GeoElections®

Goes to Nashville

ICW attended the 99th NASS Summer Conference exhibiting the functionality of GeoElections to a wide variety of Sec States and their staff from across the country. Even vendors of VRS software whom we currently do not interoperate with engaged in talks around the benefits their clients would derive from a GeoElections interface.

The 99th NASS Summer Conference was well attended by both NASED members along with an abundance of vendors who specialize in elections products and services.

Setting up for the trade show and introducing GeoElections to numerous attendees interested in technology solutions for their respective states is always a treat.

Packing up marks the first step to returning home.

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Some people who voted absentee in Selma’s upcoming municipal elections were given the wrong ballots.

The problem revolves around the voters’ list, which assigned some residents to the wrong ward.

Carl Nelson with the Dallas County Board of Registrars said his office is working with the city to correct the list this week.

Anyone who votes in person at a polling place Aug. 23 should be given the right ballot, according to Nelson.

The issue was discussed at length Friday during a special city council work session. Ed Packard, an election administrator with the Alabama Secretary of State’s Office, came to answer questions and offer advice.

Several city council members said it appears that redistricting following the 2010 Census was never applied to the voters’ list.

“They did not take the maps following those streets they were explicitly given. Those lines were drawn a certain way, but the voters’ rolls were never changed,” said Councilwoman Bennie Ruth Crenshaw.

At a glance one can see the extensive feature enhancements the GeoPoints© module has received comparing the prior version of the menus to the latest version.

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The story above is only a most recent example of voters receiving the wrong ballot which could have been avoided with the use of GeoElections’ interoperability with the installed voter registration system.

In the case of Alabama, ES&S sold PowerProfile® state wide covering all 67 counties in Alabama. Jefferson County, AL has been a GeoElections and PowerProfile client since 2000 and has averted the dilemma discussed in the story above interoperating with GeoElections.

The use of GeoElections as an interoperable application with your VRS provides numerous benefits, not the least of which is improved integrity in the data that drives ballot delivery.

In addition to improved data integrity, GeoElections assists in the assurance that each and every voter will receive the correct ballot regardless vote by mail, early vote or election day polling place votes. GeoElections was first introduced in 1998.

 

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Temple Terrace Public Library Receives NOTES FROM A PETITIONER

Friday, August 13, 2016, Teressa Fraser, Library Division Director for the Temple Terrace Public Library received additional copies of Ken Tozier’s, NOTES FROM A PETITIONER. The additional copies will increase the total available for circulation since the Hillsborough County Public Library Cooperative acquired their first volume. Now with three copies available, this book which chronicles a stormy period of Temple Terrace politics, should meet readership demands.

The First Amendment to the United States Constitution is part of the Bill of Rights. The amendment states, “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances” (emphasis added). Thus begins the Foreword written by Gregg Darrow Thomas, Esq.

This is a story based upon fact chronicled by newspaper, television, and radio accounts of the events that started with the simple announcement of a City Council member’s intent to resign his office to run for Mayor, leaving a two year vacancy. The City Charter adopted in 1978 gave the Council authority to appoint someone to fill the vacancy for the balance of the term.

“Two years is too long. The emergency power of interim appointments makes tremendous sense, but twoyears? Despite the disagreement…council set a determined course to appoint and then did everything in their power to halt the voice of the electors,” wrote the author. It is remarkable to read the steps which this group of small town politicians would go to thwart the Petitioner and in so doing deny the very people who had elected them the right to elect a replacement.

Had these politicians succeeded they likely would have reached into their circle of cronies to appoint a rubber stamp for their agenda, serving the few at the expense of the many. So a citizen is transformed by historic events to become the Petitioner and follow his beliefs to success and failure but always with the best interests of the citizenry at heart.

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ICW To Offer a GeoAuthor® VTD Edition in 2017

The people at ICW will make the VTD Edition of GeoAuthor available to any county in Florida at no charge. Florida is able and should be a model for other states to aspire to emulate regards the outstanding performance expected from 2020 Phase 2 VTD Update Project.

John Guthrie, then staff Director of the Florida Senate Reapportionment Committee and Catherine Clark McCulley, then Chief of the Census Data Redistricting Office, stated; data from county participants who used GeoAuthor® was superior to the data received from county participants who had used the software distributed by the Bureau.

ICW staff has been corresponding with individuals at the Data Redistricting Office and Division of Geography to confirm both the dauta structures intended for use in the 2020 Phase 2 program and the reports the Bureau wants to receive after participants have completed their work.

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