Dubious voting technology, a mistrust of election management and an expected record turnout may combine to threaten the integrity of the Nov. 4 general election, D.C. leaders and residents said Friday.
“We have a system that obviously doesn’t have the bare requisites of a system that’s reliable,” said Ward 3 D.C. Councilwoman Mary Cheh, who was appointed chair of a special panel to investigate the failures on primary day, Sept. 9.
It still is unclear, even after a nine-hour hearing Friday, what caused more than 4,700 uncast votes to show up in an unofficial results report handed to the public on primary night by the Board of Elections and Ethics. Executives with Sequoia Voting Systems blamed human error, while the elections board continued to cite static electricity, or a spark, for the anomaly.
“This has never happened before in the District of Columbia,” said Michelle M. Shafer, vice president of Sequoia. “You’ve had very well-run elections.”
Either way, board members said, no future results will be distributed on election night before the numbers are checked and rechecked and proven accurate — even if it slows the tabulation process.
“We acknowledge the problem,” said Errol Arthur, the elections board chairman. “We’re looking forward.”
The larger issue might be the age of the technology the city is using. Ed Smith, a Sequoia vice president, told the committee that the District’s optical scan voting machines are one generation old, and its touch-screen machines are two generations old.
D.C., Smith said, “is the only jurisdiction running this configuration in the country.”
Cheh accused the board of acting in a “non-innovative, non-progressive, non-proactive” manner. How is it, she asked, that “we’ve come to be the jurisdiction with the ancient equipment?”
“I think quite honestly I inherited the equipment that’s here,” said Sylvia Goldsberry-Adams, acting executive director of the elections board.
Cary Silverman, who was soundly defeated by Ward 2 Councilman Jack Evans in the September primary, has called for a recount in his race. He said Friday the vote tabulations still are not trustworthy.
“I feel as though we’ve just slipped backward in the last few years,” said at-large Councilman Phil Mendelson.
