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To the Honorable Co-Chairs and the distinguished members of Governor Bush's Task Force on Elections, I am pleased to submit this written testimony for your consideration and deliberation.

My name is Jim Willard and I am formerly the President of Votation Corporation. I began research in the field of elections and voting technology in 1988 and have continued my research and development activities up through this day. This research led to the founding of Votation Corporation in 1994. I have been issued Patents from the United State Patent Office for the Audio Ballot and the Electronic Absentee Ballot. I presently have patents pending for other voting related technology advances. My complete professional biography is appended to the end of this testimony.

My testimony covers the research and development performed in the area of elections and voting technology and provides a brief illustration of the value of good research. This testimony also covers the status of the industry and some of the barriers to progress in the business of election technology.

Through the benefits of CSPAN and the services provided by the Collins Foundation and their website, I have been able to observe much of the testimony provided to this Task Force. You have heard from your state's election officials, the Election Center, a number of special interest groups, and your voting public. What you have clearly heard is that "there is a problems with the elections and the voting machinery used in Florida."

What is remarkable about the testimony provided is what you have not heard and what has not been offered. And what you have not heard is testimony from the elections research community.

I am reminded of the commercial some years back that asked, "Where's the beef?" In this case the question is, "Where's the research?" And its companion question is, "Where is the demand for that research?"

If this Task Force were asked to solve a problem related to taxes there would be no end to the testimony available from the research community including universities, "think tanks," independently funded special interest group research, and the entire body of science that covers economics. But, here and today not one researcher has come forward to assist you with the information you need to improve your elections process in Florida.

To my knowledge, there are only two sources of significant election and voting-system research today. Those sources are Mr. Roy A. Saltman, formerly of the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), and myself and my company Votation Corporation.*

Mr. Saltman conducted extensive research in elections technology during his tenure at NIST and concluded his research with the document entitled Accuracy, Integrity, and Security in Computerized Vote-Tallying Systems (NBS Special Publication 500-158).

Mr. Saltman clearly demonstrated the need for improvements in this well-written report. Many of the problems you are dealing with today on this Task Force were identified in his report. Mr. Saltman's charter concluded with an identification of elections related problems and did not include the development of solutions.

My research began with my former company Engineering Sciences Corporation in 1988. I transferred that research into Votation Corporation in 1994 where it has been continued. Our research charter includes the development of solutions.

From our research I hope to be able to provide to you high-quality information that we have developed from our research and assist you as necessary in establishing a set of high-quality solutions to the issues you are confronted with solving. You will be able to clearly identify those solutions that are based on real, well-reasoned, properly conducted research.

We do not have to go far afield to start our discussion. It has already been exemplified before this Task Force.

Virtually all of the election professionals who have testified before this Task Force have concluded their testimony with the statement, "there are no perfect systems." This is a comment that bears consideration.

Let's evaluate this statement with a common and familiar system as an example: street light systems. Is the street light system employed at traffic intersections today perfect? Perhaps it is not if you accept the "no system is perfect" theory but, would you or anyone else accept a one percent accident rate at our road intersections and simply shrug it off as "no system is perfect." I suggest that you would not. Would you accept the fact that your toaster would catch on fire one in 99 times that you used it? I suggest that you would not.

Yet, it appears as though the entire election community is ready to accept that significant failure is acceptable and common in our voting machinery, and merely shrug it off as, "no system is perfect."

Could you draw the conclusion from these statements that there is more fundamental research in toasters than there is in any of the voting systems available today. You, in fact, can draw that conclusion and you should – for it is indeed true. Traffic systems and even the humble toaster may not be perfect but the levels of imperfection in these systems are so low as to be virtually indistinguishable from "total perfection." This is not the case with our voting systems.

The next question is "why." Why are these systems, though maybe not perfect, so much better than our elections systems. Simply, I submit, it is demand. Heretofore there has not been a demand that these systems attain a level of perfection that makes their failings indistinguishable from perfection. It is time these demands are made for voting machinery and this Task Force has the opportunity to do so. The national spotlight on Florida, this Task Force, and Florida's legislature, requires that you make such a demand for your voting machinery and election systems.

From the testimony you have heard here, each and every system being offered has some particular shortcoming. Thus, when you purchase a voting system you are not just buying that system's solutions, you are also buying that system's problems. In some cases it would appear that you are buying more problems than solutions.

So why are none of the elections companies bringing you real, cost-effective solutions to your problems? Because voting system buyers have not demanded that they do so. They don't have to provide you with solutions when their apologies for their equipment's failings are good enough to sell you their voting machines. Consequently these companies have not been compelled to conduct a shred of basic research to fundamentally improve their offerings. What they are offering you today are solutions to their marketing problems, not solutions to your elections needs.

In the voting machine business I have found that all too frequently the differentiation between systems becomes not the quality of the system being offered but the quality of the lobbyists representing the interests of individual voting companies. I don't think public scrutiny will allow Florida to select from a group of flawed systems on this occasion. I think there will be a demand for hard answers and truthful systems.

For the purpose of illustration I wanted to provide you a small sample of the benefits of research as it relates to your current task. To serve this illustration we will look at a small set of issues and evaluate potential solutions to some the basic problems that led to the formation of this Task Force. Specifically, the set of election failures of the 2000 election.

Issues

1. Failure of the voting system as characterized by:

The inability of the voter to properly mark the ballot.

The inability of the system to tolerate voter error.

The inability of the system to definitively and accurately count legally cast votes.

2. Failure of the post election processes

3. Disenfranchisement of legally registered voters.

A primary issue of the last election was the overwhelming failure of the voting system. The characteristics of this failure included all parts of the system. This complete failure provides to us an opportunity for a systematic evaluation of each component of the failure and lays a logical foundation for assessing the potential solutions this Task Force is charged with finding.

In order to provide a boundary for this assessment we will incorporate the framework provided by the testimony of Ms. Pam Iorio. Her testimony provides not only a framework for our assessment but a yardstick, as well that is useful in measuring our progress.

Ms Iorio's comments and recommendations to this committee are extracted below from the Collins Foundation minutes:

I would like to suggest that Ms. Iorio made her recommendations to you with reluctance. She faced a practical reality that the state of Florida cannot, in all likelihood, reasonably afford the "touch screen" systems she would desire "to have today." Further, she realizes that the optical scan systems are only slightly better than punch-card systems. Her ultimate recommendation to you is that the State of Florida move to a "touch Screen" system. I would suggest that Ms Iorio might have actually intended to say a Direct Recording Electronic system (DRE). DRE machines are almost generically now labeled as "touch screen."

I think it is possibly an unfortunate reality that you will not be able to accept Ms. Iorio's advice in total.

Florida came very close to having its entire electorate disenfranchised because it was using technology that was known to be flawed. I do not think this Task Force can recommend the adoption of another flawed system such as optical scan. To do so would place your entire electorate in jeopardy again. And you still leave your legislature the awesome task of developing a new "voter intent" standard.

What then, can we do to meet Ms. Iorio's objectives? We can start by providing a legitimate assessment of the requirements necessary to prevent the problems experienced in the past election. From that we can develop a set of objectives, requirements, and goals that define the systematic solutions required to repair the election process. With our understanding of the failed system, the application of our research, and prudent evaluation, we can derive a set of requirements that meets these goals.

I feel obligated to tell you that I have tried to prepare these remarks in a way so as not to be merely self-serving. I must point out however, that the focus of our research was to develop solutions for elections and voting. Our research was a systematic assessment and it considered the entire voting process as a system. It included the law, registration, voting, administration, and even the lowly issues of handling, shipping, and storage. In short – no stone was left unturned. No question un-answered. And the answer was never found to be "there are no perfect systems." With these considerations presented I will, of necessity, provide some of our solutions as being the logical end product of our research efforts.

It would be hard to find in today's technology environment another system that facilitated failure as completely as did the punch-card voting system. Fortunately, this complete system failure identifies for us the necessity of evaluating the system as a whole rather than as a set of individual parts.

Item 1 on our list of issues is the failure of the voting system. The first thing we know about the punch-card system is that it had a known set of problems before it was used in the elections. Critical, is the fact that these known system failings could not be avoided through policy, procedures, or administrative actions because the system as designed, was a failure.

A fundamental issue that has been overlooked is that the entire system of Florida elections including state election law, was adjusted to tolerate and accept the use of this flawed system. This is clearly the "tail wagging the dog." And in the end it did not work.

The election was the result of a cascading series of actions performed to tolerate a system that could not perform its basic single function when it was used as it was intended and for the purpose in which it was intended. The failure here was fixing the policy to accommodate the system rather than fixing the system to meet the policy. It can be reasonably assumed that this was done because there was not any possibility of making the voting system perform better so the only adjustment that could be made was to relax the legal scrutiny applied to the system. The laws excused the poor system performance and therefore actually became a part of the entire systematic failure structure.

It seems reasonable to suggest that an output of this Task Force be a set of recommended policy-level requirements that specifies the minimum acceptable level of performance for voting systems.

Continuing our assessment of problems identified by issue 1, is consideration of the voters frequent failure to properly mark the ballot. To whom shall we allocate the responsibility for this failing?

Was it the voters' fault? Yes, that is a determination we can make.

The system as designed and employed in the election required a certain amount of diligence on behalf of the voter. If the voter did not perform properly, the chances were good that his intended vote would not be recorded on the paper punch-card ballot properly. If the voter did not inspect the punch-card ballot after voting and remove any hanging chad, the intended vote may not have been recorded. If the voter did not observe the punch-card ballot and ensure that each desired voting position was fully punched through the punch-card ballot, the voters' intention may not be recorded.

Another major issue raised in the election was the "butterfly ballot." It was reported after the fact that many voters felt that they had not recorded their vote properly because of the butterfly ballot design. The voters made this determination on their own by determining the amount of votes received in their community for a particular candidate was too high therefore, there must have been something wrong with the layout of the ballot.

What considerations can be observed here?

The voter using this system must be trained in the use of the system,

The voter must be attentive when using the system,

And the voter must be directly responsible for this systems operation.

So we can allocate all of the blame for the majority of the system failure to the voters actions. And given that it is the voters who have lodged the complaints about the system, is it correct to "fix the voter" or "fix the system."

Assuming that we can only fix what we can directly control, the only choice would be to "fix the system."

What requirements then, do we provide as guidance for acquiring a system that prevents the problem of voter error, mis-use, and mis-understanding and relieves the election officials from the responsibility of "fixing the voter" through voter education?

The voter interface with the voting system is a good starting point. What does the voter see on the ballot? What does the voter have to do to cast a vote? Should we seek to constrain the voter's actions to conform to the vote selection requirements?

The current voter interfaces available are: optical scan paper ballots, Direct Recording Electronic (DRE) Touch screen ballots, and DRE push-button ballots. A sub-group of the DRE push-button ballots are the full-face ballot and the page styled system (MicroVote system).

Optical Scan Paper Ballots - As you have seen, the paper ballot is a source of great argument and disagreement. This is so even in the case where the paper ballot is marked by a mechanical device such as is used in the punch-card system, where the voters intent was indicated by a definitive mechanical mark or "punch."

Consider the issues that are forthcoming when the simple mechanical mark is replaced by a mark of the voters' own hand as will be required with the optical scan system. Users of optical scan technology already know that this voter interface is a problem and have documented these problems. But this paper ballot when combined with the problematic machinery is a flawed system. Early adopters of optical scan systems have already moved on to DRE systems because optical scan failed their voters. North Carolina abandoned optical scan altogether and de-certified the system for use in the state.

It appears that optical scan would not be a solution for Florida as it might well provide a new means of getting to the same problem set experienced in the 2000 election. But, there is more to consider in the debate over the paper ballot used in the optical scan systems than just the voter interface problem.

I am certain you have heard the argument that, "we must have paper because we need a paper trail." These comments are pedestrian in nature and are made without the benefit of the understanding derived through a thorough assessment of fundamental election requirements and operations.

An issue generally ignored when a paper ballot and its paper trail is discussed and promoted as the ultimate security mechanism is the ease in which paper ballots actually facilitate the potential for fraud and just plain accidental mishandling. You may not have heard the stories about the ballot box that was left on top of the car that fell off somewhere along the road to the counting center. The cup of coffee "accidentally" dumped into the ballot box. Or the precinct where an election judge marked a ballot "his way" and after the poll closed simply ran it through the precinct counter time after time. I think you have heard of the box of ballots that was found behind a file cabinet after the election. The security of paper ballots has always been a major concern. They are inherently vulnerable.

The other issue frequently cited in favor of paper ballots is the provision for a manual recount. I believe experience shows that it would be a more desirable solution to use a system that does not require a manual recount to verify its accuracy and results.

Requiring a paper ballot for the purpose of providing a paper trail will not, in fact, definitively answer the question of the truth of the election. It will, in fact, complicate it further as you have already seen here in Florida. It will also require your legislature to develop a completely new standard to specify an interpretive policy and procedure to determine what the voter "intended" when the paper ballot was marked.

The point is, with a paper based voting system, anyone who can operate a pencil, can tamper with or steal your election. The movement and handling of paper ballots from the precinct exposes the inherent security risk of paper ballots to a variety of concerns from intentional malfeasance to simple accidents. And the requirement to develop an "interpretive" ballot standard for manual recounts will continue to be a significant burden.

Conclusions: The use of the optical scan paper ballot cannot be positively controlled in a manner that prevents certain types of voter errors. This can be overcome to some extent by voter training but, using our requirement guidelines above, we have determined that the proper "fix" can only be made by the part of the process that is under our direct control. The optical scan paper ballot fails this test.

As bounded by Ms. Iorio: our goal is to be a model of

Optical scan does not pass her test.

Therefore we have now established a potential requirement for our next system procurement, "Eliminate paper ballots." Assuming that we accept this requirement for our next system then we must derive another requirement as a result of the elimination of paper ballots, "the system must perform a definitive post-election process to confirm the accuracy and truth of the election results."

Thus we have now established a basis for addressing the issue of the post-election processes and evaluating a means for developing a solution set to improve that process. It can be observed that many of the problems of the post-election processes were in fact caused by the data being on the paper ballot. It's elimination instantly resolves item 2 on our list of issues and relieves us of the necessity of scrutinizing the process as is relates to the election of the year 2000. We can now move forward to establish new detailed post-election requirement based on an improved technology.

As we have seen from the discussion above, the elimination of paper ballots from the process has many positive effects in the elections process but none come close to the overwhelming requirement to fix the most basic fundamental problem with the system; the actual means provided to the voter to make vote selections.

What alternative choices are offered by DRE systems? To facilitate our considerations I have derived a set of minimal requirements to apply to our considerations for the DRE voter interface function. I derived these minimal requirements by analyzing those problems that we seek to eliminate with a new system. These are as follows:

1. The voter's interface must be direct, easy to use, easy to understand, and intuitive.
2. The ballot must not require voter expertise of any kind to cast a vote.
3. The ballot must provide a means for indicating a positive confirmation of the voters' selection.
4. The education that must be provided to the voter prior to entry into the booth to vote must be minimal.

Touch Screen Systems – The impetus for touch screen systems came about mainly because of early election provisions in Texas. The Texas early voting practices allows a voter to vote up to 45 days before election day at any one of a number of early voting precincts located around the voter’s county. The problem that the touch screen system sought to solve was having a DRE system that could provide all ballot styles required in the county at all early voting precincts. This is indeed possible but the system imposes certain operability penalties as a result.

The main problem with the touch screen systems presently offered is that they require that the voter become an "operator" in order to vote. The "touch screen" systems may initially appear to the casual observer, to be an acceptable voter interface. But when one considers the voter requirements to operate the ballot effectively this ballot type begins to show its design shortcomings.

Elections that have a large number of candidates and issues will require the voter to "page" through a number of display sets to get to all of an election's races. While this "paging" design is better on some voting machines than others, the whole body of touch screen design simply fails the voter usability test. This is not an acceptable design that can pass our test for simple voter operation and interaction.

And we now have definitive observations that demonstrate that touch screen systems greatly reduces voter throughput at the ballot. This research was from an association in which the voters could be considered fairly sophisticated voters and there were few candidates in which to choose. We have not fully assessed the specific reasons for the slower throughput with the touch screen design but the slow down was apparently obvious and became critical as the election continued.

With this understanding the touch screen now begins to generate a host of issues related to the practical considerations of the system. They are expensive so fewer can be purchased and put into each polling place. Therefore it is a marketing objective to show that fewer available voting positions are acceptable because the touch screen "improves voter throughput." This is now demonstrated as a potentially false assertion and clearly not supported by independent data. In effect, you have the worst of all combinations, a slow voting methodology with less equipment upon which to vote.

Further considerations of the touch screen voter interface reveals that it will take considerable understanding to establish a set of standards for the ballot design. This will no doubt again lead to a controversial set of issues about "who" appears "where" on the ballot, which "page" they appear on, and how the ballot layout may effect the election results. This system has the makings of becoming the computerized version of the "butterfly ballot."

Some press accounts tout the ATM styled touch screen ballot as the ultimate answer to voting. Again, this pedestrian notion of a solution does not hold up to the scrutiny of solid analysis, research, and understanding of the elections and voting processes. These comments ignore the very different motivations of the persons performing the tasks and the totally different nature of the task being performed.

Conclusion: Some benefits are clearly made available by this systems' ability to provide all ballot styles within one booth. However, for general use in a public election that does not require all ballot styles be available in one booth, the touch-screen ballot does not pass our test for ease of use, understanding, and the low voter training requirement. Additionally, it appears as though the ballot will actually cause an on-going problem in developing a practical standard for the ballot layout.

As bounded by Ms. Iorio:

Failed: ultimately offer voters the best

Passed: As a supervisor of elections, I would like

DRE Push-Button Ballot - Presently there are two types of push-button DRE ballot types available. One is the MicroVote Corporation design. Due to the uniqueness of this systems design and the systems documented history of failure I will not present a discussion of the system. This system is probably not a legitimate contender for Florida's elections business.

The other push-button design is a "full face ballot" design. This is a ballot type that is a requirement in some areas such as New York State. A full-face ballot is defined as, "a ballot in which all races and all candidates are presented to the voter at once on a single ballot face" The full-face ballot is in fact the design incorporated on the old mechanical voting machines. The use of this definition as requirement was heretofore the anti-competitive requirement of the manufacturers of mechanical voting machines. Interestingly, it has accidentally provided a sound model for a voter interface. The full-face ballot is simple, intuitive, and when coupled with a proper feedback mechanism, requires very little, if any, voter training.

The full-face ballot provides a candidates name with an adjacent button with which to select that name as a selected vote. A light also adjacent to the name illuminates to positively indicate that selection to the voter. It meets our requirement for a simple, intuitive ballot and requires a low amount of voter training. It is simply "push-button" voting.

There are some existing DRE designs that use this concept today but they are flawed in several respects. First is that the actual ballot for these machines are overlaid on a set of switches. We rejected this design because of its potential for tampering and unintentional mis-placement of the ballot over the switches. Our chosen design embeds the switches with the printed ballot information so that there is no potential for such mis-placement either accidentally or because of purposeful malicious intent.

Conclusion: The push-button full-face ballot design meets our requirements for voter usability and intuitive voting. While some systems using this design concept may have security issues, the overall design of the push-button system provides an improvement over all other ballot types. It's major shortcoming is its inability within the currently available systems to provide all ballot styles as is desirable for the early election process. (We are currently monitoring new technology that will provide a cost effective full-face ballot that can switch ballot styles.) (We would not necessarily recommend that you only specify a full-face DRE ballot as part of your procurement specifications but the requirements related to operability should be specified.)

As bounded by Ms. Iorio:

Passed: ultimately offer voters the best

Passed: As a supervisor of elections, I would like

This brief topical analysis of the problems and issues of the year 2000 election demonstrates that we can apply our research and lay the foundation for a system that measures up to Ms. Iorio's yardstick. Her yardstick is the rule we must apply to achieve success in this endeavor and the first inch of that measurement is the acquisition of voting machinery that actually performs the task for which it was designed without excuses. Good research is the key to the processes.

Before we leave this discussion of voter interface technology, I wish to provide for you information on an issue that has rightfully become a prevalent topic in elections, handicapped and blind secret ballot access. It would be at best inconsiderate of this Task Force to not include in its set of election improvement recommendations, a recommendation to provide full secret ballot access to our physically challenged population. Technology to facilitate this at a reasonable cost is available. The following discussion is the result of our research and solution for this necessary service.

Handicapped/Blind Ballot Access - The State of Texas has been sued for not providing a means for the blind and handicapped to vote a secret ballot. Texas has now passed a law that requires handicapped and blind secret voting. I am not aware that Florida has such a law but I believe that Florida will come under scrutiny from a number of organizations that represent our blind and handicapped citizens if a secret ballot service for the disabled is not provided.

Our participation in many government sponsored forums during the mid 1990's timeframe brought us into close contact with a number of special interest groups asserting their positions on voting issues. On one of these occasions we were providing testimony to Congress and we shared our panel with Mr. Scott Marshall, Vice President of the National Foundation for the Blind. Based on his testimony we dropped our intended Braille ballot design and immediately developed the "Audio Ballot." I applied for a patent on this technology on December 24, 1996 and was awarded US Patent # 5,821,508 for the Audio Ballot on October 13, 1998.

We have demonstrated the Audio ballot at several election conferences and due to the overwhelming response we received from the election community we devised a means to implement the Audio Ballot in each and every voting booth. Accepting this challenge and developing this solution allowed us to derive even greater benefit that we originally intended for the application. Because in addition to just providing a means for secret and private voting access for the blind and disabled, the Audio Ballot also became useful in providing cues to the sighted and able-bodied voter and in fact has become an in-booth, real-time, voter instruction/education tool.

You no doubt have seen the Audio Ballot offered by a number of DRE vendors. Such an advance looks perfectly obvious today but when I invented it in 1996, it was not so obvious and the means to provide it were certainly not what we have available today.

You should note that I have not provided a license to any vendor to offer this product for sale and these vendors are infringing my patent.

Conclusion – Florida should provide some means for handicapped and blind secret voting whether it is an Audio Ballot or some other means acceptable to our disabled community.

Another research topic that I am compelled to address for the Task Force is the recording and processing required to collect the vote data, and count the votes. This includes the security of the vote data and a guarantee of its truthfulness.

We have heard from a number of critics that computerized voting systems are ripe for fraud. These critics frequently point out opportunities to tamper with the data or the program, destroy the data, or otherwise subject the vote data to manipulation. Rarely do I hear or see a voting system vendor defend their design against the legitimate concerns expressed in these attacks. I fear in most cases it is because they can't. Again, I sense a lack of diligent research to establish a set of processes that will prevent, detect, and or otherwise provide complete security and integrity to the voting system.

Our research yielded designs that are defendable under such scrutiny. We have established a set of processes that provide the security and accuracy that must be demanded in a voting system. Beyond the audit trail and a particular method of storing the systems "event critical data," we have incorporated a method of guaranteeing the truth of the each vote cast and the ability to prove its truth. These processes stand alone in the voting industry as a required fundamental principal of our design criteria for any voting system. We choose to research, specify and build a system with integrity and truth, rather than excuse our performance.

Yet, our research demanded that even a greater margin of safety be built-in to the voting system. Prior to actual system design we perform an analysis called a "failure modes effects and casualty analysis." This is an analysis that evaluates how the system and its components will fail and what happens when they do fail. This allows us to incorporate in our design a means to prevent the loss and/or corruption of any data should any system component fail.

Conclusion – The ability to protect the vote data, guarantee its truth, and assure the security of the system exists and can be designed into a voting system. In cannot be excused for not being an integral part of the system. Your procurement specification should take into account these requirements and clearly establish these objectives for mandatory inclusion in your system.

As a researcher I am surprised frequently how a solution to one problem becomes a solution to something very unrelated while performing its original function. Such was the case with the Audio Ballot. We built it to solve a problem for the blind but, it improved our overall system performance by facilitating the otherwise handicapped, and the illiterate. It also improved our system by providing audio cues for the able-bodied voter which ultimately aids the overall experience of voting.

Such is the case with our discussion of the resolution to item 3 on our list of election year 2000 issues, the disenfranchisement of legally registered voters.

From my work as a duly sworn poll judge in Montgomery County Maryland, I observed a number of polling place operations that should have the benefit of automation. Voter check-in is clearly one of those areas that would benefit from automation. The purpose of this was to merely improve the efficiency of the polling place operation. I now see however that our simple efficiency improvement has brought us the means to solve a majority of the problems associated with this issue.

Precinct Communications - Our observations of voting technology from the aspect of what happens in the precinct to what happens at the election directors' office led us on to further research and developments of importance to the election process. One of our first conclusions was that there should be communications between the precinct and the election headquarters.

This consideration led to the incorporation of a private network facilitated by a common telephone connection. It first included only data and allowed the election director to monitor the activities at the precinct. It also facilitated the transfer of the election data from the precinct to election headquarters so as to reduce the risk of physical data transport from the process. Data is actually collected at both the precinct and the election headquarters and is provided as a system redundancy.

Continued research demonstrated the need to have registration data provided electronically in the precinct. This eliminated a number of problems with voter rolls and improved the efficiency of the precinct operation. This was upgraded later to take advantage of the two-way communications between the precinct and election headquarters so that the poll judges could directly access the county voter database from the precinct.

Had such a system been in place for the last election many of the problems dealing with voter disenfranchisement would not have occurred because the precincts could have had direct access to the voters' history in the county database. As has been reported to this committee, the provisions for resolving registration problems through call centers was hampered because the large voter turnout overwhelmed the ability of the call centers to handle the call volume. The addition of two-way voice communications on top of the data communications would have also provided for direct person-to-person assistance when it was required.

This system would have prevented many of the problems experienced in the year 2000 election. This exact experience was a problem nationwide and has been reported to every committee I am aware of that has been formed to evaluate elections.

This issue and its potential solution is now the focus of a number of special interest groups including the Rainbow Coalition, the NAACP, and others. Avoiding a solution today extends the chasm of confidence in electoral integrity and this need not occur. This is now a political problem but its resolution is a cost-effective technical solution. If this problem is not solved the political cost to Americans will likely far exceed the monetary cost of the technology required to implement this solution.

Conclusion – Current communications technologies can facilitate the direct data communication between precincts and an election headquarters. Such a system yields significant benefit to the elections process including precinct operation monitoring, voter roll verification, redundant on-line continuous vote data collection, and two-way voice communication. It is an overall increase in the efficiency of the election operation. The prices of these systems have now reached affordability and should be considered part of an improved system procurement process.

What I have described to you in the above discussion is a topical treatment of our research. I have demonstrated to you some of the issues we discovered during our research and I have shown how we used our research conclusions to establish meaningful requirements specific to a set of voting related problems.

This brief shows how good research can lead to quality solutions that do not have to be excused. It demonstrates that thorough treatment of problems can lead to effective solutions. It also demonstrates that some systems that you are considering have not had the benefit of effective analysis. This is evident by observing the poor-quality performance these systems provide you and your voters.

I hope what I have imparted to you is the need to demand that your voting systems, at the minimum do not, cause the same problems you are trying to eliminate.

The chain of accepting and excusing poor voting-system performance leaves your elections directors to face the brunt of the failings of these systems and jeopardizes your state’s ability to participate in national elections. You can and should demand better systems.

I would now like to focus on the practical business problems in this industry and I will briefly touch on the difficulty I have experienced first hand in getting new voting systems technology to market. The first and foremost issue is that private investment for voting systems companies is virtually zero.

There is good reason for this attitude in the financial markets. Doing business with local governments is considered risky business and is not an area that is considered profitable. Add to that business concern the perceived risk of such a high profile environment like elections and you have a business project that will interest very few sophisticated investors.

Beyond that consideration we have allowed a set of requirements to be established in election system procurements that, while well-intended, actually preclude the very equipment you need from ever being produced. I have detailed these concerns in an article that I wrote for govcon.com, a government contracting website popular in Washington, D.C. I prepared this article basically as a primer for congressional staffers who will be supporting the upcoming congressional hearings. Its purpose was to point out the formidable obstacles that must be overcome to improve elections technology and to further point out that is was not simply the lack of good research and engineering that was at the heart of today's elections failures. It is to a large extent the poor business environment.

I have appended the article to my testimony. It is provided to you as part of my testimony because it specifically identifies how we were backed into the corner we are in today. This article clearly identifies the exact problems that your are now facing: the selection of the lesser of evils, the best of the failures, and the expensive but poor designs.

I believe this Task Force has the opportunity to break this circle of purchasing failures. I believe you can and should demand a system whose performance characteristics meet your objectives for accuracy, truth, accessibility, and low cost. I believe your requirements should demand a system that is perfect.

I will now offer you a bold recommendation: If none of the systems you are being offered are "perfect", then have one built that is perfect.

Tough requirements - absolutely. Necessary requirements – absolutely. "Doable" – absolutely.

To summarize my remarks to you, I believe you should rely on good research to assist you in finding solutions to the election problems of Florida. While such research is scarce today, it is available and it is of significant quality.

Your recommendations should establish a goal of identifying a means and a method for acquiring continuous analysis and research directed solely towards the issues of elections and voting machinery.

Do not accept performance "excuses" for election machinery that cannot perform its one and only function with 100 percent precision. Abandon the concept of "there is no perfect system." If for no other reason you should abandon this concept because it is an absurd proposition and does not deserve one second of your valuable consideration. You would not accept this in any other part of your personal or professional life, don't accept for voting.

Do not ignore problems for which there appear to be no solutions to apply. Ask, research, and demand solutions. Hard found solutions are often the most effective solutions when they are discovered. And like my Audio Ballot, these solutions often far exceed the original goals of the solution found. But a problem ignored will never be solved. Demand solutions.

Don't buy a failure when you can build a success. It is obvious that today's voting system vendors are not going to invest in your problems but they certainly expect you to invest in theirs.

Don't let the forces of lobbying sway your decision to provide a working system. They won't be here to apologize for the failures you purchased.

Cost is a factor. The components to build a "perfect" voting system exist and are commonplace in the technology market. The price you pay should be fair, not premium.

Define your acceptable level of minimum performance as "100 percent accurate and secure." Any less will not solve any of the problems you've been asked to fix.

I realize that I have provided you with some difficult decisions because my recommendations are totally contrary to virtually everyone's thinking about how to purchase and deploy a voting system. But look at what you are being offered. Systems that are flawed by anyone's judgement and the providers' own admissions. Make a reasonable decision that if you can't purchase what need, you'll have it built. You cannot be faulted for this decision but you certainly can be faulted for your purchase of a failure.

If you can't find the answer anywhere else, ask me. We will find the answer.

I appreciate the opportunity to provide this testimony for this Task Force. I shall avail myself to you for whatever services I can provide for the remainder of your term. I conclude.

My testimony.

Jim Willard

http://www.govcon.com/content/news/article.asp?DocID={98A020A3-DB49-11D4-A76E-00D0B7694F32}&Bucket=Features

www.papercomputer.com

http://www.formmedia.com/papercomputer/intro.htm

Businessman, entrepreneur, inventor, and engineer Jim Willard has been in the research and development of advanced computer systems since leaving the US Navy in 1974. Jim has spent over 20-years of his 26-plus year career developing major systems for the military including a number of submarine combat systems, Army weapons test systems, Air Force intelligence and communications systems, and long range radar and sonar surveillance systems. Jim is an expert in large-scale systems development and technical management. He has led design teams of scientists and engineers developing real-time mission critical systems requiring development of over 1 million source lines of code and having full program development budgets of over $1 billion. Since 1988 Jim has been involved in the research and development of advanced voting systems and holds patents on critical voting systems technology.

His early career accomplishments include the installation of the first digital torpedo fire control system aboard a US Navy submarine; setup, staffing, and operations management of the Army's advanced Weapons Evaluation and Scoring System (WESS); the original scientific research and overall specification for the US Navy "Dark Shadow" stealth research ship control system; the design, development, and management of the Trident Submarine development laboratory resource control operation; the design and specification the Navy's high speed Surface Effect Ship Combat and Navigation and collision avoidance systems; and the design and development of the signal processing and display system for the long range towed array sonar surveillance system SURTASS.

Following these technical achievements, Jim moved into scientific management where he was responsible for major naval simulation systems research and development managing a group of over 50 scientists and engineers and annual budgets approaching $ 50 million. This was followed by a position to head the New England operations for a technology company where he served dual management and marketing roles. His management and leadership skills were considered prime reasons for on-budget, on-specification development program successes for projects such as the Re-locatable Over-the-Horizon Radar System. Jim also served as a Senior Consultant to the Canadian Government where he performed a review and analysis of the legal procurement specifications for the Canadian Patrol Frigate.

In 1985 Jim used his technical, management, and organizational skills to launch Engineering Sciences Corporation (ESC). This Company was founded to take advantage of Jim's systems development expertise in a corporate environment that could be dedicated to his advanced systems analysis and design practices. This allowed Jim to foster his employee's skills into a marketable consulting commodity for large-scale systems development. Jim and ESC were immediately successful and received contracts and subcontracts for systems research and development. ESC's customers included Raytheon, Lockheed, Hughes Aircraft, General Electric and most of the other large system development corporations.

Jim and his team of scientists and engineers began investigating elections and voting systems technology in 1988. This internal research and development project was based on his desire to move the Company beyond its dependence on military programs and find other applications for the company's skills in mission critical systems development.

The research performed led to the design of a number of significant voting system improvements. These improvements include, the design of an actual voting "system" (as opposed to a voting "machine"); a voting system capable of being securely (privately) networked to all levels of state government, an electronic solution for absentee voting, and a voting system designed to accommodate blind and otherwise handicapped persons.

Jim and his team spent untold hours performing thorough research to arrive at an optimal voting system design. Jim's voting system is characterized by its "single-use" low-cost design. It is also characterized as the most effective system to be marketed because it includes every requirement identified by elections officials as being problematic, deficient, or missing from other systems. An example of this thoroughness is the incorporation of an "Audio Ballot" in each and every voting booth.

Jim holds patents on critical election's technology including the "electronic absentee ballot" and the "Audio Ballot." He has a number of patents pending on elections related technology.

Jim incorporated Votation Corporation in 1994 to market and sell his voting system products. He sold ESC Corporation to ManTech Corporation in 1995.

From 1994 through 1997, Jim actively marketed Votation's advanced voting systems. These products were considered to be the "dream system" by election officials throughout the country. During this time Jim and his company were invited to a number of elections conferences and he was a sought after speaker by the groups hosting these events. Jim's invitations have included such venues as the California Election Summit, hosted by California Secretary of State Bill Jones. In 1994 the Company was invited to testify before the House committee on Government Affairs – Elections Subcommittee. Mr. Henry Valentino, Votation's President of Elections Services and former Director of the Federal Voting Assistance Office, delivered the testimony about Votation's advancements in elections technology.

Unfortunately, for Jim, election officials, and the voting public, he was unable to find the venture capital financing necessary to bring his advanced voting systems to market.

Subsequently, Jim took the Electronic Absentee Ballot and redesigned it as a single-use web access device and in 1999 he incorporated Paper Computer Corporation (PpC) to market this product. He has provided briefings before the National Science Foundation on the use of Paper Computer products for large-scale government processes such as census data collection and tax filing.

As a result of the problems during the presidential election of 2000, Jim and his election's management team have decided to reorganize and attempt a second time to capitalize on his advanced voting systems technology.

Contacts:

Jim Willard

(301) 258-8128

Press:

Miles Allen

(703) 729-3331

votation@bellatlantic.net