|
In Maryland, a New Way to Vote
Touch-Screen Polling Machines to Make Debut on Sept. 10
 Listen to Pam Fessler's report.
A father teaches his child how to use Maryland's new touch-screen voting machine.
Photo: Pam Fessler, NPR News
|
Voting machines, stacked in their cases, will be used in four Maryland counties this fall.
Photo: Pam Fessler, NPR News
|
Initiatives in
Other States
Besides Maryland, several other states are buying equipment, adopting provisional balloting and spending more on poll worker training.
• Georgia is replacing every one of its voting machines -- more than 20,000 units -- with new touch-screen technology.
• California is also in the process of replacing its punch card system.
• Florida -- the site of the biggest election recount in U.S history -- has made some of the most sweeping reforms, including adopting new statewide standards for what does or doesn't count as a vote.
|
A volunteer poll worker demonstrates the new voting machines at a Maryland shopping mall.
Photo: Pam Fessler, NPR News
|
A Maryland firefighter and "Adopt-A-Precinct" poll worker trains on use of the new voting machines.
Photo: Pam Fessler, NPR News
|
Aug. 29, 2002 -- The confusion that followed the 2000 presidential election led to a nationwide call for more accurate and reliable ways to vote. But Congress has yet to pass an election reform bill, and many states are waiting for federal funds to upgrade their voting procedures. With the 2002 elections only weeks away, some experts say there are still gaping holes in the system.
Maryland isn't waiting for the federal government to take the lead. NPR's Pam Fessler reports that state voting officials are taking steps they hope will avoid the problems encountered in 2000.
The state now has a centralized voter database, making it easier to keep registrations up to date and weed out duplicate registrations. And this year, voters in four Maryland counties will use new computerized voting machines for the first time, for the Sept. 10 primary and again in the Nov. 5 general election.
Also new this year is an "Adopt-A-Precinct" program, where county employees sign up to work on Election Day, on their own time. Like other states, Maryland needs all the poll workers it can get. The state is also starting something called provisional balloting. Voters who go to the polls only to learn their names aren't on the register still get to vote. The vote will be counted later, if election officials determine the person was a legitimate voter.
Voting machine instructor Harold Ruston and other county workers, Fessler reports, "are a lot like performers right before opening night -- they're putting in long hours, rehearsing their roles. They know soon they'll be in the spotlight."
The pressure's on, because the new machines and procedures are radically different from how Maryland voters have cast their ballots in the past. "In my 20 years, as far as changes, I've seen more in the last couple of years than I've seen in my previous 18 years," says Robin Downs, election director for Prince George's County.
Maryland's Administrator of Elections Linda Lamone thinks such changes are necessary if voters are to have confidence in the results. She says the 2000 presidential election was a wake-up call "because it showed where the vulnerabilities are, and what could be fixed, and where we should be going nationally."
Maryland's touch-screen systems are in many ways similar to an ATM. Users can choose a ballot in either English or Spanish. To pick a candidate, voters just touch a box next to the name. What the machine won't do is allow voters to choose too many people for any one office -- an "over vote" that caused hundreds of thousands of ballots to be discarded in 2000.
At the end of the process there's a button with the words "Cast Ballot," The machines are also equipped with special audio attachments to allow the visually impaired to vote without assistance for the first time.
Voting officials seem enthusiastic about the machines -- but Kim Alexander, an expert on technology and elections with the California Voter Foundation, warns that voters and officials shouldn't be too optimistic.
She notes that there have already been a couple of lawsuits involving touch-screen voting machine results -- including one pending in Palm Beach County, Fla., home of the notorious "butterfly" ballot. And there's also the issue of trust: Alexander says voters might feel uneasy sending their vote into cyberspace, without a paper ballot they can see first to back it up.
"But election officials say an additional ballot would only be more confusing, and that some problems are inevitable with every election," Fessler reports. "They only hope these latest changes will make them rarer than they've been in the past."
In Depth
 Aug. 6, 2002: NPR's Phillip Davis reports on yet another potential political foul-up in Florida, where ballot instruction could lead some voters to mistakenly vote for two gubernatorial candidates.
Feb. 27, 2002: NPR's Pam Fessler reports on the stalemate in the U.S. Senate over changing the nation's election laws.
Aug. 9, 2001: Fessler reports on election reform recommendations from the people on the front lines of the issue -- state election officials.
May 31, 2001: NPR's Pam Fessler reports on continuing problems with the nation's voter registration lists.
Other Resources
• View a demonstration of the new voting machines on the state's Maryland Votes! Web site.
• ElectionLine.org, created by the Election Reform Information Project, features updates of changing state election rules.
• ElectionCenter.org
• California Voter Foundation
• State vs. federal election reform issues are featured at the National Conference of State Legislatures Web site.
|
