Topic: TACIR

TACIR to act on verifiable votes

January 8, 2008 |

Yesterday’s New York Time’s Magazine cover story, “Can You Count on Voting Machines?,” offers valuable and in depth coverage of electronic voting machines and the threat they pose to the foundation of our democratic process - our right to vote in free and fair elections.

In Tennessee, 93 out of 95 counties use electronic voting machines with no voter verifiable paper trail. That means there is no way to be completely sure of an accurate tally or recount in the event one is needed.

This Thursday, January 10, the legislature’s Voter Confidence Act Legislative Study Committee will meet to discuss the findings of the Tennessee Advisory Commission on Intergovernmental Relations (TACIR) report, “Trust But Verify,” which recommends that to improve election integrity in Tennessee we move away from electronic voting machines and replace them with paper-based optical scan machines. «Read the rest of this article»

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NYT to blast e-voting; TACIR urges verifiable votes in Tennessee

By Christine Anne Piesyk | January 5, 2008 |

“A long way from where we started…”

With those words activist Bernie Ellis, a staunch advocate for traceable, verifiable voting records, cited a BRAD BLOG report announcing the publication of a major New York Times article on the issues surrounding electronic voting.

According to The BRAD BLOG, the NYT article includes a graphic of an exploding voting booth and a warning that your vote may be “lost, destroyed, miscounted, wrongly attributed or hacked.” The story is reportedly titled “The Bugs in the Machine.” The story claims that electronic voting machines may create far greater problems than hanging chads and cites a ten percent failure of electronic voting machines. http://www.bradblog.com «Read the rest of this article»

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TACIR commissioners recommend voter-verified paper ballot for Tennessee

By Bernie Ellis | December 17, 2007 |

The TACIR “Trust But Verify” report recommends that Tennessee move to voter-verified paper ballots to improve election integrity.

Our efforts to achieve more secure elections in Tennessee moved forward this week when the TN Advisory Commission on Intergovernmental Relations (TACIR) voted unanimously to release the TACIR staff report, Trust But Verify, to the state legislature and the general public.

The TACIR Commissioners were obviously influenced by the outpouring of emails and other messages they received from many of you last week. They told us that hearing from so many people did influence their deliberations. We need that to happen again in the next 2-3 days in order to move safe elections legislation forward.

The joint legislative study committee that is considering a bill to require optical scan voting systems statewide by November, 2008 meets on Tuesday, December 18. The recommendations of this study committee and the actions it recommends to the legislature will go a long way toward determining if our elections will be secure in 2008. «Read the rest of this article»

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Voters: Demand a verifiable voting process

By Bernie Ellis | December 11, 2007 |

It’s not too late to take action on the issue of electronic voting machines and demand a “verifiable vote” through paper trail and/or auditing. Activist Bernie Ellis (right), who is featured in the film UnCounted:The Movie and who addressed a Clarksville audience on Friday, today offers a fledgling “action kit” for worried voters who want to register their concerns with state leaders. These words from Mr. Ellis:

This “action kit” will get you started (or moving faster) to register your concerns with our state leaders.

Here are three things YOU CAN DO NOW to help up ramp up the discussion for voter-verified paper ballots and mandatory random audits here in Tennessee. «Read the rest of this article»

Sections: Opinion, Politics | 1 Comment »