Reply #2: Don't forget the guy [View All]

who had the machine with paper trails--TruVote. This guy had an approved deal in January 2004 with Microsoft and died in a car crash in March! Interestingly, he had the same idea I proposed during a Dean MeetUp right about the same time--before the primaries--that the receipts have a number that could be checked on a website.

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Brian Forrester

Nashville-based TruVote has partnered with technology powerhouse Microsoft Corp. to position the election voting software designer for nationwide distribution in a multi-billion dollar market.

As part of the agreement, Microsoft has given TruVote President and CEO Athan Gibbs access to its technology labs to test his product. Microsoft scrutinized coding and helped improve the TruVote software to industrial strength. Microsoft, run by Chairman Bill Gates, waived standard fees that would have totaled as much as $120,000 to gain access to the labs.

"We could see the potential in this tool," says Winston Smith, Microsoft Corp. director of supplier diversity. "It is the most robust use of Microsoft technology among electronic voting machines on the market."

TruVote also is working on alliances with global system integrators like Electronic Data Systems and Unisys.

TruVote recently received U.S. certification for its voting system. The certification will allow the Nashville company to approach state and local governments to test the product in an official election.

TruVote's product allows individual voters to audit their votes though printed receipts at the voting location. In addition, TruVote has the capability of displaying voting ballots in various languages on a visual computer screen, an advantage for precincts with numerous non-English-speaking voters.

TruVote has approached Arkansas, Mississippi, Alabama, Michigan, Ohio and Tennessee to supply voting machines. The U.S. Congress passed a $3.9 billion Help America Vote Act in December 2002, and President Bush signed the bill in February 2003. Each state now can re-evaluate its voting systems, a potential floodgate of economic opportunity for TruVote.

"There's literally a view that there is a need to spend more than $5 billion to change out election equipment with problems that were highlighted by the problems of the 2000 election in Florida," Smith says.

Gibbs first met Smith while attending a conference in Memphis and struck up discussions about forming a partnership. Gibbs says he had tried unsuccessfully for 12 months to establish a Microsoft partnership.

"We were introduced to Winston Smith, who was hired by the president of Microsoft to come over and head up Microsoft's vendor diversity program," says Gibbs. "We were able to go through the proper channels and form this alliance. And it's been crucial."

Microsoft and TruVote have approached Los Angeles, the largest voting county in the United States, about purchasing TruVote software. A Los Angeles contract, which is 18 months from making such decisions, would be worth nearly $141 million.

"We're going to actively go after those California counties," Gibbs says.

Source: Nashville Business Journal

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Ballot boxes get high-tech tryout
By Chris Lewis, clewis@nashvillecitypaper.com
January 26, 2004

With bitter memories of “hanging chads” and other punch-card balloting snafus of the 2000 presidential election, the nation is moving toward electronic voting systems.

But with touch-screen balloting presenting its own problems, more states and counties are demanding a verifiable paper audit trail so computerized votes can be double-checked in case of an election dispute.

Nashville-based TruVote International Inc. is on the forefront of developing and marketing the only Microsoft-based computer balloting system that meets the new standard.

“So far we’ve been to 33 states in 60 cities demonstrating it to secretaries of state, county election officials, and state legislators,” said Athan Gibbs, TruVote’s president and chief executive officer. “The response has been overwhelming because public confidence in the election process is at an all-time low.”

TruVote is among about eight companies or organizations in the United States that are certified to market the voter verifiable paper audit trail (VVPAT) technology, according to the web site, VerifiedVoting.org

“I’m very pleased that (Gibbs) is basically staking the future of his company on this paper trail, and that he’s out there fighting for it,” said Verified Voting’s founder David Dill, a professor of computer science at Stanford University.

Although Dill said he’s not seen the TruVote system demonstrated, he supports the efforts of companies to provide paper audit technology. His organization supports two pieces of proposed federal legislation (HR 2239 and S 1980) to require the use of such technology in federal elections.

http://www.nashvillecitypaper.com/index.cfm?section=10&screen=newsprint&news_id=30175

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He wanted every vote to matter; Athan Gibbs, Sr. dies in crash

03/14/04

By HOLLY EDWARDS
Staff Writer

After more than 1 million votes went uncounted in the last presidential election, Athan Gibbs Sr. devoted his life to making sure voters in future elections would know their votes mattered.

The enterprising 57-year-old saw his invention of the TruVote vote-casting system as nothing less than the key to social justice and democracy in America.

As family members and business partners gathered at the TruVote office yesterday morning to mourn Mr. Gibbs' death, they vowed that his dream would not die with him.

Mr. Gibbs was killed about 10:30 a.m. Friday in a car crash on Interstate 65 near Eighth Avenue North as he drove from his north Nashville home to his downtown office at Tennessee State University's Business Incubation Center.

Metro police said Mr. Gibbs lost control of his Chevy Blazer after he cut in front of an 18-wheeler and the two vehicles collided. The Blazer rolled several times in the southbound lanes, went over the retaining wall and came to rest on its roof on the northbound side. Gibbs was ejected, police said.

Before his sudden death, friends and family said, Mr. Gibbs worked tirelessly on the TruVote system and, with backing from Microsoft Inc., was marketing his invention nationwide.

''He loved God, he loved people and he loved democracy, and we're going to keep his dream going,'' said Mr. Gibbs' 25-year-old son, Jonathan, who worked with his father on the project. ''It's more important than ever now to make sure his vision becomes a reality.''

Mr. Gibbs spent about three years and roughly $2 million — including thousands of dollars from his own bank account — to develop and market the electronic vote-casting system. TruVote allows voters to touch their candidates' names on a computer screen and receive receipts of their vote at the end of the process. They can then go to a Web site, punch in their voter validation number and make sure their vote was recorded.

U.S. Rep. Jim Cooper, a Democrat who represents Davidson, the eastern half of Cheatham and the western half of Wilson County in Congress, said the TruVote system was ''one of the most promising technologies in the world for fixing democracies.''

With a federal mandate for states to review and upgrade their vote casting systems by 2006, Mr. Gibbs' invention was getting increasing attention nationwide, Cooper said.

''Every once in awhile, we see a fundamental need in this country and someone comes up with a fundamental discovery to fill that need, and that's what Athan had,'' Cooper said. ''This is a tragic loss for the entire country.''

Mr. Gibbs was driven by his experiences growing up in Memphis in the 1950s and '60s, when minorities were struggling to exercise their right to vote. After a U.S. Commission on Civil Rights study of the 2000 presidential election showed that votes cast by African-Americans in Florida, a decisive state, were 10 times more likely to be rejected, Mr. Gibbs knew he had to take action.

His quests for democracy and social equality also were driven by his religious faith, and he served as an associate minister at Mount Zion Baptist Church in Nashville.

''As an African-American clergyman, Athan was consumed by a desire for justice, equality and freedom for all people,'' said the Rev. Enoch Fuzz, pastor of Corinthian Missionary Baptist Church. ''And, he just ran out full speed ahead and tried to accomplish that.''

Mr. Gibbs was an accountant and financial auditor for 30 years and started his own company, INCO Tax Service of Tennessee. He received a bachelor of business administration degree from Tennessee State University and a bachelor of theology degree from American Baptist College.

In the 1970s, former U.S. Rep. Bob Clement hired Mr. Gibbs as a financial analyst when Clement headed the Tennessee Public Service Commission. The two remained close friends over the past three decades, and Clement had been serving as a business consultant for TruVote.

Clement said Mr. Gibbs' energy and idealism were infectious, and he called Mr. Gibbs ''one of the finest people I've met in my life.''

''We in the U.S. have one of the worst voting records in the world, and Athan was out to fix that,'' he said. ''A lot of people have ideas but never carry them out. Athan was following through on his dream, and his energy level was phenomenal. I don't think he ever slept.''

In addition to his son, Mr. Gibbs is survived by his wife, Dorothy, and a daughter, Angela.



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