and the Boulder
County Clerk to resign.
Al
Subject: NEWS: Is Boulder County violating election laws?
NEWS: For immediate release
CONTACT
Al Kolwicz
Boulder County Republicans
Election Representative
2867 Tincup
Circle
Boulder, CO 80305
303-494-1540
AlKolwicz@xxxxxxxxx
October 31, 2004
Is Boulder County
violating election laws?
Boulder
County’s new vote
counting system consists of 8 systems used to scan ballots, interpret the
voter’s intent, and export the votes to portable media. One
additional system is used to import the votes from the portable media and
calculate the election results.
Each of the 9 systems can be easily modified by keyboard input or by
loading data into the computer. Data include computer programs, files
that define the election to the system, and files for storing scanned images of
each ballot and the votes that were interpreted from each ballot. The
smallest change in any of these elements can result in undesirable side
effects.
By law, before and after a system is used for
processing live ballots, the system must be tested. Colorado statute C.R.S. 1-7-506 says, “The
designated election official shall have the electronic vote-counting equipment
tested at each counting center in the manner prescribed in this section to
ascertain that it will accurately count the votes cast for all offices and
ballot issues. The electronic equipment shall be tested at least three times,
once on the day before the election, again just prior to the start of the count
on election day, and finally at the conclusion of the counting.”
Also, whenever maintenance is performed on a system,
the system must be tested. Colorado
statute C.R.S. 1-7-506.5 says, “The
tests shall be sufficient to determine that the system is properly programmed,
the election is correctly defined on the system, and all of the input, output,
and communication devices are working properly.”
Boulder
County is violating both
of these laws. They have not performed the tests required by C.R.S.
1-7-506, and they have not performed the tests required by C.R.S.
1-7-506.5.
A set of test ballots was prepared by the political parties. The
vote counting system failed to correctly count the test votes.
After days of secret discussions, Boulder County Clerk Linda Salas made an unbelievable decision. She
decided to make changes to the systems and, without testing the modified
systems, she began processing early and absentee ballots. After
processing thousands of ballots, she decided to perform maintenance on the
systems and, again without testing, resumed processing the real ballots.
Not one of the required tests was performed.
Salas turned down requests by the Republicans to test the systems being
used to process the real ballots. Republicans are not satisfied running
tests on systems other than the ones actually doing the processing of the real
ballots.
Republican Party representative Al Kolwicz
is horrified saying, “Ms. Salas is being irresponsibly reckless with our
votes. She is breaking the law. Anybody with a tiny bit of common
sense would test these systems before using them to process real
ballots.”
An election complaint has been filed with the Secretary of State.
* * * END * * *