**Florida's Tracking of Voting Systems Performance**

I am honored to be here today to testify about Florida's efforts to
track voting system performance.

I believe Florida has one of the toughest certification programs in the
nation but certification is only the first step in the process. We
monitor performance of the equipment to ensure that the product we
certified is the product that is delivered to the counties and used by
our voters.

Our Bureau of Voting Systems Certification, led by Bureau Chief David
Drury, is responsible for establishing and implementing standards for
voting systems certification, to provide technical assistance to county
Supervisors of Elections, and to track voting systems performance in the
field. The Bureau is also developing in-house expertise for security
assessment to promote a preventive philosophy toward security
vulnerabilities.

As background, Florida became an all optical scan state on July 1, 2008.
Fifteen, many of our largest counties, representing over half the
registered voters in our state, made the transition from touchscreen to
optical scan voting systems. In the year preceding the transition, the
Bureau tested and certified 15 different systems or upgrades to voting
systems, including Ballot on Demand. In addition, the Bureau conducted
functional testing and source code review for the Okaloosa Distance
Balloting Project. This project established a secure distance balloting
environment for approximately 100 overseas voters.

I have been asked to cover three areas for evaluating voting system
performance: Proactive measures taken by the Florida Department of
State, Election Day monitoring, and Reporting.

**[Proactive Measures]{.underline}**

In recent years, the nature of election administration has become very
reactive. It was my goal this election cycle to be deliberative and
proactive in our preparations for the 2008 election cycle. The efforts
of the Florida Department of State and the 67 Supervisors of Elections
paid off. We planned and prepared for every eventuality, checked and
re-checked those plans and most importantly, never assumed anything. As
part of our planning and preparations, the Department took a number of
proactive steps to ensure our state was ready. These steps helped us
assess the performance of the voting systems in the field and their
readiness for the anticipated large turnout.

My staff and I held monthly conference calls with the 67 Supervisors of
Elections during the year preceding the general election to track the
preparations for our statewide primary and the general election.
Likewise, we held regular conference calls with voting system vendors on
certification and equipment deployment issues.

My staff and I traveled to the 15 transition counties to offer
assistance and assess the performance of the new equipment during the
implementation phase.

The Bureau of Voting Systems Certification (BVSC) typically attends the
voting system vendors' user group meetings. These meetings provide a
forum for county officials to discuss the performance of both new and
older technology with the vendors and the State.

The Bureau of Voting Systems Certification is in constant communication
with each county's IT staff. In July of this year, the Bureau hosted a
voting systems roundtable discussion for county IT personnel. For the
first time, this group was able to exchange ideas and share their
observations in a large group setting regardless of which vendor they
used. This provided extremely valuable information for my staff to
assess the systems.

The BVSC analyzes the security procedures for all 67 counties in Florida
and provides recommendations for improvements and enhancements as well
as release "Technical Advisories."

**[Election Day Monitoring]{.underline}**

Election Day monitoring is a bit of a misnomer. In Florida, the Bureau
of Voting Systems Certification staff monitors Election Day
preparations, Early Voting, Election Day, Recounts, and Post-election
audits, as needed.

The objective is to observe and examine the registration and election
processes and the condition, custody, and operation of voting systems
and equipment.

The Bureau of Voting Systems Certification (BVSC) deployed its personnel
across the state for observation and support of the Presidential
Preference Primary, our August Primary, and General Election. During the
past two years, the Division of Elections traveled to and maintained a
presence in 34 counties during Logic and Accuracy Tests; 32 counties
during Early Voting; and 8 counties on Election Day. Typically for each
Election Day, personnel are assigned to four geographic areas: East,
West, Central, and South Florida.

In addition to the Voting Systems personnel in the field, the 67
Supervisors of Elections are assigned a staff member from the Division
of Elections and Office of the Secretary in Tallahassee. During Early
Voting and Election Day, these staff members contact their assigned
counties to assess how the voting process is going. Voting systems
issues reported by the counties are tracked by vendor and by equipment
type. The issues are assigned to the Bureau for follow up and
coordination with the voting system vendors to resolve them. This
process has been extremely helpful in quickly assessing whether issues
are isolated/county specific or a statewide occurrence.

**[Reporting]{.underline}**

The Florida Election code mandates a number of reports that the counties
must file with the State. These reports have been a valuable tool for
the Bureau of Voting Systems Certification to track voting system
performance. The primary objective is to promote continuous improvement
in the voting process.

The Bureau is responsible for acquiring, analyzing, and categorizing the
various problems that occurred during an election. Typically, these
issues can be grouped into four general categories: [man, machine,
materials, and methods]{.underline}. Analysis of apparent systemic
problems may reveal root cause(s) and offer the potential for developing
mitigating strategies that can be applied state wide.

County Canvassing Boards our required to file a Conduct of Elections
Report with the official certification of the Election. This year, we
revised the form to gather very specific information on the number of
machines deployed, by type, the number that were removed or
malfunctioned and the reasons for removal. Counties also report to us
issues with ballot printing, Ballot on Demand, election definitions,
shortages of poll workers or procedural violations, and insufficient
staffing or equipment at polling places.

Florida implemented Post-Election Audits this cycle. Reports are filed
by the counties detailing any discrepancies encountered, the likely
cause of the discrepancies, and the recommended corrective action to
mitigate it in the future. The Bureau of Voting Systems Certification
examines the audit reports for concerns with the precinct and central
count voting devices.

Finally, an overvote and undervote report is filed with the State. The
objective is to analyze the over and undervotes from each general
election to ascertain the suitability and effectiveness of voting system
technology. This analysis has sometimes been erroneously referred to as
an error rate assessment of voting systems and has inappropriately been
used to indicate the degree of tabulation uncertainty for each type of
voting device. The actual intent of the over and undervote analysis
relative to voting methods is to assess the suitability and
effectiveness of voting methods, voter education, voting processes and
procedures toward reducing inadvertent voter actions that result in an
undervoted or overvoted ballot. However, the analysis is confounded by
such problems as aggregated data from different voting methods and voter
intent such as voter apathy and the protest vote.

In closing, let me share with you our preparations for the 2010
elections. Through our tracking efforts in 2008, we have suggestions for
enhancements and improvements to both new and older systems. Voting
systems are a constantly evolving product and it is the responsibility
of state officials through testing and certification, observation in the
field, and analysis of reported data to ensure those products not only
function as advertised, but continue to do so. I use the analogy of
voting equipment needing to be a lot like an airplane....it has to start
up on time and make it off the ground, stay in the air throughout the
flight, and land safely with all of its components intact. The
difference is with 99.9% certainty we know that the plane will take off,
stay in the air and land safely.

Voting system vendors must be held accountable for the equipment they
produce but it has been my policy to treat vendors as partners not
adversaries. We have had great success working together to improve the
systems certified in Florida. To that end, I am hosting our three
certified vendors next month to discuss my expectations for the 2010
cycle and to build on our successes. I often use the analogy that
elections are like a three-legged stool. The State, local elections
officials, and voting system vendors all must work together or the stool
will fall over. If one fails, we all fail.

Thank you again for the opportunity to speak to you today. I would be
happy to take any questions at this time.