TALLAHASSEE:
In a historic vote, the Florida House today unanimously passed CS/HB
537, already passed in the Senate, that provides almost all voters
paper ballots in time for the 2008 Presidential election, and bans
paperless DREs outright by 2012. The bill now goes to the Governor
where he’s sure to sign it since it’s his initiative.
Counties
will have the option to pitch DREs immediately and provide ballot
marking devices for voters with disabilities. “FVC urges all 67
counties to convert to uniform paper ballot systems without delay and
leave no voter behind voting on failed electronic voting machines,”
said FVC Co-Founder, Dan McCrea.
The
bill is funded with $27.9 million in HAVA funds and there’s plenty more
money in that account should more be needed next year. Counties will
get help from the state to purchase optical scan equipment to count the
paper ballots; ballot-on-demand equipment to ease paper congestion
problems in Early Voting; and ballot marking devices to serve the
disabled.
While
there was talk earlier in the legislative session about retrofitting
printers to failed touchscreen DREs, that talk faded as legislators saw
it would be throwing good money after bad. Additionally, they are sure
to have understood that currently available “VVPAT” printers would not
comply with proposed federal legislation which, if passed, will
supersede Florida law. (Federal bill HR 811, sponsored by Rep. Rush
Holt, currently has 212 bi-partisan co-sponsors in Congress.)
The
Florida bill also contains new audit provisions essential to the
security of paper ballot voting systems. There was agreement among
legislators that the new audit provisions will need further tweaking
next year before becoming effective in July 2008. For now, the language
requires that after every election, at least 1% and not more than 2% of
randomly selected precincts be audited by hand-counting the paper
ballots in one randomly selected race. The audit will take place after
certification and be reported 3 days before the contest period ends.
“FVC
supports ‘statistically significant’ audits that would yield a far
greater confidence level in election results and should be reported
before certification. FVC will be working with state and local election
officials in the coming year to strengthen Florida audit language,”
said another FVC Co-Founder, Kindra Muntz, who led the successful
charter amendment campaign in Sarasota County that requires both voter
verified paper ballots and mandatory random audits in all elections.
“We
thank Governor Crist and the Florida Legislature for their vision and
diligence in improving Florida voting systems,” said FVC Co-Founder,
Susan Pynchon, “and for working together in a bi-partisan, bicameral
effort. The eyes of the nation have been and still are on Florida
elections – and Florida finally got it right! We can now say Florida is
leading the nation in election reform.”
