Voting Machines

Although New York City may not sleep, it does procrastinate. NYC will be one of the last municipalities in the U.S. to adopt electronic voting machines for elections. In fact, had the old voting machines not been replaced by January 14^th, the state government would have been forced to step in and select new electronic machines for the city.

The decision to contract for voting machines isn’t as easy as it may seem. Voting machines are graded on ease of usage, reliability, predicted years of use, and most importantly, accuracy. Contracts are often political battles; the NYC voting machine contract is no different. The NYC Board of Elections was tasked with choosing new voting machines for the city. After narrowing it down to two choices: Dominion, a Toronto based producer that would employ more than 60 New Yorkers (their proposal can be found here), or Election Systems & Software of Omaha, Neb (their proposal can be found here). ES&S, the dominant voting machine provider in the country, received slightly higher scores from the Board of Elections. The complete report and how scores were calculated can be found at Board of Elections. [Read more…] about New York City Selects New Electronic Voting Machines

– The Supreme Court’s decision in Citizens United has been released, and it’s a doorstopper. Weighing in at over 180 pages, the decision gives corporations, unions, and non-profits more power to spend freely in federal elections. Of course, Citizens United has sparked quite a bit of controversy. Rick Hasen, a leading election law scholar and member of the William and Mary Election Law Program Advisory Board, posted a scathing critique of the opinion on Slate, and an examination of the possible future of campaign finance on the Huffington Post. Ironically, Hasen’s book was cited in the majority opinion.

– Senator Chuck Schumer is rumored to be working on a “universal voter registration” bill. Originally, rumors had pegged Barney Frank as the author of the bill, sparking a mild controversy on the Hill and a fierce denial by Frank. The possibly fictional bill would automatically register millions of people to vote.

– State of Elections has published several articles about felon disenfranchisement over the past few weeks, all of which have supported the restoration of felon voting rights. In the interest of balance, here’s an editorial opposing the restoration of felon voting rights, written by Hans A. Von Spakovsky and John Park and published in the Richmond Times Dispatch.

– State of Elections is working on a new article, possibly a series of articles, about voting machines. Specifically, we will be looking at New York City’s recent decision to replace its old lever operated machines with modern electronic voting machines. If you have any information about NYC’s process for selecting a company to provide its machines, or any special knowledge about voting machines in general, please contact us at editor@stateofelections.com.

http://stateofelections.pages.wm.edu/2010/01/22/weekly-wrap-up-8/

In the kind of life they led of peripatetic, wellheeled idleness that took them on http://www.essayclick.net/ a seasonal round to paris, new york, palm beach, biarritz, monte carlo, portofino and back again the great enemy is boredom.