Computer glitch leaves Atlanta voters waiting  (GA)

MARCUS K. GARNER    The Atlanta Journal-Constitution   30 October 2008

An Atlanta early voting center encountered a glitch that left hundreds of voters waiting for more than an hour to cast their ballots Thursday night.

Around 7:30 p.m., four of the five terminals connecting the Adamsville Recreation Center, 3201 Martin Luther King Drive S.W., to the Secretary of State’s voter database went down, Fulton County election chief Dwight Brower said. The computers are used to verify voter registration.
Brower said the malfunction originated with State Secretary Karen Handel’s office, the Georgia division responsible for elections.

“The state was having an Internet connectivity issue,” he said.

But Handel spokesman Matt Carrothers suggested the fault belonged to Fulton County.

“What appears to have caused this was when one of the computers at the location would time out, it would have problems reconnecting with the state voter registration system,” Carrothers said. “We’re not sure why the computers would’ve been timing out when there were people still in line.”

Voter Andree Heath, of Atlanta, got in line to vote at 6:30 p.m., and didn’t actually reach the polling machines until just before 10:30 p.m. “I was going to vote, no matter what happened,” Heath said.

Atlanta City Council President Lisa Borders came to Adamsville to help keep voters comfortable during the delay.

“I suggest that (Handel) investigate what happened here and fix it, and extend the hours for advance voting through the weekend and Monday … as North Carolina and Florida have done,” Borders said.

The voting machines began operating again at around 9 p.m. By 10:30 p.m., almost all voters had finished voting.