[Vision2020] Wayne's election comment

[Saundra Lund]

In part, Dan Carscallan wrote:
"If there wasn't so much other stuff going on that our City Council is
dealing with, I do agree with Kit that maybe this should be looked at."

Hi Dan & Other Visionaries:

I don't mean to pick on you because there have been others who expressed a
similar view, but I'm going to pick on you  because I don't think you'll
mind  :-)

As a future potential supporter <g>, it bothers me that you think there's
more important City business than making sure our election results are
valid.  Actually, I don't think there's much (if anything) more important in
our democratic representative government than the ability to trust that our
votes will be counted and counted properly.  Quite frankly, I think the
brouhaha about the Pledge pales in comparison to the possibility that -- for
whatever reason (and I personally wouldn't use the word 'fraud') -- a
substantial number of City voters voted but their votes weren't counted.

Now, I'm no "elections" expert by any stretch of the imagination, but
throughout my voting years, I've had reason to learn some things about the
process.  And, one of the things I've had reason to learn about are residual
-- or uncounted -- votes.

Nationwide, the average residual rate is about 1.9%, give or take a couple
hundredths of a percent depending on the source.  The rate in Idaho,
unfortunately, is significantly worse at 2.91%.  Not too much to be proud of
there  :-(((

Now, let's look at a piece info Kit provided that you didn't address:
"4) The votes that were publicly reported show a very close race for the
third, fourth, and fifth finishers for the 4-year position. Three hundred
six (306) ballots were overvotes in this race--ten times the difference in
between 3rd & 4th and 4th & 5th places."

I'll use the 306 number (the number I was told was 360).  The stats I have
indicate that there were a total of 4055 ballots cast.  With 306 (minimum)
ballots thrown out due to overvotes, that puts the residual rate for the
4-year seat at a *whopping* 7.5%.

That, my friend, I see as incredibly problematic:  7.5% of the good folks
who voted for the 4-year seats didn't have *any* of their votes for those
seats counted.  And, that's without taking into account other (if any)
residual votes.

I could go on about ballot design (we had way too many candidates and
offices on single pages) and how overvotes in the 4-year seats could
translate to undervotes in the other races; how the ballot design was such
that a very slight shift in how the pages were held made the little holes
not align with the numbers, etc.

But, I won't  :-)

The reading I've done indicates that when the residual rate is above about
3%, that should be a red flag for the electorate and officials -- that's
***us***, folks.  The residual rate for the 4-year seats in the November,
2005 was over *double* that.

But, maybe City of Moscow elections always have an astronomically high
residual ballot rate?  How about Latah County -- maybe it's always high in
those elections, too?

Quite frankly, I don't know because I don't think I've ever seen those
numbers reported.  While I've asked some questions in the past about local
residual vote/ballot rates, I wasn't able to get any helpful info.  In all
honesty, though, I didn't ask real hard, and it could be that what I was
asking wasn't clear or I could have been asking the wrong resources.

With respect to the November, 2005 City election, part of the reason I
personally didn't push the issue (yes, it was something I was aware of from
looking at the numbers) was that there really was no potential for
satisfactory outcome in my mind.  There is no way to recreate voting
conditions for that particular day, even if the money (voting is pricey)
weren't a factor.

But, in my mind, what we *can* do is find out what, if anything, went wrong
so we don't have a repeat in the future.  On the face of it, it's
unacceptable to me that apparently a minimum of 7.5% of the ballots cast for
the 4-year seats weren't counted.  I want better for my city -- while there
will always be residual votes, I hope we can do better than 7.5% on a local
level.

Honestly, I don't know that the City has any more important task than making
sure that our elections are valid.  IMHO, elections are something where the
*process* is far, far more important than the outcome.

I think the questions Kit raised are not only valid, I think we *all*
deserve for them to be answered.


JMHO,
Saundra Lund
Moscow, ID

The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good people to do
nothing.
- Edmund Burke

***** Original material contained herein is Copyright 2005, Saundra Lund.
Do not copy, forward, excerpt, or reproduce outside the Vision 2020 forum
without the express written permission of the author.*****

-----Original Message-----
From: vision2020-bounces at moscow.com [mailto:vision2020-bounces at moscow.com]
On Behalf Of Area Man
Sent: Thursday, March 09, 2006 12:34 PM
To: 'Moscow Vision 2020'
Subject: RE: [Vision2020] Wayne's election comment

Kit says:
	""--  5.4 times the votes between "Carscallen" and
"Craine"--adjacent  names on the list. 
	Question: What happened to those ballots? Were they counted or
thrown out?"

So Kit got all my votes?!?!?  (easy now, count to ten . . . My tongue is
planted in my cheek)

Then Kit says:

	"There were a large number of undervotes. Although these can be
explained by people voting for fewer than three candidates, more than  
	a third of the possible votes were in this category. That seems a
little extreme."

Not extreme, that was a strategy.  Look at the winners in Mayoral and the
two-year race, and compare that with the top vote-getter in the 4-year race:
	mayor  -- 2061
	2-year -- 2040
	4-year -- 1932

With that close of a spread, it's fairly obvious that there was a strategy
among voters, especially when you look at the next vote-getters for those
positions:
	mayor -- 1767
	2-year -- 1760
	4-year -- 1770

A pretty good chunk of strategery, if I do say so myself.

Maybe I'm a pollyanna, but I don't really see "fraud", and as Keely stated,
making the accusation without proof is kinda hinky, and the accusation
should be dropped.  

If there wasn't so much other stuff going on that our City Council is
dealing with, I do agree with Kit that maybe this should be looked at.
I don't like someone saying, though, that  our city clerk is inexperienced,
since every time I talked with her regarding any of the reports I had to
file or anything else to do with the election, she knew her stuff.  She did
a bangup job, in my opinion.  This ain't her first ro-day-o.  There were
almost as many candidates in the prior election.

Your pal, and Tom Hansen's favorite two-time loser,

DC