County's Electronic Voting Machines Worth $30 Million Sit Idle Ahead Of June 5 Primary

As Riverside County voters get set to go to the polls during the June 5 primary election, millions of dollars worth of electronic voting machines sit idle.

The roughly 3,700 machines owned by Riverside County are locked in a warehouse, being scavenged for parts, with no plans to sell the equipment that was rendered idle by the stroke of a pen more than five years ago, a county official confirmed Thursday.

In August 2007, California Secretary of State Debra Bowen decertified e-voting units in use in counties throughout the state following a series of security tests that revealed vulnerabilities in the machines that could leave them open to computer hack attacks.

At the time, Riverside County's Sequoia AVC Edge voting machines had been used in elections going back to 2000. County supervisors universally lauded e-voting, calling the practice a great time-saver with less risk for the type of errors that came to light in Florida following the 2000 presidential election.

Members of election integrity group Save-R-Vote of Temecula Valley, a staunch opponent of e-voting, forecasted Bowen's decision, with the head of the organization, Tom Courbat, recommending that the county sell its Sequoia units for pennies on the dollar to cut its losses.

He was ignored.

The units, which cost an estimated $30 million to purchase and maintain between 2000 and 2008, are now stored in a "secure" warehouse in the Riverside area, according to county Executive Office spokesman Ray Smith.

"Currently, the extra inventory is used for replacement parts," Smith told City News Service. "The law still requires one accessible unit for each polling place; using parts from extra inventory saves taxpayer dollars."

At least one machine is set up at each polling station during an election for the benefit of disabled voters as required under the federal Help America Vote Act.

Smith said that since the state's de-certification of the machines, there is "not a market" in which to sell them.

According to Smith, the county's position today remains the same as it was five years ago: "The county has said all along that our electronic voting system is safe, secure and helps speed the return of results."

Meanwhile, Riverside County Registrar of Voters Kari Verjil today anticipated smooth sailing for the June 5 primary election ahead, highlighting steps that have been taken to speed up ballot processing and get results posted quicker so that candidates and voters aren't left guessing which way contests are going.

"We're feeling well prepared to conduct this election," Verjil told City News Service.

For next Tuesday's election, the registrar’s office will be fully staffed, with employees working "all night long" to complete the tabulation of votes, according to Verjil. The office is already operating 18 hours a day in preparation for June 5, counting absentee ballots as they arrive, she said.

Under state law, mail-in ballots can be counted beginning a week before election day. According to Verjil, just under 90,000 ballots had been received by noon today.

Verjil told CNS that, with 200 temporary hires for the upcoming election, plus 150 full-time personnel, the efficient and expeditious handling of ballots should not be an issue.

"We're in constant communication with the post office, and we're picking up mail-in ballots (from postal stations) daily," Verjil said. "We'll be doing the same thing on election day."

According to the registrar, sheriff's personnel will be used, for the first time, to retrieve ballots at the county's 17 collection centers and transport them to the registrar's headquarters on Gateway Drive in Riverside.

"I borrowed the idea from Los Angeles County. They always seem to finish fast over there," Verjil said. "We have a great partnership with our sheriff's department."

She noted that only off-duty law enforcement personnel will be utilized.

To retrieve ballots from the eastern reaches of the county, including Blythe, a helicopter will be put into service, flying the materials back to Riverside shortly after the 8 p.m. election night deadline passes, according to Verjil.

The county has 11 Sequoia Optech scanners, each of which processes paper ballot returns at the rate of 400 per minute.

"So far everything's running smoothly," Verjil said. "We're processing ballots as fast as we can so we can have a nice strong, healthy election posting right after the polls close Tuesday."

The posting of results in the Nov. 2, 2010, election became the subject of controversy after the registrar's office didn't offer any data on races via its website until an hour after the polls closed, and then took several hours more to release updates because of a software glitch.

Then Riverside County Registrar of Voters Barbara Dunmore defended her office's actions at the time, leading to a testy exchange with then-Board of Supervisors Chairman Marion Ashley. She was fired a few hours later by then-Executive Officer Bill Luna.

Verjil said voters can expect regular updates on the registrar's website Tuesday night. The county official is also regularly posting election information on Facebook and Twitter.

"We're using social media tools to keep connected to voters and candidates," Verjil said.

She said the one thing her office is short of is bilingual poll workers. Anyone interested was encouraged to contact the registrar's office office at (951) 486-7200. The pay range for one day's work is $110 to $145.