Iowa: Congratulations to County Election Official Marilyn Jo Drake

[helderheid]

http://www.votetrustusa.org/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=1380&Itemid=113

By John Washburn, VoteTrustUSA Voting Technology Task Force
June 10, 2006

You may not have heard of Mary Jo Drake, yet. Marilyn Jo Drake is the County Auditor for Pottawattamie County, Iowa. Last Tuesday, Mary Jo Drake decided an accurate election was more important than a convenient election. Marilyn Jo Drake had computer-generated numbers conveniently available to her. Instead Ms. Drake reported actual vote totals to the public in lieu of these computer-generated numbers which were masquerading as vote totals.

Making this correct, but inconvenient descision has cost her much embarassment, time, and money. She had to tell candidates and the press at 11:00 pm on election night there would be no results that night. Candidates had to go to bed without knowing if they won or lost in the primary. Poor babies.

This meant 22 people had to hand count the paper ballots in order to determine the actual vote totals instead of settling for the convienient, but incorrect, machine totals. This meant vote totals for Pottawattamie County were not available until Friday.

This also meant the actual winner of an election will move on instead of the candidate the counting machines had incorrectly annointed.

This is an uncomfortable place to be in and Marilyn Jo Drake deserves our support.

On election night the candidate for county recorder that she expected to win, 23-year incumbent John Sciortino, was losing to an improbable foe, college student Oscar Duran. The full details can be found here.

http://www.votetrustusa.org/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=1378&Itemid=51

Marilyn Jo Drake noticed something wierd.

[Oceansaway]

1. TOUCHE !!...n/t

[Norquist Nemesis]

2. Wow! And WooHoo for Marilyn Jo Drake!

:applause:

[helderheid]

3. more

On her own authority she performed a hand count of the absentee ballots (since absentee ballots for every precinct of the county are counted together, auditing the absentee ballots was in effect an audit of a single, virtual precinct.) to determine if the voting machines were counting correctly. She determined from this audit that the machine counts for this "virtual precinct" were manifestly incorrect.

She then went public - immediately. No reassurances that this was "just a glitch" or an attempt to blame the problem on "human error". That same night she informed the press, candidates, and the Iowa Director of Elections, Sandy Steinbach, that the ES&S equipment (M100 precinct scanners and one M650 central count optical scanner) had tainted the administration of the public elections in Pottawattamie County.

She then conducted an audit of the machine programing for the other precincts of Pottawattamie County, Iowa.

As a result of the audits, Marilyn Jo Drake now has vote totals for Potawattamie County, Iowa instead of convenient, computer-generated numbers masquerading as votes totals for Potawattamie County, Iowa.

She accepted the uncomfortable truth over the pleasant, convenient and plausible lie. Her life would have been so much simplier today had she acceped the lie and stated that the Pottawattamie County, Iowa election was "problem free". Instead, she chose accuracy over expediency.

I fear Drake may find she is one of only a hand full of election officials in the nation willing to choose this difficult option. But, I do know this, it may be a small club but being a member is worth it.

Marilyn Jo Drake is a hero.

[sinkingfeeling]

4. She deserves a medal!

[BurtWorm]

5. Thanks for posting that.

:toast:

[helderheid]

7. you bet! I bet you were the one to recommend too! Thank you!

[BurtWorm]

8. I was.

:hi:

[helderheid]

9. :D

:hi:

This woman along with Bruce Funk deserve medals! Thanks BurtWorm!!

[BurtWorm]

10. I agree

[BurtWorm]

6. Kick

[Iowa]

11. K&R.

[Vidar]

12. Kudos to Mary Jo!

[Skidmore]

13. Also worthy of note generally for Iowa was the fact that

many counties which had machines offered voters a choice between paper ballots and the machine. We chose paper, of course.