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Originally Posted by Opa
I just read in a foreign newspaper that the Florida legislators voted to scrap all voting machines and that Florida will return to paper ballots. I have not read this in any American paper but if it's true I can only say "Too bad that it's eight years too late". I'm suspicious that De Telegraaf may have been taken since I can not confirm this but just the same, I hope it's true.
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Quote:
The bill's other major provision would replace nearly all of the state's touch-screen-voting machines with optical-scan paper ballots. Providing a paper trail became a bigger issue after a heated congressional election in Sarasota County last year, when more than 18,000 electronic ballots did not register a vote in the race. Republican Vern Buchanan was declared the winner, but a congressional panel this week ordered an investigation.
Scrapping touch-screens also was a priority for Crist.
Under the bill, the state will use $28 million in federal money to replace touch-screen machines in 15 counties that don't currently use paper ballots, including Lake and Sumter.
A touch-screen machine will remain available at each polling location to comply with federal rules intended to help those with disabilities vote independently. The bill eventually would replace those machines with versions that create a paper trail.
http://www.orlandosentinel.com/orl-m...,5729047.story
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My jurisdiction pulled all but one electronic machine from each polling place before the 2006 election, and used paper ballots instead. The machines we had incorporated a button on the back that could put the machine in an administrative mode (without requiring a key or password) and allow anyone to change the tally in the machine. The one electronic machine in our polling place was next to the election monitor, with the back panel exposed to make sure nobody hit the button and played around.
One note though - electronic voting was not widely used in Florida in the 2000 election. Remember all that "hanging chad", "pregnant chad" nonsense?
Matt