EAC - Voluntary Voting System Guidelines

Name : | Pamela Smith
Organization : | The Verified Voting Foundation
Post Date : | 9/30/2005
General Comments
Comment : | INTEROPERABILITY: Interoperability is the ability of equipment from different vendors to work together. For example, it should be possible to use a ballot marking device from one vendor with an optical scan system by another vendor. The current requirement that whole systems be certified may allow one vendor to sabotage the use of another vendor’s equipment, if the first vendor does not cooperate with the certification process. What this means is that counties can be forced to discard one optical scan system and replace it with a different optical scan system simply in order to be able to use a ballot-marking device (which may only be available from one vendor). This is an outrageous waste of resources, and there’s no good reason for it. We urge the EAC to incorporate a requirement for interoperability, allowing counties to select from the best and most cost-effective solutions to meet their needs.