The Future of Voting in California
Secretary of State Hearing, February 8, 2010
Remarks by Kim Alexander
Thank you Secretary of State Debra Bowen, your staff, and all
the people who have traveled to Sacramento to participate in
this hearing today.
I am Kim Alexander, president of the California Voter Foundation
(CVF), a nonprofit, nonpartisan organization I refounded in 1994
to advance the responsible use of technology in the democratic
process.
For over twenty years I have been involved in elections in California,
and for the past ten have been deeply involved in the topic of
voting equipment and voting security. CVF was a leading proponent
of the voter-verified paper audit trail requirement and also
of advancing electronic filing and online disclosure of campaign
finance reports, both in California and nationwide. CVF provides
California voters with online access to reliable, nonpartisan
information on propositions and candidates, via our web site,
www.calvoter.org.
I have seen a lot of change over the years, but some things
remain the same.
One of the biggest problems facing California voters is the
lack of standardization in the voting process. We have 58 counties,
and essentially 58 different voting systems. Every aspect of
the process – large and small – varies from county
to county. Some counties allow voters to look up their registration
status online, some don’t. Some promote vote-by-mail voting,
others don’t. The variation in polling place practices
and poll worker training is mind-boggling. A 2008 study by the
State Auditor on poll worker training reviewed the practices
in eight counties and found that some appeared to train poll
workers only partially in certain areas, such as cultural competency,
rights of voters, and relevant election law, despite the Legislature’s
and Secretary of State’s efforts over several years to
standardize training across counties.
The UC Berkeley Election Administration Resource Center (EARC)
has also conducted research into county poll worker programs
and poll worker training since January 2005. The EARC found that:
We observed a tremendous amount of variation across counties
in their training of election workers, even where they shared
the same voting machines and might reasonably conduct a similar
training…..
The most common reason for variation was the difference in
organization of Election Day processes and materials, down
to details such as color coding schemes or when to tear off
a ballot stub. These procedural differences clearly stem from
each county election department evolving its own way over the
years and reflecting the style of its managers.1
These variations in election practices, along with the variations
and procedures applied in the use of voting equipment in California,
make it enormously difficult for the public to have a clear sense
of the rights to which they are entitled, or the ability to judge
whether their county is following election law. It also creates
a situation where not all voters in the state enjoy equal voting
rights.
This lack of standardization continues today, as counties begin
to acquire new devices to aid in their voting systems, such as
ballot sorting and automatic signature verification machines.
One was recently acquired by Sonoma County. It is my understanding
the several other counties have similar systems in operation,
and that none of these are subject to state certification, standards,
or testing. There are no uniform procedures in place that say
how these machines should be calibrated, or what to do in the
case of a false negative, or worse, a false positive. It is enormously
disturbing to me, after watching counties spend hundreds of millions
on dollars on questionable voting equipment, some of which was
purchased before it was certified by either the state or federal
government, to continue acquiring new equipment without that
equipment being required to meet any kind of statewide standard.
Clearly, some of this variation is a function of the several
attempts made in recent years by state policy makers to make
voting easier and more convenient for Californians. Whatever
their intended effects, these efforts have also had the inadvertent
effect of making the voting process more complex and confusing
for voters. No voter attempting to register, cast a vote, or
understand election results can be exactly sure of what to do
or what to expect. The other vitally important consequence of
this bewildering complexity is a loss of accountability. When
things go wrong, is it an accident, is it incompetence, or is
someone trying to shape electoral outcomes by manipulating the
process?
Such questions most recently arose in California during the
so-called “double-bubble” fiasco in Los Angeles County,
where tens of thousands of votes cast in the Democratic presidential
primary went uncounted due to poor ballot design and voter education.
That episode led California Secretary of State Debra Bowen to
comment, at a legislative hearing following the fiasco, that: “(We
are) in an election system that has evolved since the beginning
of our history as a country in a way that we probably would not
design if we were to design it today.”
One reason, I believe, why we find ourselves in this situation
where we have such wide variations in election practices across
the state is because of a lack of staffing and funding at both
the state and county levels. There are simply not enough people
or resources to conduct a big-picture analysis of California’s
election process. The priority is always to prepare for the next
election, just around the corner, and this constricts the window
of opportunity for thinking about and implementing systemic and
comprehensive change.
If one county wants to begin an early voting program, for example,
but another county cannot take on that additional responsibility,
the practical and political solution has been to allow the county
that has the resources to go forward but not impose a state mandate.
This also has the advantage that the state does not have to fund
the change. The downside of making public policy for voting and
elections in this way in a large and diverse state like California
is such a deeply embedded and structurally endemic lack of uniformity
in election practices that fairness and accountability are jeopardized.
Yet another problem is that the voting rules are complex. Voters
are drawn into nonsensical political districts, elect dozens
of individuals to represent them in various public offices, and
vote on numerous local and state propositions. The primary election
rules get changed every other year. Then on top of all this,
58 counties are each running their own voting systems with unique
procedures. It is inefficient, duplicative, wasteful, and most
wretchedly, it ill-serves the voters of California. California
voters are unnecessarily and unfairly disenfranchised because
they get caught in a rabbits’ warren of holes and missteps.
The development of uniform standards and procedures for election
processes and polling place operations across the state could
ensure a more predictable, positive, and consistent experience
for California voters and provide a basis for holding election
officials accountable. Greater uniformity would also make it
easier for voter education groups to give voters accurate and
precise information about what to expect from their experiences
as voters. And it would reduce the workload on county election
offices.
However, elections are one of the trickiest areas of public
policy to reform. First of all they are perennial, they take
place every two years (sometimes more frequently). It’s
not an ongoing problem, it is a problem that rises and falls
before, during and after each election. Some crisis occurs, people
are outraged, time passes and the issues are forgotten until
they arise again.
It’s also considered a “soft” area of government – i.e.
not a life or death situation. It’s like libraries and
parks, not fire, law enforcement, hospitals. Funding for elections
is easier to withhold because what’s the downside? Nobody
dies, and no one loses their jobs if people don’t show
up to vote.
Another reason why elections are hard to reform is because unlike
every other area of public policy, election reform is an area
where every politician is an expert. Each one has had a direct
experience with a particular election problem. And they want
their problem to be addressed. So it’s hard to build consensus.
So how to overcome these barriers and make election reform possible,
on a big scale? How could we achieve something so ambitious as
uniform statewide voting standards? How do we “grow up” our
voting system, replace what we are doing now with something efficient,
something that equally enfranchises all voters, something less
provincial and more inviting, where the rules are the same up
and down the state, the instructions and procedures are the same,
we can all follow along and make sure the process is working
properly?
First, at the state and local levels, there needs to be a more
active constituency of concerned citizens speaking out for election
resources. These folks also need to make sure that election reform
doesn’t fall off the table at the end of the year.
Secondly, county boards of supervisors and the legislature need
to provide more, not less funding for elections. And lawmakers
need to be more thoughtful about what they are doing to the election
process and to voters when they change the laws willy-nilly.
Thirdly, metrics need to be developed – how do you know
if an election is “good enough”? What is a “good
enough” turnout? If we set some performance standards for
accuracy, accountability and turnout, it would help the public
and election officials alike know where to aim and provide a
tool for measuring performance and progress over time. It may
also motivate politicians to care more about election reform
if they think the legitimacy of their own election victories
could be called into question because of poor turnout.
We desperately need to create statewide voting standards for
security, accountability, and participation. We need to give
all California voters equal access to the voting process – to
check their voter registration status online, to vote early,
to observe the vote counting process. Then we will have a voting
system worthy of this great state.
1 University of California,
Berkeley, Election Administration Research Center, ”A Snapshot
of California Poll Worker Training in 2005,” (unpublished
report, 2006). |
