Re: Friday's Meeting with Boulder City and County Clerks

[Peter or Alison Richards <aprichards@xxxxxxxx>]

Hey Joe...  et al...

What is the time line on a decision  being made on the type of ballot to
be used here in the City of Boulder, for the 8 March 2005 election ??

Will the decision be made this Tuesday at the City Council meeting ?

I was hoping the 5th graders at some elementary school could organize the
election...  

Bye,  Peter Richards


On Sun, 19 Dec 2004 14:37:58 -0700 "Joe Pezzillo" <jpezzillo@xxxxxxxxx>
writes:
> 
> 12/19/2004
> 
> Greetings!
> 
> Thanks to Ralph Shnelvar's efforts, Boulder City Clerk Alisa Lewis 
> met 
> with Neal McBurnett, Ralph and me on Friday afternoon at the big 
> table 
> downstairs at the City building, along with Linda Salas, Boulder 
> County 
> Clerk, and Diane whose last name I didn't get, but who manages 
> financial compliance and/or matching funds for city elections, and 
> we 
> discussed the upcoming March 2005 City Election plan.
> 
> Neal and Ralph may wish to describe the concerns that they voiced 
> (and/or heard) separately, such as fundamental concerns about the 
> use 
> of mail ballots, but I mostly presented information about the Swiss 
> 
> method of voting, including showing the sample ballots that quickly 
> and 
> visually explain how hand counting can actually be cheaper and 
> easier 
> than what we've got now.
> 
> Alisa graciously spent at least half an hour explaining the 
> materials 
> she will be presenting Tuesday 
> (http://www.ci.boulder.co.us/clerk/agenda/2004/122104/6B.pdf) to 
> support her recommendation to do a mail ballot election with the 
> County's system in March 2005, including cost considerations behind 
> the 
> options she evaluated, and other very interesting details, like the 
> 
> fact that David Hart personally came to visit her to express his 
> confidence in HartIntercivic's ability to print ballots that will 
> work 
> with their own opscan system, since three other printing vendors had 
> 
> apparently declined to respond due to compatibility concerns. One 
> very 
> interesting thing to me was that the cost of a mail ballot election 
> 
> will only be about $5,000 (five thousand dollars) less than doing a 
> 40 
> polling-place election (just less than half the 93 precincts in the 
> 
> city). I wonder if hand counting would lower the cost even more?!?
> 
> In short, she expressed three key concerns that led to her 
> recommendation:
> 
> 1. A Sense of Disenfranchisement after November and the potential 
> that 
> will lower turnout in a precinct election.
> 
> 2. Retention of Elections Judges and Polling Locations, after last 
> election quite a few may have been lost, don't want to overburden 
> them
> 
> 3. Partnership with County Elections Office, need for the system to 
> 
> work going forward in the rest of 2005 and beyond.
> 
> After reviewing the materials, we talked a little and then I did a 
> brief presentation of the Swiss voting information and sample 
> ballots. 
> Alisa and Linda both expressed a great deal of interest in the 
> ballots 
> and methods used to do the hand counting (I think they were 
> surprised 
> at how straightforward, widely used, and quick it turns out to be), 
> and 
> also the integrated privacy envelope that saves additional costs. I 
> 
> gave Linda one of the sample windowed ballot envelopes that the 
> Swiss 
> Voting System company (http://www.swissvs.org) prepared as a mock-up 
> 
> for Florida with the perforated slot to remove the voter 
> identification 
> card from the ballots and about a dozen of the color coded, 
> thumb-notched sample ballot slips.
> 
> Both Alisa and Linda expressed that they did not think that it would 
> be 
> possible logistically to do this for March, although they would 
> consider it, including asking the Secretary of State if it would be 
> 
> permissible in Colorado. I expressed a confidence that it must be 
> permissible, as paper ballots, hand counting, and both various sizes 
> 
> and multiple pages are already legal and in fact quite common. I 
> told 
> them that when (not if) Donetta says "No", I want to know exactly 
> why.
> 
> Here's hoping we get a chance to reclaim our elections leadership 
> and 
> prove that we can restore our democracy starting right here in 
> Boulder!
> 
> Joe
> 
> Joe Pezzillo, Citizen Activist
> Boulder, Colorado USA
> jpezzillo@xxxxxxxxx
> 
> 
>