[Date Prev][Date Next][Thread Prev][Thread Next][Date Index][Thread Index]

Re: how about a trial timing of how long it takes people to vote before the election?

Title: Re: how about a trial timing of how long it takes people t
At 11:39 AM -0600 8/25/08, Mary Eberle wrote:
Hi Margit and Everyone,

Would early voting be a better approach than seeking more investment in machines, especially DREs?

However, I did just hear of a situation in Indiana's spring primary in which the voters who appeared to vote when the polls opened in one precinct were given paper ballots to mark but could not cast them because the scanner did not work. The second scanner was delivered, and the poll workers could not get it to work either. Finally the voters left without casting their ballots.

For line-phobic people, early voting on paper ballots at the clerk's office or satellite office, where people presumably know how to operate the machinery, seems the best bet to me.

Mary
(303) 442-2164

Margit Johansson wrote:
Hi All,
     I've just been reading something about the interaction of voters with machines in 2004 in one state.  With a long ballot, some people with limited English skills, and machines cancelling people's votes when they took too long, some people took an hour on a machine.
     Part of the solution to lines is to have enough machines.  Another would be to have people prepared for how they were going to vote ahead of time.  Could we get the clerks to do tests before the election, using people who were and were not prepared, people whose English was poor, etc?
Margit
 Margit Johansson
303-442-1668/ margitjo@xxxxxxxxx <mailto:margitjo@xxxxxxxxx>
 


       Please note that the time to buy new machines for the November election is long past, although many states are having fire sales on DREs.
        If you are in a Colorado county, e.g. Jefferson, that uses DREs for precinct voting I would note that there is an easy rule-of-thumb for calculating how many machines will be required per precinct to minimize the lines.
      Most people will take roughly 10 minutes to vote, although with the anticipated longer ballot in November many will take somewhat longer. Thus, for a 12 hour Election Day (7 AM to 7 PM, 720 minutes) each DRE can handle a maximum of 70 votes (720 minutes divided by 10 minutes per voter plus 20 minutes to change tapes).
       In Presidential Elections turnout averages around 60% of registered voters. So a precinct with 1,000 registered voters needs to be prepared for 600 people to show up at the polling place. 600 voters divided by 70 votes per machine requires a minimum of nine (9) machines for that precinct.
       Murphy should also be expected to take part in the election and of nine machines one failure should be anticipated. So, to make it easy, for every 1,000 registered voters in a precinct using DREs exclusively there should be 10 machines, or one(1) DRE for every 100 registered voters in the precinct.
      You might want to check on how many DREs your county clerk has allocated for each precinct by number of registered voters as I'll bet it is probably less than half the estimate of DREs needed presented here. Lets see, Jefferson County has roughly 350,000 registered voters, which suggests they need around 3,500 DREs. Anybody willing to check on how many the county clerk actually has?
      Traditionally only a small percentage of voters use the DREs at early voting polling places. That probably will not be enough to ease the lines at polling places on Election Day.
       By now it should be obvious why county clerks have so desperately been pushing mail ballots. Otherwise citizens are likely to be heating up the tar, gathering chicken feathers, and tearing down fence rails on Election Day. Come to think of it, that might not be a bad idea anyway given that several states, e.g., California, Ohio, New Mexico, et alia, have done away with DREs prior to this election. But thanks to SoS Mike Coffman and John Gardner, Colorado still uses them.
       For those of you who follow BradBlog note that Diebold/Premier (whoever they are today) optical scanners aren't performing any better than DREs.
                     Chuck Corry
P.S. Watch for Coffman to tout his "election experience" if he wins the 6th Congressional District seat.
--
Charles E. Corry, Ph.D., F.G.S.A.
President, Equal Justice Foundation http://www.ejfi.org/
455 Bear Creek Road
Colorado Springs, Colorado 80906-5820
Telephone: (719) 520-1089
Personal home page: http://corry.ws
Curriculum vitae: http://www.marquiswhoswho.net/charleselmocorry/Default.aspx
    The Equal Justice Foundation is a non-profit 501(c)(3) public charity supported entirely by members and contributions. Dues are $25 per year and you may join at http://www.ejfi.org/Join.htm.
    Contributions are tax deductible and can be made on the Web at http://www.ejfi.org/join2.htm or by sending a check to the address above.
    Federal employees can contribute through the Combined Federal Campaign. The EJF is listed in Colorado , Utah, Idaho, and Wyoming #18855.
_____________________________________________________________________________
                      Issues of interest to the Equal Justice Foundation http://www.ejfi.org/  are:
Civilization                             http://www.ejfi.org/Civilization/Civilization.htm
Courts and Civil Liberties  http://www.ejfi.org/Courts/Courts.htm
Domestic Violence              http://www.ejfi.org/DV/dv.htm
     Domestic Violence Against Men in Colorado http://www.dvmen.org/
     Emerson case                                                      http://www.ejfi.org/emerson.htm
Families and Marriage                         http://www.ejfi.org/family/family.htm
Prohibitions and the War On Drugs  http://www.ejfi.org/Prohibition/Prohibition.htm
Vote Fraud and Election Issues         http://www.ejfi.org/Voting/Voting.htm
_____________________________________________________________________________

The good men may do separately is small compared with what they may do collectively.
Benjamin Franklin