Voting machine ion may be in secret

A voter types in a "write in" candidate's name during a demonstration of an electronic voting machine at the state Capitol last year. (Steve Griffin/ Tribune file photo)

By Thomas Burr
The Salt Lake Tribune

    Should a state committee charged with deciding how Utahns will vote in the future close their meetings to the public?
    Some officials think so.
    While keeping their meetings open for now, the Voting Equipment Selection Committee on Thursday discussed shutting the doors to the public so as not to raise fears that technology may mess up elections.
    "The [news] media may exacerbate those other problems," Weber County Clerk/Auditor Linda Lunceford, a committee member, said during the group's first meeting. She clarified later that she was concerned that news reports would alarm the public about allegations that new electronic voting equipment was not secure.
    "I'm trying to mitigate a lot of hysteria created by computer people," she said.
    Some computer scientists have said that electronic voting machines like ones Utah plans to use later this year in some precincts could be manipulated by hackers, or that the vote totals couldn't be verified without a printed ballot.
    David Dill, a Stanford University computer-science professor who is leading the charge for a voting paper trail, told The Salt Lake Tribune last year: "Right now, with the touch-screen computers we have, they're not trustworthy. It's an invitation to disaster in many ways."
    Lunceford says such comments alarm the public. "It's so important for the public to trust their voting system," she said.
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    State Elections Director Amy Naccarato said there was a "conscious" decision to have the meetings open until the committee will be debating bids for specific equipment. "This is the public's business," she said.
    Utah plans to replace all punch-card machines with some new type of electronic voting within two years as part of new federal legislation called the Help America Vote Act.
    That mandate was prompted by the chad-laced fiasco in Florida during the 2000 presidential election.
    The voting equipment committee was ed by Lt. Gov. Gayle McKeachnie to decide what type of equipment Utah would use instead of punch-cards, which have yet to cause a problem in Utah elections. The committee made up of computer experts, county officials and advocates for the visually and hearing impaired plan to meet often between now and Sept. 15. That's when the state plans to sign a contract with a vendor to provide the first machines for Utah's use.
    Utah is one of the last states to make the switch from punch-cards voting. "There are others that have experience, but we need to catch up," McKeachnie said.
    The committee also decided Thursday to model the state's purchase after one made by Georgia one of the first states to make the transition to electronic voting.