Get Full Government Meeting Transcripts, Videos, & Alerts Forever!
Get email alerts on the Elections topic
No spam. Unsubscribe anytime.
Citizen urges hand counts and an ethics policy, citing voting‑machine concerns
Summary
Citizen Diane Nowak told commissioners she believes Marion County voting machines have modem vulnerabilities and reported discrepancies in vote figures from public records requests; she urged hand counting and pressed the commission to adopt conflict‑of‑interest/ethics rules for board appointments.
Diane Nowak used the public‑forum portion of the July 20 meeting to renew concerns about the county's voting equipment and to press the commission for an ethics or conflict‑of‑interest policy for appointed board members.
Nowak recounted a prior presentation she made and cited several reports she said document vulnerabilities in ES&S voting machines, including claims that machines had modems and could be connected to the internet. She said she submitted public records requests after the election that produced vote totals she described as inconsistent and said those discrepancies prompted her to raise the issue again.
"...the machines had modems in them and they were on the Internet," Nowak said, referring to reports she had previously provided. She described a difference of 189 votes between local totals and state election figures and asked the commission where those votes went. Nowak recommended hand‑counting ballots as a transparency measure and offered to provide supporting documents.
On the ethics question, Nowak asked whether the commission would place a conflict‑of‑interest policy on an agenda; commissioners indicated staff would add such an item for future consideration.
The commission did not take immediate action on Nowak's specific election‑security requests during the meeting. Commissioners agreed to place discussion of a conflict‑of‑interest/ethics policy on a future agenda and directed staff to pursue that administrative item.
