POLITICS: Dress Rehearsal for Elections a Success in Florida (Maybe Not?) Updated, page 1

posted on Sep, 1 2004 @ 05:51 AM

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General Elections in South Florida were a success and played out with only a minor glitches yesterday. With the eyes of the most of the country on Florida for this upcoming presidential elections and controversy around Florida voting methods, the new touch screen voting system was a success in the eyes of Floridians. The new system proved to be easy to use and there were no long lines at the various polling locations. But even with the apparent success of this general election, concerns still remain about November's elections.

www.miami.com
While South Florida has conducted numerous successful elections on the electronic voting equipment since it was purchased in 2002, this year's presidential election has drawn an unprecedented beam of focus to the new machines -- and South Florida's ability to use them correctly.

The increased attention smoked out technological problems and prompted officials to take last-minute measures to help ensure votes are counted accurately in the absence of a paper trail.

Undoubtedly, early voting and an increased use of absentee ballots reduced the numbers that voted Tuesday in the polling places.

The biggest fear -- that Miami-Dade would relive the disastrous 2002 gubernatorial primary -- clearly did not come to pass. In that election, long boot-up times and poor poll worker training set off a chain of events that left some precincts closed for hours and disenfranchised untold numbers of voters.

On Tuesday, Burgess said voting problems were ''so minor and so isolated'' that they were barely worth noting. The few that cropped up were mostly human error, he said, and quickly resolved.

Please visit the link provided for the complete story.

Knowing that the system now works, it's imperative to see the how the human factor will play into the elections since all eyes will be watching Florida once again.

[edit on 10-13-2004 by worldwatcher]

worldwatcher

posted on Oct, 13 2004 @ 07:28 PM

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I figured it's best to keep this stuff all in one place

Voting Machines' Server Crashes Before Test; West Palm Officials Hope It's Not Sign Of Things To Come

Tuesday's public test of Palm Beach County's electronic voting machines had to be postponed until Friday because of a computer server crash.

Elections supervisor Theresa LePore blames it on damaged computer equipment. She says a power outage caused by Hurricane Jeanne increased the building's temperature, which may have damaged equipment.

But, LePore said, the machines won't be hampered by a similar failure during the November election, adding that a backup server will be in place to count votes.

Robert Wexler, a Florida Democrat, has sued LePore, claiming touch-screen voting machines are unconstitutional because they don't allow manual recounts in close elections.

Wexler sued state elections officials, arguing that constitutional promises of equal protection would be violated by a voting system that varies from county to county.

taibunsuu

posted on Oct, 13 2004 @ 08:12 PM

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How does anyone know those things are accurately recording votes? Do they kick out a receipt like an ATM machine?

worldwatcher

posted on Oct, 13 2004 @ 10:02 PM

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no paper reciept. It is supposed to be recorded electronically in 3 different places I believe. (let's hope we don't have thunderstorms that day)

here's some more info:
www.kuro5hin.org...
slashdot.org...