or advocates -
there isn't time to wait for the creation of yet another non profit
organization. (Non Profit is a mis nomer anyway).
Asking someone else to do the work is not going to pan out.
HCPB must address the 4 A's, Accuracy, Affordability, Accessibility and
Acceptability. This has to be done just as you would in a business plan. It doesn't take an MBA, just someone who thinks
logically.
Accuracy -
has already been documented by the CalTech study and some individual states have
made the effort to study their own data as well. In NC, we only had 3 HCPB counties, and
they are extremely small, atypically small, in that they have less than 6,000 registered voters (about the
size of 2 or 3 large precincts).
CalTech 2001 study -
http://www.cs.duke.edu/~justin/voting/docs/caltech_mit_report_version2.pdf
2004 Undervotes by technology in NC -
http://www.cs.duke.edu/~justin/voting/totals.html
studies comparing optical scan and DREs have been done in Florida and North
Carolina, providing documentation of net annual expenditures. These studies show what a
county can expect to pay per voter per year to operate an elections department. Elections
Departments are open year round, and have other expenses besides the cost of election day.
To show affordability, it is essential to show that how the cost to run a HCPB
county compares to the cost to run a OS or a DRE county. Similar size counties should be compared
if possible.
I have not seen a study of actual net annual expenditures for HCPB anywhere.
Here is my study of OS verses DRE in North Carolina, and how I obtained the data
-
http://www.ncvoter.net/affordable.html
Accessibility -
the answer to how voting will be accessible in a HCPB county, and what it will
cost, must be addressed to provide a complete answer to how HCPB is a viable answer.
A viable option must be provided, must be included in the plan.
Acceptability -
show how HCPB can be done in a reasonable amount of time, and what constitutes
a reasonable amount of time. Provide examples of how HCPB is quicker (and more
sure) than say running an election on electronic voting machines in Chicago (a few weeks
ago), or on electronic voting machines in Texas (this is an annual recurring theme),
or North Carolina in 04.
With the messups this year, some from previous showing how election contests
went on for months without being settled (like in NC for Commiss of Agriculture)
it would be possible to offer a solid argument in favor of HCPB, and to make
it seem a reasonable thing to do.
*Disclosure - Being right is not enough - You will never ever win just by
stating that you are right, or citing some part of the constitution that you believe mandates
HCPB. If you want to be successful, you have be be able to prove your point,
and also give your legislators creditable and reasonable information that they
can use to validate their decisions in favor of HCPB.
This doesn't take money to do, it takes time and hard work.
I recommend obtaining at least one credentialed computer scientist at some point
of the way.
The key is to get ready now, so you can be ready for the "train wreck".
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