Politico.com, February 20, 2008
New York Mayor Mike Bloomberg yesterday alleged "fraud" in the unofficial count of New York City's votes, which left Obama with zero votes in 80 election districts.
"If you want to call it significant undercounting, I guess that's a euphemism for fraud," he said.
This contradicts what some familiar with the system thought, which was that it's within the range of error for the sloppy, unofficial count.
Bloomberg's spokesman, Stu Loeser, reiterated the charge in an e-mail, in which he also made clear that the charge was part of the mayor's local campaign to take the Board of Elections out of the control of the local political parties.
There are plenty of people arguing that the same error could have been made by mistake more than 80 times (and counting!), but the mayor is less sanguine. Certainly, if the system for administering elections was based on competence (and if the special-interest induced gridlock in Albany hadn’t prevented the State from certifying new machines some time in the last 40 or more years), someone might have noticed that there’s a problem where Sen. Obama apparently got no votes in areas where he clearly had a lot of support.
Bloomberg controls the police department, and I asked if he planned an investigation. Loeser said he didn't think there was actually a legal issue at stake in the preliminary, unofficial vote counts.
Anyway, we'll have a clear sense of the scale of the discrepency when the state gets an official count. And the Harlem results, at least, are unlikely to swing the delegate count; Clinton won the district by 4 percentage points and split the delegates anyway.
But it's a pretty dramatic allegation. I'm surprised it hasn't gotten more attention.
Wednesday, February 20, 2008
Wednesday, March 23, 2005
Council Assails Bloomberg Over Money for Elections
New York Times, By MIKE McINTIRE, March 23, 2005
The City Council demanded yesterday that the Bloomberg administration explain why it did not tap $27 million in capital money that was appropriated years ago to improve the city's election system.
Citing technical problems at the Board of Elections that caused frustration and delays for some voters last fall, Bill Perkins, chairman of the Council's Governmental Operations Committee, delivered a letter to Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg asking him to draft a plan for using the money to make improvements.
"It is unacceptable that last November's Election Day was marred by poor service while available money remained hidden in your budget," Mr. Perkins wrote. "It is unconscionable that now, after so many months, this matter has not yet been cleared up."
The board's telephone and Internet operations crashed in November, leaving many voters unable to locate their polling places or find other Election Day information. In 2003, the board asked the administration for an additional $1 million in its operating budget to improve its telephone call center and Web site, but the request was turned down.
The operating budget is separate from the capital budget, whose projects are typically financed through borrowing. The New York Times reported last year that the unspent money remained in the capital budget under the heading, "Board of Elections Modernization Project."
But the city had drawn up plans to spend only about a third of the $27 million - on renovations to the board's offices and warehouse space - and elections officials said they were unaware that the remaining $18 million was available for other projects, like the call center and computer servers for the Web site.
Jordan Barowitz, a spokesman for Mr. Bloomberg, said the mayor's budget office had met with elections officials in recent weeks and was "ready to assist them with their plan to address their capital needs and improve their information technologies."
He also took a jab at Mr. Perkins, who in his letter criticized the mayor for not doing enough to "end the bureaucratic buck-passing and take responsibility." Mr. Barowitz said Mr. Perkins acknowledged that he, too, had been unaware of the $27 million capital appropriation, which was approved by the City Council years ago.
"As for the council member's vitriol," Mr. Barowitz said, "it's always bizarre when elected officials are unaware of what's in the budget that they approve."
The Board of Elections functions independently, but relies on the city to finance its operating budget, which this year totaled $75 million.
At a budget hearing this month, the executive director of the board, John Ravitz, said he knew nothing about the additional capital money, and referred Mr. Perkins's committee to another city agency, the Department of Citywide Administrative Services. The commissioner of that department, Martha K. Hirst, later testified in the same hearing that the money was available, but that the board and the mayor's budget office needed to agree on a plan for spending it.
The City Council demanded yesterday that the Bloomberg administration explain why it did not tap $27 million in capital money that was appropriated years ago to improve the city's election system.
Citing technical problems at the Board of Elections that caused frustration and delays for some voters last fall, Bill Perkins, chairman of the Council's Governmental Operations Committee, delivered a letter to Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg asking him to draft a plan for using the money to make improvements.
"It is unacceptable that last November's Election Day was marred by poor service while available money remained hidden in your budget," Mr. Perkins wrote. "It is unconscionable that now, after so many months, this matter has not yet been cleared up."
The board's telephone and Internet operations crashed in November, leaving many voters unable to locate their polling places or find other Election Day information. In 2003, the board asked the administration for an additional $1 million in its operating budget to improve its telephone call center and Web site, but the request was turned down.
The operating budget is separate from the capital budget, whose projects are typically financed through borrowing. The New York Times reported last year that the unspent money remained in the capital budget under the heading, "Board of Elections Modernization Project."
But the city had drawn up plans to spend only about a third of the $27 million - on renovations to the board's offices and warehouse space - and elections officials said they were unaware that the remaining $18 million was available for other projects, like the call center and computer servers for the Web site.
Jordan Barowitz, a spokesman for Mr. Bloomberg, said the mayor's budget office had met with elections officials in recent weeks and was "ready to assist them with their plan to address their capital needs and improve their information technologies."
He also took a jab at Mr. Perkins, who in his letter criticized the mayor for not doing enough to "end the bureaucratic buck-passing and take responsibility." Mr. Barowitz said Mr. Perkins acknowledged that he, too, had been unaware of the $27 million capital appropriation, which was approved by the City Council years ago.
"As for the council member's vitriol," Mr. Barowitz said, "it's always bizarre when elected officials are unaware of what's in the budget that they approve."
The Board of Elections functions independently, but relies on the city to finance its operating budget, which this year totaled $75 million.
At a budget hearing this month, the executive director of the board, John Ravitz, said he knew nothing about the additional capital money, and referred Mr. Perkins's committee to another city agency, the Department of Citywide Administrative Services. The commissioner of that department, Martha K. Hirst, later testified in the same hearing that the money was available, but that the board and the mayor's budget office needed to agree on a plan for spending it.
Friday, November 5, 2004
New York Votes, With Difficulty
New York Times Editorial, November 5, 2004
New York City's local election results were bereft of suspense this year, with candidates from John Kerry to state legislators rolling up local landslides. That was fortunate because the city's system - both its human and machine components - could never handle a close election.
Across the city's five boroughs, there were complaints about broken machines, ill-trained workers and lines that were hours long. Callers who simply needed to know where they should vote could not get through to the Board of Elections, and the board's shamefully underdeveloped Web site continues to be of little help. In addition, the board didn't distinguish itself in the weeks leading up to the election. There's enough anecdotal evidence to show that its handling of registrations and absentee ballots was chaotic.
The greatest frustrations may have been with the antiquated machinery, 40-year-old hulks that are finally to be replaced by 2006. While new machines may offer other complications, we hope that they'll be more dependable: 5 percent of the ones in use now regularly break down. On Tuesday, that problem was further complicated by unprepared poll workers, some of whom did not even know how to substitute paper ballots or - at least at one site - where to find them. The voters who hung in there deserve credit for tenacity.
Both Mayor Michael Bloomberg and the City Council speaker, Gifford Miller, have angrily demanded improvements by next year, when both are expected to run for mayor. A good start would be better preparation for poll workers; some of them still show up without attending a single training session. But the entire structure of the Board of Elections, a panel of political appointees selected by county leaders, needs reform. Since the board's executive director, John Ravitz, has been effusive in his praise of how the system worked, fixing the mess will clearly mean looking elsewhere.
New York City's local election results were bereft of suspense this year, with candidates from John Kerry to state legislators rolling up local landslides. That was fortunate because the city's system - both its human and machine components - could never handle a close election.
Across the city's five boroughs, there were complaints about broken machines, ill-trained workers and lines that were hours long. Callers who simply needed to know where they should vote could not get through to the Board of Elections, and the board's shamefully underdeveloped Web site continues to be of little help. In addition, the board didn't distinguish itself in the weeks leading up to the election. There's enough anecdotal evidence to show that its handling of registrations and absentee ballots was chaotic.
The greatest frustrations may have been with the antiquated machinery, 40-year-old hulks that are finally to be replaced by 2006. While new machines may offer other complications, we hope that they'll be more dependable: 5 percent of the ones in use now regularly break down. On Tuesday, that problem was further complicated by unprepared poll workers, some of whom did not even know how to substitute paper ballots or - at least at one site - where to find them. The voters who hung in there deserve credit for tenacity.
Both Mayor Michael Bloomberg and the City Council speaker, Gifford Miller, have angrily demanded improvements by next year, when both are expected to run for mayor. A good start would be better preparation for poll workers; some of them still show up without attending a single training session. But the entire structure of the Board of Elections, a panel of political appointees selected by county leaders, needs reform. Since the board's executive director, John Ravitz, has been effusive in his praise of how the system worked, fixing the mess will clearly mean looking elsewhere.
Thursday, November 4, 2004
Mayor and Council Speaker Criticize Elections Board
New York Times, By JENNIFER STEINHAUER, November 4, 2004
Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg stepped up criticism yesterday of the Board of Elections for its performance on Tuesday, and his complaints were echoed by the City Council speaker, Gifford Miller, who said the Council would hold oversight hearings over the board's practices.
On a day of heavy turnout at the polls, phones at the board's office went unanswered, information on where to vote was hard to obtain and broken voting machines and befuddled workers greeted many voters, some of whom stood in line for nearly two hours at polls around the city. The New York Public Interest Group logged more than 3,000 phone calls on its hot line from voters who had experienced problems.
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"We are concerned about the fact that our system was overstressed yesterday and was not able to handle the tremendous influx of voters," Mr. Miller said during a news conference on the steps of City Hall. "All across this city, voters were frustrated in their attempts to vote yesterday for reasons that are not clear to me and that aren't really legitimate."
He said that his office placed 300 calls to the board's hot line on Tuesday and that only 21 of them were answered. Further, while Mr. Miller conceded that the Council had not heeded the pleas of the board for more money to train and pay workers, he said the Bloomberg administration was even less open to allocating more to the board's budget.
Mr. Bloomberg said yesterday that he was unsympathetic to the board's inability to handle its high phone volume, comparing its performance to "restaurants that complain that the service is slow because it's mealtime."
"I don't have a lot of sympathy for that," he said at a news conference in Queens. "Of course, the Board of Elections had their phone lines busy at election time, and I think they should have prepared for it."
John Ravitz, the executive director of the board, said yesterday that while the board was understaffed on its phone lines and had faced sporadic problems at the polling stations, he was proud of its work.
"I have heard comments that we didn't have a good day or we weren't prepared but I thought we had a great day," he said. "We got an additional 400 machines out and we hired additional workers. At no point did voters have to be turned away. We got 435,000 new voters this year. We got through it."
Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg stepped up criticism yesterday of the Board of Elections for its performance on Tuesday, and his complaints were echoed by the City Council speaker, Gifford Miller, who said the Council would hold oversight hearings over the board's practices.
On a day of heavy turnout at the polls, phones at the board's office went unanswered, information on where to vote was hard to obtain and broken voting machines and befuddled workers greeted many voters, some of whom stood in line for nearly two hours at polls around the city. The New York Public Interest Group logged more than 3,000 phone calls on its hot line from voters who had experienced problems.
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"We are concerned about the fact that our system was overstressed yesterday and was not able to handle the tremendous influx of voters," Mr. Miller said during a news conference on the steps of City Hall. "All across this city, voters were frustrated in their attempts to vote yesterday for reasons that are not clear to me and that aren't really legitimate."
He said that his office placed 300 calls to the board's hot line on Tuesday and that only 21 of them were answered. Further, while Mr. Miller conceded that the Council had not heeded the pleas of the board for more money to train and pay workers, he said the Bloomberg administration was even less open to allocating more to the board's budget.
Mr. Bloomberg said yesterday that he was unsympathetic to the board's inability to handle its high phone volume, comparing its performance to "restaurants that complain that the service is slow because it's mealtime."
"I don't have a lot of sympathy for that," he said at a news conference in Queens. "Of course, the Board of Elections had their phone lines busy at election time, and I think they should have prepared for it."
John Ravitz, the executive director of the board, said yesterday that while the board was understaffed on its phone lines and had faced sporadic problems at the polling stations, he was proud of its work.
"I have heard comments that we didn't have a good day or we weren't prepared but I thought we had a great day," he said. "We got an additional 400 machines out and we hired additional workers. At no point did voters have to be turned away. We got 435,000 new voters this year. We got through it."
Wednesday, November 3, 2004
Strong Showing at Polls Catches City's Old System Off Guard
New York Times, By MIKE McINTIRE, November 3, 2004
Strong Showing at Polls Catches City's Old System Off Guard
Crowds like this one, in the gym of Public School 321 in Park Slope, Brooklyn, were a common sight throughout the region yesterday.
With a huge turnout testing New York City's antiquated voting system, voters complained of long lines, confusion and broken machines at some polling places yesterday, as election officials appeared overwhelmed and unprepared for the crush of people who showed up to cast ballots.
Although the problems did not lead to widespread disorder, they left New Yorkers, including Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg, frustrated that election officials did not seem to have addressed longstanding complaints about the outdated voting system.
"At this stage in our electoral process - what is it, over 200 years? - we should have more advanced technology to vote," said David Bartolomi, 39, a Manhattan photographer waiting at an East 49th Street polling place where machines broke down. "This is the first time in 12 years I've had to wait on line to vote."
Three of the eight machines at a polling site in the Murray Hill section of Manhattan broke down early in the morning, forcing voters to use paper ballots. At a busy Wall Street polling site, workers showed up an hour after the polls opened and did not know how to use the equipment, spawning long waits by frustrated voters.
Residents of Park Slope, Brooklyn, also complained of lengthy delays and confusing instructions from poll workers, who sent one woman to the wrong school to vote.
Workers at a Greenwich Village polling place could not find the registrars' books needed to check off the names of voters.
After casting his vote at a school on East 81st Street yesterday morning, Mr. Bloomberg echoed voters' complaints and criticized the city's Board of Elections, whose phone lines and Web site were jammed or inoperable for long periods, thwarting voters trying to locate polling sites.
"We had offered them some help, but they wanted to preserve their independence from the administration, and so they declined the help," Mr. Bloomberg said of the board. "But they better get their act together by next year."
"This has been an antiquated system for an awful long time," he said, "and we've not been able to improve it, I think, in any meaningful sense."
John Ravitz, executive director of the elections board, said that problems with voting equipment were not widespread, adding that the board had not turned down help. Noting that the board operates more than 7,000 voting machines, Mr. Ravitz said, "These machines are from the 1960's and are doing a good job."
Board officials said that their telephone lines were deluged with up to 1,000 calls an hour yesterday, overloading the system, but that a bare-bones version of their Web site, which was down most of Monday, was running yesterday. They said they were caught off guard by the long wait times some voters experienced at the polls.
"We didn't expect there would be two-hour lines, but we expected it would take some time," said Chris Riley, a spokesman for the board. "Usually during an election, you'll hit a dip 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. This election, we haven't seen that dip."
The board bought 400 used voting machines in preparation for what was expected to be a large turnout. More than 400,000 new voter registrations in the past year increased the number of registered voters to 4.4 million.
New York was one of 24 states to get waivers allowing them to delay complying with federal requirements - put into place after the 2000 election - to replace mechanical voting equipment with new technology.
Complaints of problems at the polls extended beyond New York City. In Westchester, where State Senator Nicholas A. Spano, a Republican, faced a hard-fought race, Democrats won a court order impounding the ballots after several voters complained of irregularities. One voter said in an affidavit that that he arrived at the polls to find that someone else had signed next to his name. And two people said in affidavits that voting machines registered two votes cast before the polls opened at 6 a.m.
In New Jersey, more than 300 people went to the Constitutional Litigation Clinic at the Rutgers School of Law in Newark to complain that they had not been allowed to vote by machine or by provisional ballot, an alternative form of voting for those not properly registered.
"These are people that say they haven't done anything like move or change their addresses,'' said Penny Venetis, a law professor, who said she had not seen so many aggrieved voters in her 11 years at the center. "They were just told that they could not vote, period."
In Connecticut, where about 275,000 new voters registered for the election, people waited for as long as two hours at some polling places. Election officials in Hartford reported heavy turnout statewide, and in some towns, registrars seemed unprepared for the volume. Voters at an elementary school in Darien waited up to an hour, only to find a lone, elderly registrar slowly checking off names as people filed into the gymnasium.
But the worst scenes of confusion were at polling places around New York. At 45 Wall Street, a luxury apartment building that serves as a polling place for most Wall Street residents, poll workers were unfamiliar with their tasks, and one of the two machines broke down.
As replacement workers from the elections board scrambled to try to restore order - placing a cardboard box marked "official ballot box" on a folding table - a line of voters stretched out the door, nearly to the statue of George Washington in front of Federal Hall National Memorial a block away.
"They sent five people who hadn't been through training," said Louise Burley, an inspector from the elections board. "You're supposed to have some kind of training. I don't understand."
At Liberty High School on West 128th Street, voters whose last names began with the letters A through L became angry because the wait in their line was two hours, while the M-Z line was nearly empty. After repeated complaints, the poll worker on the A-L line was replaced.
For the most part, New Yorkers seemed to take the long wait in stride. In the Hell's Kitchen section of Manhattan, voters spent more than an hour in long lines at Public School 51 on West 45th Street, reading books or talking.
"I've never seen anything like this," said Vera Wells, who said she had been voting in the neighborhood since the early 1980's. "It's chaotic, but it's civilized chaos."
Strong Showing at Polls Catches City's Old System Off Guard
Crowds like this one, in the gym of Public School 321 in Park Slope, Brooklyn, were a common sight throughout the region yesterday.
With a huge turnout testing New York City's antiquated voting system, voters complained of long lines, confusion and broken machines at some polling places yesterday, as election officials appeared overwhelmed and unprepared for the crush of people who showed up to cast ballots.
Although the problems did not lead to widespread disorder, they left New Yorkers, including Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg, frustrated that election officials did not seem to have addressed longstanding complaints about the outdated voting system.
"At this stage in our electoral process - what is it, over 200 years? - we should have more advanced technology to vote," said David Bartolomi, 39, a Manhattan photographer waiting at an East 49th Street polling place where machines broke down. "This is the first time in 12 years I've had to wait on line to vote."
Three of the eight machines at a polling site in the Murray Hill section of Manhattan broke down early in the morning, forcing voters to use paper ballots. At a busy Wall Street polling site, workers showed up an hour after the polls opened and did not know how to use the equipment, spawning long waits by frustrated voters.
Residents of Park Slope, Brooklyn, also complained of lengthy delays and confusing instructions from poll workers, who sent one woman to the wrong school to vote.
Workers at a Greenwich Village polling place could not find the registrars' books needed to check off the names of voters.
After casting his vote at a school on East 81st Street yesterday morning, Mr. Bloomberg echoed voters' complaints and criticized the city's Board of Elections, whose phone lines and Web site were jammed or inoperable for long periods, thwarting voters trying to locate polling sites.
"We had offered them some help, but they wanted to preserve their independence from the administration, and so they declined the help," Mr. Bloomberg said of the board. "But they better get their act together by next year."
"This has been an antiquated system for an awful long time," he said, "and we've not been able to improve it, I think, in any meaningful sense."
John Ravitz, executive director of the elections board, said that problems with voting equipment were not widespread, adding that the board had not turned down help. Noting that the board operates more than 7,000 voting machines, Mr. Ravitz said, "These machines are from the 1960's and are doing a good job."
Board officials said that their telephone lines were deluged with up to 1,000 calls an hour yesterday, overloading the system, but that a bare-bones version of their Web site, which was down most of Monday, was running yesterday. They said they were caught off guard by the long wait times some voters experienced at the polls.
"We didn't expect there would be two-hour lines, but we expected it would take some time," said Chris Riley, a spokesman for the board. "Usually during an election, you'll hit a dip 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. This election, we haven't seen that dip."
The board bought 400 used voting machines in preparation for what was expected to be a large turnout. More than 400,000 new voter registrations in the past year increased the number of registered voters to 4.4 million.
New York was one of 24 states to get waivers allowing them to delay complying with federal requirements - put into place after the 2000 election - to replace mechanical voting equipment with new technology.
Complaints of problems at the polls extended beyond New York City. In Westchester, where State Senator Nicholas A. Spano, a Republican, faced a hard-fought race, Democrats won a court order impounding the ballots after several voters complained of irregularities. One voter said in an affidavit that that he arrived at the polls to find that someone else had signed next to his name. And two people said in affidavits that voting machines registered two votes cast before the polls opened at 6 a.m.
In New Jersey, more than 300 people went to the Constitutional Litigation Clinic at the Rutgers School of Law in Newark to complain that they had not been allowed to vote by machine or by provisional ballot, an alternative form of voting for those not properly registered.
"These are people that say they haven't done anything like move or change their addresses,'' said Penny Venetis, a law professor, who said she had not seen so many aggrieved voters in her 11 years at the center. "They were just told that they could not vote, period."
In Connecticut, where about 275,000 new voters registered for the election, people waited for as long as two hours at some polling places. Election officials in Hartford reported heavy turnout statewide, and in some towns, registrars seemed unprepared for the volume. Voters at an elementary school in Darien waited up to an hour, only to find a lone, elderly registrar slowly checking off names as people filed into the gymnasium.
But the worst scenes of confusion were at polling places around New York. At 45 Wall Street, a luxury apartment building that serves as a polling place for most Wall Street residents, poll workers were unfamiliar with their tasks, and one of the two machines broke down.
As replacement workers from the elections board scrambled to try to restore order - placing a cardboard box marked "official ballot box" on a folding table - a line of voters stretched out the door, nearly to the statue of George Washington in front of Federal Hall National Memorial a block away.
"They sent five people who hadn't been through training," said Louise Burley, an inspector from the elections board. "You're supposed to have some kind of training. I don't understand."
At Liberty High School on West 128th Street, voters whose last names began with the letters A through L became angry because the wait in their line was two hours, while the M-Z line was nearly empty. After repeated complaints, the poll worker on the A-L line was replaced.
For the most part, New Yorkers seemed to take the long wait in stride. In the Hell's Kitchen section of Manhattan, voters spent more than an hour in long lines at Public School 51 on West 45th Street, reading books or talking.
"I've never seen anything like this," said Vera Wells, who said she had been voting in the neighborhood since the early 1980's. "It's chaotic, but it's civilized chaos."
Thursday, November 1, 2001
Will Something Be Done About the Board of Elections?
Gotham Gazxette, by Elizabeth Daniel, November 2001
Maybe it wasn't the Board of Elections' fault that New York City's voters were left in a muddle for almost a week over who would be the Democratic nominee for mayor. Maybe, as the Board has argued, the fault rests with the Associated Press, the Police Department, and weary poll workers -- just about anybody involved with the unofficial reporting of the results but the board itself.
And, maybe it wasn't the board's fault in 1997 that a series of mishaps in tallying the election night returns showed Ruth Messinger and Al Sharpton heading for a run-off in the Democratic primary while the review 10 days later showed that Messinger had in fact received enough votes to avoid a run-off. Back then, the board was quick to point out, just as it has this year, that it is not responsible for the unofficial election night count.
In fact, it is the board's job to see that these mistakes don't happen -- just as it is the board's job to see that elections run competently, and that the city has confidence in the results. Yes, there is a significant distinction between the flaws in the hurried election night reporting of results and the kinds of mistakes we saw in 2000 -- broken machines, thousands of names missing from the registration lists -- that actually disenfranchise voters. And, yes, the city's votes are cast on lever machines that, at 60 years old, are prone to breakdowns. To give the board credit, it ran both the primary and the run-off with fewer mistakes than anyone predicted under difficult post-September 11 circumstances. But, year in and year out, the board drops the ball -- with serious consequences for the city's democratic process.
This year's reporting mistakes -- just as the mistakes made in 1997 -- undermined voters' confidence in whether the election was fair. These failures open the door to suspicions from historically disenfranchised voters that the system doesn't work for them even in the one place where everyone is supposed to be equal -- the voting booth. This year, the election night overcount significantly benefited Mark Green, who received the lion's share of the white vote, while it understated that of Fernando Ferrer, who took most of the black and Latino vote. This mistake left many black and Latino voters with a deep distrust of the board's scramble to come up with the official count -- just as the mistakes in 1997 left many of Al Sharpton's supporters with a sense that, once again, African Americans had been cheated. The uncertainty this year also created an unnecessary and somewhat surreal opportunity for the Ferrer camp to attack Green, while also challenging the fairness of the count -- all of which fueled a sense of heightening racial division. This year, at the end of the count, it was clear that Green had won the nomination, but this fumbling of the results supported a suspicion that Fernando Ferrer and his supporters were treated unjustly.
New York City doesn't need this. As everyone knows, the city is facing difficult times as we begin to rebuild from the attacks on September 11 and the severe economic fall-out that is following. A great many people will wonder whether the rebuilding process will go forward in a way that benefits the whole city. Running a good election may seem irrelevant when we are facing such a tremendous task, but an election that leaves black and Latino voters feeling undercounted or even cheated unfortunately highlights the city's longstanding racial divisions and contributes to cynicism about government. A smoothly run election process -- one that voters have confidence in -- can be a critical component in building confidence in how and for whom government works.
Two months ago, I wrote in this space that the problem with how elections are run in New York City goes back to the structure of the Board of Elections. Under state law, it is a patronage-based institution controlled by the party bosses and it is this structure that impedes the board's ability to run an election that inspires confidence. While a root-and-branch transformation of the board requires a state constitutional amendment, the new mayor and City Council will be in a strong position to move for some changes.
Neither Bloomberg nor Green has the burdensome ties with county party leaders that could stymie their courage here. So either man can take real leadership on this issue. Mayor Giuliani, although carping about the board throughout his administration and regularly slashing its budget, spent none of his political capital on real reform. The new mayor can use the bully pulpit of his office to focus attention on the board and its mismanagement. He could also take the extra step of appointing an oversight board as Mayor Koch did in the 1980s following a series of election debacles. He could pressure the party bosses to stop using the board as a patronage dumping ground. In short, there's a laundry list of things the new mayor could do -- if, once elected under this flawed system, he gives the issue of electoral reform the importance it deserves.
The almost all-new City Council can also become a leader on this issue. City Council has tremendous oversight authority, and a well-run Government Operations Committee could require a kind of accountability the Board of Elections has long avoided. Linked to its oversight, of course, is the Council's budget power, which the Council could use to impose some discipline on the Board.
The city's new government -- the mayor, the City Council, even the public advocate -- faces a staggering challenge in leading a post-September 11 New York, but these problems with the election process should not be pushed aside simply because they've been around for years. How the city runs its elections goes to the core of our democracy. The new government must show all New Yorkers that their voices will be heard, their votes will be counted.
Susan Reefer is a Republican pollster and media strategist. She is based in New York City.
Maybe it wasn't the Board of Elections' fault that New York City's voters were left in a muddle for almost a week over who would be the Democratic nominee for mayor. Maybe, as the Board has argued, the fault rests with the Associated Press, the Police Department, and weary poll workers -- just about anybody involved with the unofficial reporting of the results but the board itself.
And, maybe it wasn't the board's fault in 1997 that a series of mishaps in tallying the election night returns showed Ruth Messinger and Al Sharpton heading for a run-off in the Democratic primary while the review 10 days later showed that Messinger had in fact received enough votes to avoid a run-off. Back then, the board was quick to point out, just as it has this year, that it is not responsible for the unofficial election night count.
In fact, it is the board's job to see that these mistakes don't happen -- just as it is the board's job to see that elections run competently, and that the city has confidence in the results. Yes, there is a significant distinction between the flaws in the hurried election night reporting of results and the kinds of mistakes we saw in 2000 -- broken machines, thousands of names missing from the registration lists -- that actually disenfranchise voters. And, yes, the city's votes are cast on lever machines that, at 60 years old, are prone to breakdowns. To give the board credit, it ran both the primary and the run-off with fewer mistakes than anyone predicted under difficult post-September 11 circumstances. But, year in and year out, the board drops the ball -- with serious consequences for the city's democratic process.
This year's reporting mistakes -- just as the mistakes made in 1997 -- undermined voters' confidence in whether the election was fair. These failures open the door to suspicions from historically disenfranchised voters that the system doesn't work for them even in the one place where everyone is supposed to be equal -- the voting booth. This year, the election night overcount significantly benefited Mark Green, who received the lion's share of the white vote, while it understated that of Fernando Ferrer, who took most of the black and Latino vote. This mistake left many black and Latino voters with a deep distrust of the board's scramble to come up with the official count -- just as the mistakes in 1997 left many of Al Sharpton's supporters with a sense that, once again, African Americans had been cheated. The uncertainty this year also created an unnecessary and somewhat surreal opportunity for the Ferrer camp to attack Green, while also challenging the fairness of the count -- all of which fueled a sense of heightening racial division. This year, at the end of the count, it was clear that Green had won the nomination, but this fumbling of the results supported a suspicion that Fernando Ferrer and his supporters were treated unjustly.
New York City doesn't need this. As everyone knows, the city is facing difficult times as we begin to rebuild from the attacks on September 11 and the severe economic fall-out that is following. A great many people will wonder whether the rebuilding process will go forward in a way that benefits the whole city. Running a good election may seem irrelevant when we are facing such a tremendous task, but an election that leaves black and Latino voters feeling undercounted or even cheated unfortunately highlights the city's longstanding racial divisions and contributes to cynicism about government. A smoothly run election process -- one that voters have confidence in -- can be a critical component in building confidence in how and for whom government works.
Two months ago, I wrote in this space that the problem with how elections are run in New York City goes back to the structure of the Board of Elections. Under state law, it is a patronage-based institution controlled by the party bosses and it is this structure that impedes the board's ability to run an election that inspires confidence. While a root-and-branch transformation of the board requires a state constitutional amendment, the new mayor and City Council will be in a strong position to move for some changes.
Neither Bloomberg nor Green has the burdensome ties with county party leaders that could stymie their courage here. So either man can take real leadership on this issue. Mayor Giuliani, although carping about the board throughout his administration and regularly slashing its budget, spent none of his political capital on real reform. The new mayor can use the bully pulpit of his office to focus attention on the board and its mismanagement. He could also take the extra step of appointing an oversight board as Mayor Koch did in the 1980s following a series of election debacles. He could pressure the party bosses to stop using the board as a patronage dumping ground. In short, there's a laundry list of things the new mayor could do -- if, once elected under this flawed system, he gives the issue of electoral reform the importance it deserves.
The almost all-new City Council can also become a leader on this issue. City Council has tremendous oversight authority, and a well-run Government Operations Committee could require a kind of accountability the Board of Elections has long avoided. Linked to its oversight, of course, is the Council's budget power, which the Council could use to impose some discipline on the Board.
The city's new government -- the mayor, the City Council, even the public advocate -- faces a staggering challenge in leading a post-September 11 New York, but these problems with the election process should not be pushed aside simply because they've been around for years. How the city runs its elections goes to the core of our democracy. The new government must show all New Yorkers that their voices will be heard, their votes will be counted.
Susan Reefer is a Republican pollster and media strategist. She is based in New York City.
Wednesday, November 8, 2000
Long Lines And Problems At the Polls
THE 2000 ELECTIONS: THE VOTERS By SHAILA K. DEWAN, November 8, 2000
Jonathan Springer, a lawyer, was among those who did not mind the half-hour wait at the polls at 102nd Street and Amsterdam Avenue yesterday. ''It's really exciting to have all these people here,'' he said before voting in an election that many city poll workers said had drawn the largest turnout -- and the longest lines -- that they had seen in years.
And so voters lined up yesterday and waited for the moment when they could step into the voting booth. At many polling places, voters who found long lines in the morning went back after work. ''It was like going to see 'Star Wars,' '' said Andy Caso, 49, who had returned to the Congregation Mount Sinai synagogue in Brooklyn Heights to vote last night.
Mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani, who arrived at 8:15 a.m. to vote at the Richard Green School on East 88th Street in Manhattan, waited in line for 30 minutes.
''I thought it could be organized a little better,'' he told reporters after he finally emerged from the booth.
It was not the only place where there was a crowd. Around lunchtime at the Dewitt Rehabilitation and Nursing Center on East 79th Street and Third Avenue, about 80 voters were waiting, sharing an entrance with elderly patients in wheelchairs and on gurneys. ''It's chaotic,'' said Brian Scheur, a nursing home official. ''I'm trying to take care of my patients here while all these people come in and out.''
Elsewhere, there were the usual tales of things that can go wrong on Election Day. Voters, poll workers and poll watchers complained of one- and two-hour waits, overcrowding, inaccurate translations and poorly trained election inspectors. Seventy repairmen worked all day to fix numerous broken voting machines.
Daniel DeFrancesco, the executive director of the city's Board of Elections, acknowledged that at times yesterday, some polling stations had neither working machines nor emergency paper ballots. ''We anticipated a heavy turnout, but never this heavy,'' he said.
But Gene Russianoff, a senior lawyer with the New York Public Interest Research Group who had been fielding complaints since shortly after the polls opened at 6 a.m., said the board should have been better prepared. ''It's not like the weather,'' he said. ''They knew it was coming.''
At Public School 34 in Greenpoint, Brooklyn, Vitold Lach bellowed his frustration. ''Some of the elderly people have gone home,'' he said, ''and it's not easy for them to come back.''
Nearby, at the polling station at St. Anthony of Padua, a Catholic school, supervisors noticed that their booths were broken by 6:50 a.m. and called for repairs, said Betty Williams, an election district coordinator. By yesterday evening, only one of six was working, and emergency ballots were running short. ''People are getting discouraged and just leaving,'' said Kimberly Adams, 25, a waitress. ''I think a lot of people are saying this is just how the system works.''
Leon F. Nadrowski, Republican district leader for the area, was not pleased by what he saw when he inspected the polls after hearing complaints. ''We demand that this entire area of Brooklyn, Greenpoint and Williamsburg, have new elections with workable machines,'' he said.
Jonathan Springer, a lawyer, was among those who did not mind the half-hour wait at the polls at 102nd Street and Amsterdam Avenue yesterday. ''It's really exciting to have all these people here,'' he said before voting in an election that many city poll workers said had drawn the largest turnout -- and the longest lines -- that they had seen in years.
And so voters lined up yesterday and waited for the moment when they could step into the voting booth. At many polling places, voters who found long lines in the morning went back after work. ''It was like going to see 'Star Wars,' '' said Andy Caso, 49, who had returned to the Congregation Mount Sinai synagogue in Brooklyn Heights to vote last night.
Mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani, who arrived at 8:15 a.m. to vote at the Richard Green School on East 88th Street in Manhattan, waited in line for 30 minutes.
''I thought it could be organized a little better,'' he told reporters after he finally emerged from the booth.
It was not the only place where there was a crowd. Around lunchtime at the Dewitt Rehabilitation and Nursing Center on East 79th Street and Third Avenue, about 80 voters were waiting, sharing an entrance with elderly patients in wheelchairs and on gurneys. ''It's chaotic,'' said Brian Scheur, a nursing home official. ''I'm trying to take care of my patients here while all these people come in and out.''
Elsewhere, there were the usual tales of things that can go wrong on Election Day. Voters, poll workers and poll watchers complained of one- and two-hour waits, overcrowding, inaccurate translations and poorly trained election inspectors. Seventy repairmen worked all day to fix numerous broken voting machines.
Daniel DeFrancesco, the executive director of the city's Board of Elections, acknowledged that at times yesterday, some polling stations had neither working machines nor emergency paper ballots. ''We anticipated a heavy turnout, but never this heavy,'' he said.
But Gene Russianoff, a senior lawyer with the New York Public Interest Research Group who had been fielding complaints since shortly after the polls opened at 6 a.m., said the board should have been better prepared. ''It's not like the weather,'' he said. ''They knew it was coming.''
At Public School 34 in Greenpoint, Brooklyn, Vitold Lach bellowed his frustration. ''Some of the elderly people have gone home,'' he said, ''and it's not easy for them to come back.''
Nearby, at the polling station at St. Anthony of Padua, a Catholic school, supervisors noticed that their booths were broken by 6:50 a.m. and called for repairs, said Betty Williams, an election district coordinator. By yesterday evening, only one of six was working, and emergency ballots were running short. ''People are getting discouraged and just leaving,'' said Kimberly Adams, 25, a waitress. ''I think a lot of people are saying this is just how the system works.''
Leon F. Nadrowski, Republican district leader for the area, was not pleased by what he saw when he inspected the polls after hearing complaints. ''We demand that this entire area of Brooklyn, Greenpoint and Williamsburg, have new elections with workable machines,'' he said.
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