Speaker Summaries

At the Monday, November 13 luncheon meeting, Garland Favorito, founder of Voters Organized for Trusted Election Results in Georgia (VoterGA), spoke to Madison Forum members and guests on what’s wrong with our current voting process and how it happened.

Mr. Favorito said that in 2002 Georgia became the first state to implement statewide electronic voting. In 2004 Georgia received a rating as the worst voter implementation in the country after we spent 55 million dollars on that electronic vote implementation. He pointed out that prior to 2002 82% of voters cast their ballots punch cards or optical scan equipment. It could be viewed and verified as being correct. When the electronic link came in, the percentage of eligible ballots was reduced from 82% to 0%. That voting cannot be verified, audited, or recounted today. Voters cannot verify what’s on their ballot, because, if there is a ballot, it is an internal, inaccessible data base record. There is no way to audit this on election night. There is no procedure to make sure on election night that the ballots were counted correctly. These machines do not capture any direct physical evidence of voter intent, so you have nothing to recount. You can only re-accumulate the previous totals. You cannot do what we could consider as a legitimate recount. So, what that basically means is that fraud and error are now undetectable statewide. From the voter perspective, you can’t see what is on your ballot, you can’t physically verify that your ballot was ever cast, and you can’t participate in counting the ballots to determine the election results, so what more can be done to disenfranchise the voters than that.

Mr. Favorito pointed out that essentially the government is saying;” We have your ballot, and we will show you what’s on it, and we will give you the screen, but you can no longer see that the votes actually were reported”. There is a broken chain of custody between the voter and the ballot which is now in an inaccessible data base. There is also a broken chain from the precinct all the way to the state, because the lower levels are not verifying that their totals were placed into the upper level totals correctly. The verification is coming from the top down when we should be verifying from the bottom up.

Mr. Favorito said that many studies have come out, from various universities around the country, showing that these machines that we have carry serious security flaws. In addition, the machines can be reprogrammed to count differently on election night than they do when they were certified. This opens the way for a number of scenarios of error with no way of verifying how any ballot was recorded. Several states have already concluded that the voting machines we use in Georgia are inadequate to conduct elections in this state.

Mr. Favorito says that what we need is equipment that will produce a real ballot, we need procedures at the precincts on election night that make sure those machines counted correctly, and if discrepancies are found at precinct balloting, then the candidates involved should be entitled to a recount at no charge to the candidates and no charge to the parties involved.

Mr. Favorito says we are at this point because the specific recommendation made by the Secretary of State and the 21st Century Voting Commission that the chosen system should have the ability to produce an independent paper audit trail of every vote cast was ignored by the implementation team. As a result no machines that had that capability were evaluated. There are many issues about federal certification that basically allows the venders to set up themselves to certify themselves.

Mr. Favorito’s organization has tried to make itself heard in the state about these issues including having members testify at the Sate Elections Board meeting in March 2006, The board had enough money to provide all machines with printed ballot capability, but over the objections of everyone who spoke at that meeting, the board voted to spend that money on electronic poll books. His group appealed to the Governor, who did nothing. Both Democrats and Republicans have voted against bills requiring audit trails. The 3-precinct pilot self repealed after the pilot, and no audit trail was implemented.

Mr. Favorito said that virtually all the candidates who opposed his organization have now been successfully retired. VoterGA has two bi-partisan bills in the state legislature, SB591 and HB790 and has organized a lawsuit against Georgia’s current unverifiable electronic voting methods intending to prove that current Georgia voting is illegal and unconstitutional according to state law.

The regular breakfast meeting on Saturday, November 25, 2006 was primarily focused on a proposal, made by Dr John Abraham, for an annual Constitutional Contest for Cobb County 4th grade classes.

Dr. Abraham said that, from conversations with school principals and faculty, and with Madison Forum members, the idea came for a way to promote a better understanding of the U.S. Constitution. He said that it is difficult to insert yourself into a system that will have many excuses for why something can’t be done, so he came up with the idea of having a contest on the Constitution offered to all 4th grade classes in Cobb County

The purpose of the contest is to promote a greater understanding and appreciation of the intent and ideas behind the United States Constitution. 4th graders would compete as a class, with the finals to be hosted at a local venue and, hopefully, televised on Channel 23 or Public Television.

Basically, $25,000 would be raised for prize money which would be divided between the winning class and its teacher. This would be first prize, and the only prize.

The contest would be some kind of question where Madison Forum members, or members of other civic organizations could be used as coaches for all schools so they would have a firm footing. He hopes to have this contest publicized on Channel 23 or on Public Television, have a dignitary give the final test, maybe at Kennesaw State. But the big thing is to award the money.

Dr. Abraham said that he feels that if this is done, and done right, then we will see a groundswell of public participation asking “how come we don’t do this in schools”, and then the door is open to a great idea. He said that he is a great believer in the carrot, and the carrot is the $25,000, winner takes all, with a caveat that of that amount, $10,000 has to be spent in the classroom. This would be above the funding that each classroom supposedly gets.

Essentially, the contest would be annual, at a particular time, open to all 4th grade classes, and non-partisan. There would be an eclectic mix of people writing and evaluating the questions, and a big name personality giving them out. If it gains ground, it might evolve into a day of discussions and seminars by notable people who look at the Constitution from different angles.

Discussion covered a number of questions and ideas:

How many 4th grades there are in Cobb County?

Might this age be too young for this kind of contest? Should it be for 8th graders, which seems to be the grade where civics is taught?

Would several smaller prizes be more of an incentive than one big prize?

Dr. Abraham replied to this that his vision is, if this works, and if it’s a contest, and it’s done well and done fair, and equitably, and everyone feels like they had a fair chance to participate, and there is a prize, or prizes, then the idea is that we will start seeing the PTAs thinking bigger. His major emphasis for the school board is student performance, student achievement. He feels that if the carrot is big enough it will be the incentive to get teachers involved in this plan.

Should the contest be for public schools only? Dr. Abraham thinks it should.

Should the contest go statewide? And would this help the Madison Forum expand?

Should the prize include a class trip to Washington to see our government in action?

It was pointed out that we need good, accurate information. Mike Opitz said that is in hand.

It was suggested that we confine the contest to one county, to establish validity and give the big prize. The next year look into expanding. The Madison Forum will be expanding as well.

It was also suggested that the concentration should be on the Declaration of Independence as well as the Constitution.

It was suggested that the contest should be able to be inserted in already existing classroom curriculum, to help teachers to become motivated as well as the students, because school administrators are always aware of No Child Left Behind. Dr Abraham feels that the groups that need to be sold on the contest are the PTAs and the school councils. He said that Cobb School Superintendent Fred Sanderson likes the idea.

It was suggested that we have volunteers go into the schools on September 17, Constitution Day, because the schools have got to address the Constitution at least one day a year in all classes.

There was a comment about a group working with 6th, 7th, and 8th graders in a middle school in west Cobb. The group is staffed by three history teachers at the school who only provide guidance and support. The initiative comes from the students.

It was suggested we find out at what level American History is taught in Cobb County schools, see where it first comes in, and decide if, at that earlier level, they are developmentally ready to deal with a project like this.

It was pointed out that there are single 4th grades in schools, but higher grades are separated into several classes. There may be three social studies teachers in one middle school.

Dr. Abraham said he feels that this should be a community effort. He said there is a lot of intellectual capital in the community as well as within the school system. He feels the winner will be the team with the best collaboration. And he feels we have to start early, even before middle school.

It was pointed out that 4th graders are still in their formative years, while by the 8th grade they are predisposed to a lot of things and have begun to form opinions. Maybe the contest could be on a two-tier basis - 4th grade and 8th grade.

Dr. Abraham feels that the contest needs to be narrow in focus in the beginning and then evaluated.

A sign-up sheet was passed around for people who are interested in joining planning committees.

The group also discussed compiling a list of current issues to be presented to the State Legislature by the Madison Forum. These would be items that the Forum, as a group, feels should be addressed by our lawmakers in the 2007 session. The list included, among many items, Ethics Reform, Immigration, Dual Citizenship, Voting Fraud, Ballot Access, Ballot Security, and Voting Accountability. This project will be addressed further at a future meeting, and a short list will be compiled to be presented to our State Senators and Representatives.