Thursday, May 20, 2010

Violation of PA Sunshine Law in Election Board Meeting

Posting at Vote PA

Asking the questions for input here in hopes someone can answer before the Fayette Election Board holds an announced and advertised meeting next week.
Was the Fayette Election Board 'emergency meeting' held Election eve (Tues. May 18, 2010) (at an unknown time but prior to 11 pm) to determine what to do after an election judge mistakenly handed out two ballots to Primary voters registered as Republican and Democrat (special election ballots intended for registered Independents in addition to Primary election ballots which included the special election contest) in violation of the Pennsylvania Sunshine Law?
Who has the power to convene a meeting of the Election Board, without public notification, and who is able to attend the emergency meeting? And can an "investigation" be ordered within the emergency meeting that was unadvertised? And when did the "investigation" begin such as during the emergency meeting? Were any paper ballots reviewed during the emergency meeting?
It's unclear whether lawyers for all the candidates in the special election were informed of the situation that had occurred in the one local precinct and were invited to the unannounced emergency meeting and did or did not attend such an emergency meeting of the Election Board.
What action was taken after 1 PM regarding the eScan voting system upon notification of the situation by the precinct Election Judge?
Was the eScan decommissioned and/or reset or both? What happened to the memory card?
How is it possible 3 different news articles are at variance on the number of voters who may have voted twice in the special election contest? Are at variance on the number of duplicate paper ballots, etc.
And where are the accurate numbers for how many voters the eScan private voter count recorded as utilizing the eScan prior to the error of duplicate ballots being discovered?
Thank you for any help you can provide. Any recommendations on whether or not there are grounds to proceed would be appreciated.
PA Citizen Mom
Note: the following PA Independent article dated May 18, 2010 175 People Voted Twice in Fayette County was available the eve of the Election (via grassrootspa link) and did not include mention that an emergency Fayette Election Board meeting had been held Tuesday ... unknown time... the article quotes the election board solictor who says a meeting of the Election Board will be held...
No announcement is made that an emergency meeting will be held Tuesday, Election Day. In addition, the PA Independent article entitled 175 People Voted Twice in Fayete County notes comment by the director of the Fayette Election Bureau regarding how the situation was handled after it was discovered:
After realizing she had made a mistake, Ms. Lilley contacted Larry Blosser, the director of the Fayette County Election Bureau, who told her to secure all the ballots that had been cast and re-set the electronic voting machines.
"We've secured the ballots that were voted on the e-scan machine," said Sheryl Heid, election bureau solicitor for Fayette County. "We're going to hold them separately and the election board will hold a meeting to decide what to do with them."
http://paindependent.com/todays_news/detail/175-people-voted-twice-in-fayette-county
Meanwhile, the Tribune Review article includes mention on Wed. May 19, 2010 in the topic sentence that Fayette County Commissioners and Common Pleas Court Judge Nancy Vernon convened an emergency meeting last night ...
The interesting thing is one of the 3 county commissioners was not a member of the election board as he was seeking a slot on the Dem. Party Committee... a local attorney had been appointed to serve on the Election Board for the time being. It is unclear then if the full election board met with the attorney or without, or whether two county commissioners and Judge Vernon convened the meeting.
The title of the Trib article is also notable: Duplicate Ballots Investigated
Meanwhile, in its article on the matter published May 19, 2010, the Herald Standard article includes mention of the meeting which was "called" wherein presumably, Judge Nancy Vernon"ordered a count of the of paper ballots cast at one North Union Township precinct late Tuesday to determine how many voters potentially cast more than one ballot for the special election for the 12th Congressional District."
It is astonishing that 3 different articles over the course of a day issue far different numbers about how many people may have voted twice, or cast duplicate votes, or however the situation is worded.
Who issued the information to the three different news outlets and why is there a discrepancy of numbers from the very beginning and including follow-up articles published Thursday, May 20, 2010?
It would be too confusing to post the May 20 articles... so here are these...
PA Citizen Mom
175 People Voted Twice in Fayette County
Poll worker mistakenly gave voters two ballots
MAY 18, 2010 by ERIC BOEHMA mistake at a polling place in Fayette County allowed 175 people to double-vote this morning in the special election for the Pennsylvania 12th Congressional district.
Amber Lilley, judge of elections at the North Union Township fourth precinct, said she mistakenly thought she was supposed to give out two ballots to each individual in her precinct during today's election because the election served as both a primary election and a special election to fill the Congressional seat vacated by the death of John Murtha.
"There were paper ballots, and there were ballots just for the independent voters for the special election, and my understanding, which was mistaken, was that those were special ballots for the special election," she said.
Ms. Lilley said she eventually realized her mistake, but by then 178 people had already voted. Of that total, 120 were Republicans, 55 were Democrats, and three were Independents.
Because of her mistake, the 175 Republicans and Democrats were able to vote twice, once on their full ballot that included the primary and special election, and once on the special election ballot that was supposed to be used only for independent voters.
After realizing she had made a mistake, Ms. Lilley contacted Larry Blosser, the director of the Fayette County Election Bureau, who told her to secure all the ballots that had been cast and re-set the electronic voting machines.
"We've secured the ballots that were voted on the e-scan machine," said Sheryl Heid, election bureau solicitor for Fayette County. "We're going to hold them separately and the election board will hold a meeting to decide what to do with them."
Ms. Lilley said she was elected to the position of election supervisor in November and was not even aware she had won the election until February. Though she took responsibility for the mix-up, she said her training consisted of little more than watching some videos and basic directions from the state Election Commission.
Ms. Lilley is registered as a Democrat, but a Republican poll watcher was also present at the location throughout the day. Ms. Lilley said the poll watcher also misunderstood the directions on the ballot.
The special election in the 12th Congressional district is between Democrat Mark Critz, Republican Tim Burns, and Libertarian Demo Agoris.
Eric Boehm is a reporter for PA Independent. He can be reached at Eric@PAIndependent.com
http://paindependent.com/todays_news/detail/175-people-voted-twice-in-fayette-county

Duplicate ballots investigated
By Rich CholodofskyTRIBUNE-REVIEWWednesday, May 19, 2010
Fayette County commissioners and Common Pleas Court Judge Nancy Vernon convened an emergency meeting last night to decide how to handle possible duplicate ballots cast by voters in one Uniontown area precinct.
Elections officials said that voters using paper ballots early in the day at the North Union VFW were erroneously given two ballots to cast, a situation that may skew results in the special election between Democrat Mark Critz and Republican Tim Burns to fill the remainder of the 12th Congressional District term of the late Rep. John Murtha.
Fayette County Elections Bureau solicitor Sheryl Heid said the elections board was still meeting at 11 p.m. and had not reached a decision about how the ballots would be counted.
As many as 223 voters may have cast duplicate ballots, Heid said
The voting error occurred when a first-time judge of elections erroneously passed out two sets of paper ballots to voters until about 1:15 p.m.
Fayette County voters have the option of casting votes on an electronic machine or on paper ballots. Heid said that Democrat and Republican voters were given primary ballots as well as a secondary paper ballot for the special election that was only to be passed out to independent voters who cannot participate in the primary.
Although those duplicate votes were scanned and tabulated, they were immediately removed from the tallies, Heid said.
"We've taken steps to isolate the votes," Heid said.
http://www.pittsburghlive.com/x/pittsburghtrib/news/fayette/s_681829.html

Judge orders count of paper ballots after possible duplicate votes May 19, 2010 01:32 AM
TEXT SIZE
By: AMY REVAK
Fayette County Judge Nancy D. Vernon ordered a count of paper ballots cast at one North Union Township precinct late Tuesday to determine how many voters potentially cast more than one ballot for the special election for the 12th Congressional District.
A hearing on the issue was called after it was discovered that Judge of Elections Amber Lilley had handed out duplicate paper ballots for the special election, according to Sheryl Heid, solicitor for the Fayette County Election Bureau.
The mistake was discovered and corrected after 178 people had voted at the North Union Township No. 4 polling place, and the machine was shut down after 223 people had voted. Because voters have the option of either using the e-Slate electronic voting machine or using a paper ballot that is scanned on the e-Scan machine, it was unknown exactly how many voters used paper ballots, and therefore could have overvoted, Heid said.
Heid explained that Lilley handed out two paper ballots to each of those voting at the polling place, which could have led to some people voting twice in the special election.
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The special election includes the Democratic candidate Mark Critz, the Republican candidate Tim Burns and the Libertarian candidate Demo Agoris. Heid said the Democratic and Republican ballots had the special election listed on them, and the other ballots that listed only the special election should have only gone to voters of other political parties. She said three people in other parties voted in the precinct, all by paper ballot.
Larry Blosser, head of the election bureau, said a count of the paper ballots could be made to determine how many people possibly voted twice for the special election.
Vernon ordered the election board, which includes Commissioners Vincent Zapotosky and Angela M. Zimmerlink and attorney Mark Mehalov, along with attorney James T. Davis, representing Critz and attorney Gary Altman, representating Burns, to count the ballots and then report to court, when she would make a decision.
The count and decision were unavailable late Tuesday.
http://www.heraldstandard.com/news_detail/article/1220/2010/may/19/judge-orders-count-of-paper-ballots-after-possible-duplicate-votes.html

Friday, October 10, 2008

Walk Softly

Know yourself.

Personality Particulars

Want to discover who you really are? Your political personality?

Which of the basic temperaments fit you.

Start with an overview.

Temperament Blends

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Four_Temperaments