Category Archives: Takoma Park 2009

Takoma Park 2009: the conclusion

Posted on December 23, 2009 by ben

Well, it’s been a few weeks of craziness at home and catching up on other work, but I’ve finally wrapped up the Takoma Park 2009 audit. The final step: letting you, dear reader, run the audit all on your own. … Continue reading →

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Takoma Park: verifying the shuffle and the unopened ballots

Posted on November 9, 2009 by ben

So the votes have been cast, the uncertified tally has been released, and the confirmation codes have been published for all voters to check. Now, it’s time to make sure that the coded votes, which were shuffled via the Shuffle … Continue reading →

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Takoma Park: auditing the auditor

Posted on November 6, 2009 by ben

Rick Carback from the Scantegrity team just pointed out to me that my totals are not quite the same as theirs, and he surmises that I may have read the Instant Runoff rules incorrectly. Specifically, my code considers that ballots … Continue reading →

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Takoma Park: and those provisional ballots?

Posted on November 5, 2009 by ben

Coverage of the Takoma Park election continues, with a good article in Wired. And so does the audit! Some people who showed up on election day couldn’t be verified as registered voters. Thanks to one of the useful HAVA provisions, … Continue reading →

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Takoma Park: so can I see my confirmation code already?

Posted on November 4, 2009 by ben

[This post is part of my Auditing the Takoma Park Municipal Election series.] So the votes have been cast, and voters went home. Some of them wrote down their confirmation codes. They probably checked those codes against the official Scantegrity … Continue reading →

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Takoma Park: Meeting 2

Posted on November 2, 2009 by ben

[This post is part of my Auditing the Takoma Park Municipal Election series.] OK, so a couple of days ago we verified the initial P table and D tables for all 6 wards in tomorrow‘s Takoma Park election. Now comes … Continue reading →

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Takoma Park Election: the 7 steps of auditing

Posted on November 1, 2009 by ben

[This post is part of my Auditing the Takoma Park Municipal Election series.] If you’ve been following, we know what the voter experience is going to be like on Tuesday, and we know what the auditing process is going to … Continue reading →

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Takoma Park 2009: Verifying the Tally from the Confirmation Codes

Posted on October 10, 2009 by ben

[This post is part of my Auditing the Takoma Park Municipal Election series.] We’ll now consider the auditing portion of the Takoma Park election. This is a little bit involved, so we’ll take our time. Importantly, the typical voter does … Continue reading →

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Takoma Park 2009: the voter experience

Posted on September 21, 2009 by ben

For background on this post, check out the Auditing Takoma Park 2009 Election.

I’m gathering all documentation on a Google Site. This blog will continue to serve as the narrative, while the datasets and documentation will live on the Google Site, and I’ll refer to them as needed from this blog.

Let’s begin with an explanation of the voting process that Takoma Park citizens will experience on November 3rd, 2009.
(If you’re a Takoma Park resident: make sure to register by October 5th if you want to participate in this historic election!)

Say hello to Valerie, our token voter. At a high level, Valerie’s voting experience is identical to her past experience with a typical optical-scan election. She fills in the bubbles for the candidates of her choice, casts her ballot, and walks away. With one twist: if Valerie wants to, she can write down some confirmation codes that will let her audit her ballot later on.
Continue reading →

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Auditing the Takoma Park Election

Posted on September 8, 2009 by ben

In November of this year, citizens of Takoma Park, Maryland will use the Scantegrity voting system in their municipal election. This is a significant milestone for open-audit voting systems: the first time a government official is elected using a voting … Continue reading →

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