[a]s state and Miami-Dade County election officials work to approve software that will clear up a nagging problem with touch-screen voting machines, a Herald review of internal election department documents has found that there are a host of other flaws that have never been publicly acknowledged and are not expected to be fixed by the new programming.Or, put more simply, things will be fine if the county sticks in a couple of kludges and busts its ass to cover for the company's screw-ups.
The situation has led to a fractious relationship between Miami-Dade, the state and the touch-screen machine maker, Electronic Systems & Software of Omaha, Neb. At one point, a state Division of Elections e-mail shows, Miami-Dade Assistant County Attorney Murray Greenberg threatened to sue the company - and make it "close up shop nationally" - if more problems were discovered with the equipment that was certified as working two years ago. ...
ES&S Senior Vice President Ken Carbullido responded to [Miami-Dade County Supervisor of Elections Constance] Kaplan on June 14, noting that each of the problems could be resolved if the county alters its procedures, reconfigures its software or, if it wants to transmit data from the polling places, redo the programming code in the machines or retrain its staff.
Doug Jones, a University of Iowa computer expert the county hired to review its electronic voting system, said the problems can be addressed by the November election but added
the extent of the flaws expose a major failing of the system: "The fundamental problem is the data formats used were never designed to handle a county as big as Miami-Dade." ...Terrific.
The lesson, Jones said, is "the belief that a software program is correct is almost always wrong."
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