To the Editor:

 

Chapter VII of Lewis Carroll's "Alice in Wonderland" is entitled, "A Mad Tea Party." The setting is a tea party where nothing is as it seems; questions receive no answers. The simple is complex and the obvious is obscured.

It occurs to me that in Bucks County the Hatter and the other Mad Tea Party attendees have been placed in charge of the county's new voting machine contract.

Make no mistake. There will be an election Nov. 7. All eligible voters are urged to vote. There may be enough voting machines available. They may, in all likelihood, function well enough for an election to be conducted. So what's the problem?

            The problem, quite simply, is that the $5 million contract that brought the new voting machines to Bucks County reads more like the menu at the Hatter's mad tea party than a legal document.

How many machines will Bucks County receive for $5 million? Attachment B of the contract references 650 machines. Attachment E of the very same contract references 800 machines. When those who signed the contract are asked which number is correct, one is told "Neither. The county will receive 700-some machines." No specific number is forthcoming.

At no fewer than three locations does the contract specify new voting machines. Only upon direct questioning is one told that at some time by some unnamed individual on some unknown written document were some roughly 375 new machines replaced by reconditioned machines. Wouldn't any individual consumer be righteously outraged if after contracting to purchase a new computer or a new automobile upon delivery was told that reconditioned equipment had been substituted?

Should consumers be any less outraged when what is at stake is a public purchase as opposed to a private purchase? When asked, "What is the difference in cost between the agreed-upon new machines and the delivered reconditioned machines?" the answer from those responsible for the purchase was, "We don't know."

Perhaps I'm becoming too exercised with this issue. After all, what is at stake is not something really important like contracting for a personal computer or a new car. What is at issue is only a contract that could affect the sanctity of the vote for thousands of Bucks County residents.

A public forum needs to be convened as soon as possible. The attendees should be those who signed the contract in question, interested Bucks County voters, and representatives of the public media. The purpose of the forum would be for clear and concise questions to receive accurate and definitive answers. And "Alice in Wonderland" would once again be relegated to a whimsical bedtime story.

 

Andrew L. Warren

Langhorne

 

Andrew Warren is a former Republican Bucks County commissioner and Democratic candidate for Congress.