Not that Jon Husted is the brightest bulb in the box- but, he is on to something (for all the wrong reasons). We currently have 88 different boards of elections, all run differently, all using one of 5 lame software systems for keeping voter rolls, and using one of 3 electronic voting systems. Yes, we need a better consolidated system- especially with congressional districts cutting right down the middle of some of the more populous counties.
To start off- here’s what Jon, “I live in Kettering” Husted is worried about- and then I’ll explain why this affects you:
Ohio’s top elections official says it appears that thousands of voters considered “active” are anything but.
Secretary of State Jon Husted says a report has found nearly 18,500 dead people on the state’s voter rolls. Records of registered voters were cross-checked with a list of deceased Ohioans maintained by the state Health Department.
The secretary is asking county elections boards to purge those who are deceased from the statewide voter database.
Husted said in a statement Tuesday that the integrity of voter data is critical from a cost, quality and confidence standpoint.
He wants to establish a more centralized state database so his office could more easily compare voter information with files kept by several state agencies, including the Bureau of Motor Vehicles and the prisons department.
via Thousands of dead on Ohio voter rolls, report shows | cleveland.com [1].
In Dayton, with out glorious 1913 charter, we base our petition process for recall and for putting issues on the ballot- on “a percentage of registered voters” instead of on a “percentage of voters in the last general election.” This makes it near impossible for the people to petition government.
Of course, if you are trying to run as an independent, and want to run for a district that cuts across counties (like the U.S. House) and you don’t have access to the database technology that the parties maintain (with the help of their partisan board of elections)- you will be forever at a serious disadvantage in trying to come up with a simple database of the voters in your district. Different systems, different data structures, different levels of access (some allow you to access this data online- some in person, some on CD- with different formats etc…)
One central, open, honest database would go a long way to making it easier for independent candidates to access the data that is critical to running a campaign.
If you’d like to see the Dayton Charter provisions struck down as unconstitutional and put in compliance with the Ohio Revised Code- please consider a donation to the legal fund: http://electesrati.com/index.php?option=com_civicrm&task=civicrm/contribute/transact&reset=1&id=5&widgetID=1 [2]
All the money will be going to the attorneys. Thank you,
Pardon my naivety, but what are “all the wrong reasons” John Hustead” would promote accurate statewide voter data?
Bobby, it’s more of the ongoing hysterical Republican propaganda that voter fraud is widespread and so we must (a) purge voter lists aggressively whenever possible even if it means kicking off legitimate and frequent voters (b) require photo i.d. at the polls (c) install untested electronic voting systems and then punish local boards of elections when they don’t work. etc. etc.
Yes, those are good ideas. But no, there is no widespread voter fraud, and when there is evidence of real poll manipulation (9000 black citizens prevented from voting in Jacksonville in the 2000 presidential election) we don’t get any investigation.
There is a rule of thumb when it comes to election reforms sponsored by Republicans versus those sponsored by Democrats. The Republican reforms are all, universally geared towards removing voters from the rolls (for whatever reason). The Democrats on the other are always looking for ways to expand voting.
Why ? Well – it’s simple – traditionally more people have voted Democratic over the years. The Demographics for wider voting support the Democrats, so Republicans instead of changing their policies to align them better with ordinary folks (as opposed to big business interests) have chosen this path to level the playing field. Those are the wrong reasons David is alluding to…
BTW – don’t be to surprised if many of the folks thrown off of the rolls by Husted because they’re dead turn out to be alive.
In the 1960 presidential election, John Kennedy won because the Daley machine in Chicago was able to rouse the dead and get them to the polls.
Trouble is that if the dead sign your petitions, they’ll have a hard time matching the sigs to a signature card.
The overworked employee’s at the BOE can’t clean up that mess. They only work two days a year! Give me a break. How many hours a week do they work, 35 and get paid for 40? How much is the payroll for the BOE? You could hire a professional, honest firm and cut costs in half! Dayton legal Blank can allready do it for less! Make a real change jon! The way BOE’s are run!
Currently the election boards all maintain local voter databases and have no way of comparing their data with other counties because the database formats, software, and how the data is entered is often different. All counties send a copy of their database to the SOS several times a year for “inspection” basically. A step in the right direction would be to have one standardized statewide database that is easy to sort etc.
If there was a centralized database for all electronic voting machines in the state of Ohio Deibold would have found the montgomery county board of elections had about $200,000 worth of machines they didn’t pay for after the county went electronic. I hear the board quietly made Director Harsman send most of them back a few years ago.
I would like a centralized database with the criminal backgounds of employees at the board of elections. We would not have any more problems with Director Steve Harsman hiring rapists or Deputy Director Betty Smith currently employing a republican that has been arrested half a dozen times to run the absentee ballot report.
It’s nice to see clapper finally post a decent idea. Keep it going!
I worked with Director Harsman on the alumni board at Sinclair many years ago and he was bald as a cue ball. I just looked the the board of elections website and he has a great hair piece. Does anyone know if our county tax dollars pay for this guy to get his “hair thing” put on or where he gets it put on? Sadly I am at an age where I would like one myself.
The state needs to set up a current statewide voter database just like the BMV has. The voter database and the software that runs it should be accessible online 24/7 for independent candidates like David to use. The online database and software could easily provide access to signature images, precinct maps, petition circulation tools, and current voter registration addresses etc. The montgomery county board of elections should have and could have done this 10 years ago if they wanted to. Are the other offices in the county as corrupt or useless as this one?
Hot off the press, the BOE are laying off employees! Are thy over-staffed? Over-paid? This place is a mess? Why dosent the SOS clean house? I wonder who is getting the boot?
Clapper, the republican that has been arrested half a dozen times is in charge of the absentee ballot department not the absentee ballot report.
This is an office where a staff member that signed his name on his daughter’s absentee ballot application was fired by the board of elections chairman. This same board chairman has a Director named Steve Harsman that hired a violent sex offender and was not punished at all. The same board chairman has a deputy director named Betty Smith who puts a habitual criminal in charge of the absentee ballot department and does nothing about that problem. Will someone please tell me this is not the case!!! I also hear there are a number of past and current staff that are tired of being embarassed by their leadership and are ready to expose more about this office.
i WORK FOR THE BOE AND THE PLACE IS A MESS! PLEASE HELP US!! GET RID OF SMITH & HARSMAN AND ALL BOARD MEMBERS!!! THEY ARE STEALING ELECTIONS!!!!
The state already has a working relationship with an Ohio company, Teradata, that can build a database to handle this. They already use them to scour the tax roles to look for non-compliant tax payers http://www.teradata.com/t/newsrelease.aspx?id=10979
I worked at the BOE for years. Everything that is said above is true. Payoff and corruption is the norm for this coumty office.I watched them commit crimes, fix elections, and steal from the county. Huested wont go against his home town crew. A change is despertly needed in this office. Where is Deb Feldman when you need her. Someone needs to step up and take charge. Apparrently no one cares and Im sure it will all go away like all the others crimes that politicans are doing. Where is Matt Heck or the Sheriff investigation? Do your job!!!!!
I wish I would have put the number of times the director took a county vehicle to get his hair piece “tuned” when he was suppossed to be working in a database, it would be a big one!
Scotty, Jon Husted and Betty Smith both live in kettering I think so he would really have to be pressed to do what needs to be done with this office. I work in the county courts and we were happy to get rid of your current deputy director when she left our office. She hired a senior citizen to do IT work in our office that was a disaster. She is known for having a bit of a “girls club” thing going.
That explains why she put a criminal female in charge of the Absentee Dept. What are the charges against this person?
And btw- if you all want me to do the full investigation and posting of salaries, who hired who etc at the BOE- start donating to the legal fund. Get $500 more in there by end of today- and I’ll get the salaries and post.
Get $1000 in and I’ll find out who hired each person there.
Get $3000 in and we’ll start investigating all the criminal backgrounds- laws broken etc.
I like it. David is a business man. I don’t know about the proposed prices. The current and former staff have a lot of stuff they can post here.
I think doing a full investigation would be great. The problem is nothing will happen unless they do a real criminal or SOS backed investigation into this office for any changes to happen. The board of elections staff knows their director defrauded voting machines from Deibold and hired the rapist he blamed on a supervisor. They know he insults them and watches them clock in and out like a hawk and then takes a county van on a long lunch to get his glue down redone. They know the deputy director should be fired for the “girls club” support she gives to a habitual criminal to run the absentee department. They know if the SOS or law enforcement came to office and interviewed people it would be end of both the director and deputy director and maybe some board members.
Someone needs to take a look at the information posted here and get a real investigation started. More staff need to start sharing.
I see a lot of stuff posted here and I think David would do a great job of exposing this office enough that it might lead to at least the director and deputy director being removed. The problem is that unless the right people read this blog it’s not going to do much. If the board of elections employees have information about crime etc. in this office they could send it to David or DDN etc. if they want to.
The best thing they can do, in my opinion, is to share this with people that work for elected officials and the political parties. If Jon Husted, DDN, TV News, and every elected official read this blog everyday the director would be in jail by now but that is not how politics works. Find the many current and former staff that have tons of proof of what these two directors have done and make it public for them because most likely they are afraid to say anything. A simple talk with Jon Husted about how the public can trust a board of elections director that hires a rapist as a political favor would be a great start.
I’ll give you all the info needed for $1500. Tell me where to testify against the Director, I’ll gladly do it. He is scum, a real bottom feeder. I can’t wait till I see that little peice of crap walk in shame from the county building.
@Charlie- the money is going to the lawyers- not to me, not to you.
@ButlerTwpRepub- this site is read- and passed around government offices non-stop. Word is the BOE checks it several times a day. The newspaper also reads it.
Corruption and Voting
What troubles me about the dialog that’s been occurring across this thread is that whether or not local election officials are corrupt – this type of focus will inevitably lead to one outcome. It will lead to ordinary voters being removed from the voting rolls as the result of 1, mistakes as ‘reform’ is enacted and 2, through deliberate purges of specific demographics from key voting districts (dozens of documented instances of this over the past decade).
This issue is much bigger than the local pols – it relates to massive manipulation of voting systems nationwide and a total lack of election oversight standards. No one at this point can even quantify how many instances of voting machine manipulation have occurred on electronic voting machines since 2000 (and on BOE and precinct level systems before that). The conflicts of interest behind those issues (which involve millions of votes) are much more frightening that the local corruption. These in includes conflicts such as Diebold donating millions of dollars to candidates from one party and another major election machine company being partially owned by a US Senator.
Whenever the dialog turns from voter empowerment to voter fraud – we instantly begin to lose sight of larger structural issues and the only ones who tend to suffer are ordinary voters. This is the same dynamic that is at work w/ Gerrymandering. BTW – the GOP narrative always tends to be that individual voters commit fraud while the opposing side tends to focus more on system-wide conflicts (although that isn’t always the case).
My problem with the election services in this county has nothing to do with voter fraud or removing so and so from the voter roles. My problem is an office that hires criminals and steals tax resources is not a place that is worthy of my trust in counting my ballot. I would not trust the police or teachers if they had administrators that hired criminals and stole stuff from the public. As for Diebold, they make atm machines as well, how often do those rip you off?
Lupe – why should the fact that someone hired an alleged rapist to run an election board lead to legitimate voters being restricted from voting (through efforts to purge the rolls being launched by Husted or the GOP bill to require state issued IDs)?
Every time election reform turns to “voter fraud” the outcome is the same. GOP or Democratic crooks don’t suffer – actual voters do.
In regards to Diebold – go here: http://www.verifiedvoting.org/ – learn about what’s really involved. I’ve been tracking this since before 2000 – I’m a computer engineer. If you want a detailed explanation as to how those machines have been manipulated I’d be happy to provide one for you. Bottom line – if no one is allowed to review source code because it is proprietary there can be no oversight – which is why V.V. has pushed for paper receipts, like ATM machines – the GOP and Diebold fought that movement bitterly for a decade so far.
Paper receipts prove nothing. The paper receipt is simply a printout of how the voting machine has counted the votes, it simply matches the memory in the machine.
The board of elections hired a registered sex offender that was convicted of rape not an alleged rapist.
I am in agreement that electronic voting machines are the worst thing ever to hit elections (I worked on them for years) paper ballots were so much better. With paper ballots you have transparency that you will never have with electronic machines.
I sounds like you are someone who thinks when we find out our tax resources are being abused by government offices we should just sweep it under the rug because it may upset some voters. Would you read Esrati’s blog or want him counting your ballot if he ran his business like the montgomery county board of elections or had a long criminal record?
Hi Lupe, first I read Esrati’s blog because he talks about politics and does a great job of uncovering issues in this town that the local paper doesn’t cover so well. I’m also familiar with his business and he seems to be doing a great job with it…
I’m not in favor of corruption and I have my own personal stories regarding that locally and elsewhere – I don’t support sweeping anything under the rug. However, two wrongs don’t make a right. My concern is that whenever these issues arise the corrupt folks who actually cause these problems tend to come out of it unscathed – what does happen though is that ordinary voters take the hit. This has happened too many times and in too many ways – and the current trend in this state is moving rapidly towards voter exclusion. We get cut out when districts are gerrymandered, we get thrown off of voter rolls when folks go hunting for felons or dead folks, we are blocked at polls with ID restrictions and voter “truth” squads are now looking to intimidate minority and elderly voters (this happened in dozens of locations in 2010).