Cheers for Gov. Martin O’Malley for including $6.8 million in his proposed 2009 budget to pay for Maryland’s transition from touch-screen electronic voting machines back to recountable paper ballots by 2010. The funding is critical to ensure that the state’s $100 million mistake is finally corrected.
A previous attempt to leave the electronic machines behind was blocked by Senate President Thomas V. Mike Miller, who didn’t want to give Republican Gov. Robert Ehrlich something to tout during his re-election effort. Even after O’Malley was elected, Miller tried to prevent the measure from reaching the floor for a vote. He caved under pressure last April, and a half-hour before midnight on the last day of the session, the General Assembly passed the bill unanimously.
O’Malley signed it in May, but there was no funding. Prompted by Takoma Park-based TrueVote Maryland, which has been pushing for paper ballots for five years, hundreds of voters contacted the governor’s office during the 2007 special session, urging him to set aside thenecessary funds. Which, to the governor’s credit, he has done. TrueVote executive director Kevin Zeese told The Examiner his group will be watching to make sure the money remains in the final budget. It also wants random, routine audits of election results, and it’s not too late for the legislature to correct this obvious oversight.
Maryland was one of the first states to acquire e-voting machines after the 2000 “hanging chad” debacle in Florida, but it has not been at the front of the pack in disavowing them after numerous security flaws were discovered. In fact, longtime elections administrator Linda Lamone, who purchased the machines, still insists they’re error- and tamper-proof despite all evidence to the contrary. The switch back to paper would “be over my dead body,” Lamone recently declared. Somebody better check her pulse.
And speaking of Lamone, the Parris Glendening appointee not only persuaded Miller to kill a bill requiring a voter-verified paper trail in 2005, she also persuaded him to back passage of another bill that basically puts her in charge of Maryland elections for life — even if all five members of the State Board of Elections vote to fire her. Lamone’s blatant conflict of interest — she appeared in an advertisement for Diebold Inc., which has a multimillion-dollar contract with the state that she administers — is reason enough to oust her. Zeese calls the “Lamone for Life” bill “one of the most embarrassing laws any state has ever passed.” It needs to be repealed, pronto.
