People needed for Vendor Meeting in Austin, Texas on Monday

From Dan Wallach:

The ACLU and EFF recently won a preliminary injunction in its lawsuit
against the State of Texas concerning whether the Texas Open Meetings
Act applies to the meetings of Texas' Election Examiners. As part of
the ACLU's victory, the state of Texas will be holding its first ever
public voting system examination (URLs below). Any vendor who wants
to sell a system in Texas, or even ship an upgrade to its existing
software, is required to go through this process.

The public meeting will be Monday morning, February 28, from 8:30am -
noon, in the 2nd floor conference room of the Rusk Building (208 E.
10th St., Austin). Products from three vendors will be discussed:
Diebold, ES&S, and AccuPoll. The AccuPoll system includes a ballot
printer. If it's certified in Texas, that will make it the first
"voter-verifiable paper ballot" electronic voting system available in
our state. Diebold and ES&S are already certified in Texas and will
be discussing relatively minor software upgrades that, so far as we
know, make no significant improvements to the security of their
systems.

For each vendor's presentation, there will be a public comment period;
members of the public may speak for five minutes, including asking
questions of the vendors or examiners. That's where you come in. We
want to have a diverse group of public interests represented in this
meeting. Of course, I'll be there to ask questions about the security
(or lack thereof) of their systems. If you've got other concerns
about these specific voting systems, this is the place to raise them.

As part of the deal, the examiners had private meetings with the
vendors in early January and have already written their reports. As a
result of the lawsuit, these reports can only be considered to be
"drafts". You can read them over yourself and can direct your
questions to the examiners as well as to the vendors. Also, if you
don't mind watching hours of out-of-focus video with muffled audio,
you can call the Secretary of State's office and request VHS tapes of
those private meetings for a $10 duplication cost.

Like it or not, this open meeting is not an opportunity to vent your
frustration with other voting system vendors, nor is it a chance to
complain about any of the laws on the books or of the behavior of any
of our election officials. The focus is on these three vendors and on
how the state's official examiners determine whether or not any
vendors' product meets the state's requirements.

We're hoping that this meeting will open the door to more public
access to the voting systems selection process in Texas, and will
support reform efforts being made in the Texas legislature.

WE WILL BE HAVING A PLANNING MEETING THE EVENING BEFOREHAND. IF YOU
ARE INTERESTED IN ATTENDING, PLEASE RSVP TO <dwallach@cs.rice.edu>.
We'll send you directions and other details once we figure them out.

What: First-ever public meeting of the Texas Election System Examiners
When: Monday morning, February 28, 8:30am - noon
Where: 2nd floor conference room, Rusk Building (208 E. 10th St., Austin)
Why: Your chance to ask questions of the vendors and examiners.



More information on the preliminary injunction, won by the ACLU:

http://www.eff.org/news/archives/2005_01.php#002240



Announcement of the meeting:

http://info.sos.state.tx.us/pls/pub/pubomquery$omquery.queryview?P_OM_ID=71244&Z_CHK=1859


Written "draft" reports from the election examiners:

http://www.sos.state.tx.us/elections/laws/jan2005.shtml

There are several regulars there who don't come by this forum but might be able to make it.