Doug Jones Studies Arizona Voting Machines
Iowa’s nationally recognized voting machine expert–Doug Jones of Iowa’s Dept of Computer Sciences–has just completed an investigation of voting equipment in Arizona.
The main finding was that the ES & S Optech 4C machines (used in Maricopa County to tally absentee ballots) failed to count some paper ballots that were marked in accordance with the instructions to “Connect the arrow with a single line”.
If marks were not dark or thick enough for the machine, votes were uncounted. But the directions did not demand dark, thick marks. If voters used red ink to make their marks, their votes were uncounted. But the voters were not warned to avoid red ink.
On the other hand, voters using the traditional number two pencil may have accidently made a tiny dot that the machine counted as a vote. This dot by Candidate X’s name caused the machine to reject the ballot when a dark thick mark had also been made next to Candidate Y’s name. No fair voting for two people, you see!
Most erased pencil marks were still counted as votes. Those voters, too, had their ballots tossed out for voting twice.
Jones concludes that the machines can count well enough, but they can’t see worth a darn. Wrote Jones:
“My tests identify a clear problem with the scanner calibration; it is too sensitive to pencil lead, yet too insensitive to ballpoint pen marks made in conformance to the current instructions.”
Warren Stewart reports on the study here.
A pdf file of the Jones report is also available.