To the Editor:
We are convinced that we are about to lose the viability of our votes. Bucks County
Commissioners appear to have chosen electronic voting systems which neither state nor federal governments have tested even
as vigorously as slot machines are tested.
We are having severe problems with implementing the Help America Vote Act here
in Pennsylvania, as are so many other states. We are not worried about
insecurity with our old lever voting machines, nor do we want to deprive handicapped people of the right to vote privately. What
we do want is to know that our votes will be properly registered, recorded and counted, in other words, provable.
Please consider our plight. We are being asked to buy voting machines
that are definitely inadequate to the task. The Government Accountability Office's (the GAO's) report last September states
that rather clearly. Please check our research at www.coalitionforvotingintegrity.org and support our request to have Senator Specter introduce a bill into the Senate to save us from having to replace
all of our voting machines until truly adequate safeguards are in place.
We need more time before our local governments must choose new voting
systems, without the loss of federal funds of any kind, HAVA or otherwise. Representatives Michael Fitzpatrick, Rush
Holt, John Peterson and Alison Schwartz are co-sponsors of HB 4666, which would do that, but we need someone in the Senate
to introduce such legislation ... and to see it through. We are asking Senator Specter to introduce a similar bill
in the Senate, preferably before February 15th, by which time we expect our commissioners to have obligated us to buy insecure
machines. (Relevant legislation has been introduced at the federal level by Rep. Rush Holt, of New
Jersey, in HR 550 and at the state level by Sen. Joe Conti, in SB 977 and Rep. Dan Frankel, in HB
2000.)
We may not agree with Senator Specter (or anyone else) all of the
time, but we do think he is sincere in his efforts to do his very best to fight for what he believes in, sometimes against
truly tough odds, personal and otherwise.
T.J. and C. Fewlass
Langhorne
