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Voting in North Carolina
In recent elections of 2000, 2002, and 2004 widespread allegations of large-scale election misconduct were heard across the nation. Manipulation of registration rolls, abuse of voting machines, the targeting of minority and opposition voter precincts, and out-right fraud are some of the charges.
In North Carolina, the history of election misconduct has also resulted in serious charges of error and malfeasance in recent elections. In its Final Report of March 2005, the UNC School of Law’s Center for Civil Rights, made a number of significant observations.
· In the wake of the 2000 election, county Boards of Elections in Harnett and Duplin counties were dismissed after an investigation carried out by the State Board of Elections found voting procedure discrepancies. In 2002, “an error-ridden primary” resulted in the dismissal of the Robeson County Elections Director, where “malfunctioning electronic tabulators, improper ballots, inaccurate registration records, and polling places with no voting booths” required that the State to order new elections in two local races.
· In 2002, North Carolina did not count 3.3% of its votes, by comparison to 2% for the national average. That year, North Carolina’s poor record resulted from a variety of circumstances, including the refusal of some polling officials to provide challenged voters with provisional ballots and/or the destruction of completed provisional ballots prior to being counted. In some cases polling sites were moved without notice, ex-felons received incorrect information about their right to vote, and registration rolls were purged of the names of voters who did not vote after 1998. This included up to 60,000 African American voters.
Go to: http://www.law.unc.edu/PDFs/EPreport.pdf
· In 2004 the North Carolina election mishap in Carteret County also became an outstanding event resulting in widespread publicity. The loss of 4,400 votes in that county due to a machine malfunction, resulted in a statewide run off in a closely disputed race for N.C. Superintendent of Public Instruction.
New Elections Law In 2002 the U.S. Congress enacted the Help America Vote Act, and in the fall of 2005, the N.C. General Assembly passed the N.C. Public Confidence in Elections Act (S223/H238), requiring “that all voting systems generate either a paper ballot or a paper record by which voters may verify their votes before casting them...” along with other provisions.
In December of 2005, Diebold Election Systems, Inc., a manufacturer of election systems machinery embroiled in controversy surrounding the 2004 Presidential election in the state of Ohio was forced to withdraw from the North Carolina elections procurement process. The withdrawal came as a result of a lawsuit by the Electronic Frontier Foundation. Diebold had refused to escrow its source code for the setup, configuration, and operation of its system according to the provisions of North Carolina’s recent election reform legislation.
New Election Machinery In response to the new law, new voting machines were ordered for all North Carolina counties and made available by the time of the May 2 primary. All of the new machines were made by Election Systems & Software, a corporation providing advanced elections technology certified for use in countries throughout the world. ES & S is based in Omaha, NE., with offices in Canada and the U.K. Find out more at www.essvote.com.
The new election machinery in North Carolina consists of three basic types:
iVotronic DRE A computerized touch screen voting system designed for improved access by visually or physically handicapped voters, and is also multilingual. This machine will not accept over votes, and will alert the voter in the event of an under vote. After completing the ballot, the voter can touch “review” and then either accept or make revisions to the ballot. The iVotronic made its appearance for the first time forty-two North Carolina counties during the recent primary. It produces a visible paper printout that records all votes, available to election officials in the event that a recount should become necessary.
Model 100 Optical Scan The Model 100 Optical Scan machine is an improved version of the optical scanner already widely used in North Carolina during previous elections. Optical Scan machines make use of paper ballots marked by the voter that remain available in the event of an official recount. The Model 100 has new features which alert voters to overvote or undervote situations, providing the voter with the option to “accept” or to “return” the ballot for revision. The Model 100 is now in used in all but a handful of N.C. counties.
AutoMARK ADA Also widely used in North Carolina is the “voter assist” machine designed especially to increase the access of handicapped or multilingual voters. The AutoMARK is a computerized system in which the voter marks a paper ballot with the aid of the machine, then records the vote by feeding the paper ballot into an optical scanner. The AutoMARK employs a variety of systems which enable blind, physically impaired or language restricted voters to mark their ballots.
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The iVotronic DRE |
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The Model 100 Optical Scan |
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Carolina Civic Voice Summer 2006 Vol. 6, No 2 |