Protest of California Voting "No Hearing" Hearing

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[research99]

(Someone sent this to me via Email. Looked interesting).

Protest of California Secretary of State: Decision To Hold A "No Hearing Hearing"

On November 21, 2005, citizens may voice their concerns about what voting system will record their votes, but thanks to a decision by Secretary of State Bruce McPherson, there's absolutely no guarantee that anyone with the authority to certify voting systems in California will hear those voices.

California law requires the Secretary of State to conduct a public hearing as a condition of certifying any voting systems in the state. The Secretary of State has scheduled a hearing for November 21, 2005 on the question of whether certain Diebold voting systems will should be certified before the end of the year.

"The Secretary of State has disbanded the Voting Systems Panel that's supposed to conduct these hearings and has replaced it with one person, a stenographer, and a tape recorder," said Sherry Healy, a steering committee member of the California Election Protection Network (CEPN), a non-partisan organization of over 25 groups across California who have come together to try and ensure the integrity of California's election systems. "How the Secretary of State can classify this as true 'public input' is beyond me. If he had any interest in what the public had to say about these Diebold systems, he would have joined the VSP panel at this public hearing instead of disbanding it and sending a tape recorder and a stenographer in its place."

"Doesn't this sound like a closed-door public hearing?" asked Carole Mills, Co-Chair of the Marin Democracy For America (DFA) group.

Dagmar Zakim, another steering committee member of the CEPN, asked "Is this legally sufficient for a public hearing? I mean is this the new government trend for public hearings - just give the people a room and a tape recorder?"

Jody Holder, a long time election reform activist, summed his concerns up by saying "What the chief elections officer of our state, is trying to do is to prevent people from using their right to influence the process for approving the voting systems. It's these people's votes these machines are counting! Time and time again, this administration has arbitrarily disregarded all established precedents on how public's voice can be heard.

"For two years, concerned voters of this state have been traveling to Sacramento to voice their concerns about voting on electronic voting machines at public hearings," continued Holder. "Their concerns have been increasingly recognized by the Legislature, resulting in new laws requiring paper verification of their votes, and requiring that the paper record be used in the required manual audit and in any recount (SB 370 [Bowen]). Unfortunately, Secretary of State McPherson opposed using voter verified paper records for any audit and recount.

"Now, Secretary McPherson has made it virtually impossible for people to provide meaningful testimony, expert witnesses, and public comment on the proposal to certify the Diebold machines for use in California," continued Holder. "In June, over 200 people traveled to Sacramento to voice their concerns at a public hearing before a panel of advisors to the Secretary of State on voting systems. Since then, every scheduled meeting of the VSP has been cancelled, and now the Secretary has simply disbanded the VSP without notice, without hearings about what will replace it, without any type of due process."

The California Election Protection Network is calling on Secretary McPherson to reverse his arbitrary abandonment of established procedures and to allow people to provide meaningful input on the voting systems approved for use in this state. CEPN believes the voters of California are entitled to be able to choose their representatives with the confidence that their votes are recorded and counted accurately. It is the duty of the Secretary, as the chief elections officer of the state, to make sure voting systems are approved in the interests of Californians, not the voting system vendors or the local election officials. The most important duty of a Secretary of State is assuring the citizens that we can vote with confidence on the voting systems he approves.

Sarah Rath of CEPN and CitizensAct said, "Even if this turns out to be legal by some technicality, it illuminates for us all what Bruce McPherson stands for, and against."

For more information: http://www.califelectprotect.net.

[newzjunkey]

Love it!

[ArmstedFragg]

Essentially, they were planning to turn the meeting into another one of their staged protests, and they're upset because they can't force anyone else to listen to it.

The current occupant of the office is a Republican. The prior occupant was a Democrat who resigned his position following an investigation of the office's use of Federal voter registration funds to pay for partisan activities.

Need I say more?

[mvpel]

I remember a crowd of us testifying against the expansion of the "assault weapon" ban, under guard by six armed plainclothes officers.

Even though the commitee was present, it was not really any different than what they propose here - it merely had the outward appearance of representatives listening to their constituents, where this doesn't.