Firm, Elections Board Faulted in Voting Mishap

Panel Cites Poor Equipment, Communication Washington Post Staff Writer Thursday, October 9, 2008; Page B04 The D.C. Board of Elections and Ethics and the company that provides the city with its voting equipment are both responsible for last month's primary election blunder that caused thousands of phantom votes to appear in initial results, according to a preliminary report from a special D.C. Council committee. The report, released yesterday, says Sequoia Voting Systems, a California-based firm, "was too quick to exonerate itself and the equipment used in the tabulation process. . . . To date, the evidence appears to indicate that there was a problem both in equipment (the server) and in the software." Also, the elections board failed to effectively communicate with the public about the mishap, the report says. The... [read full story]