Friday, Feb. 17, 2006
by Jared S. Hopkins
Capital News Service

ANNAPOLIS — State lawmakers followed Gov. Robert L. Ehrlich Jr.’s lead Thursday in expressing concerns about the reliability of the state’s electronic voting machines.

‘‘I just want to get through the 2006 election,” said Sen. James Brochin (D-Dist. 42) of Towson during a hearing on a bill to require the state’s voting machines to produce paper records of ballots. ‘‘I worry about this catastrophe in 2006.”

Ehrlich (R) wrote to the state elections board Wednesday that he is no longer confident the state could carry out fair and accurate elections this year because of concerns about voting machines and a new early voting law.

Two weeks ago, the House Ways and Means Committee discussed security problems with the electronic voting system machines, made by Diebold Inc., as Elections Administrator Linda H. Lamone defended the system, saying requiring paper ballots would be too costly and impossible to put in before the elections.

Lamone repeated those concerns Thursday before the Senate Education, Health and Environment Subcommittee.

‘‘I continue to believe that we don’t need it and I continue to believe that we don’t have the money for it,” she said. ‘‘It’s just not workable.”

Linda Schade continued to battle on behalf of paper-producing election machines, producing a chart documenting problems discovered in the 2004 election in Baltimore.

Schade, co-founder of TrueVoteMD, an advocacy group for paper ballots, received the documents as part of litigation against Lamone.

The Senate also heard from a researcher, who concluded in an earlier study that changes to the voting machines by the September primary would be impossible. Don Norris, a University of Maryland, Baltimore County public policy professor, told senators that half of his survey’s 800 polling subjects said the Maryland voting system ‘‘can be corrupted.”

‘‘Voters need to find confidence in the system,” said committee Chairwoman Paula C. Hollinger (D-Dist. 11) of Pikesville. ‘‘There are people who don’t have the confidence. It’s up to us to try and find a way to give this state confidence.”

As in the past, Lamone cited cost and time as the two main factors in why a change cannot be made by September. She said it would cost $55 million to install a new system. TrueVoteMD estimated machines at $5,000 and the total cost at $24 million. Diebold has also said optical scanners are about $5,000.

Following a closed session Thursday with members of the House subcommittee and representatives of Diebold, Del. Jean B. Cryor (R-Dist. 15) of Potomac said time constraints will prevent paper trails by September.

‘‘I think one thing is very clear though — there will be no paper trail this year,” she said.

Mark Radke, director of Diebold Election Systems, defended the machines, saying that a new system would be feasible by 2008.

Diebold does make machines that produce paper ballots, but because state law does not require such records, they were never purchased.

Twenty-seven states have mandated paper ballots, according to VerifiedVoting.com.

Capital News Service reporter Connor Adams Sheets contributed to this report.

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