But first, a little background.

The Tennessee Voter Confidence Act – which was supported almost unanimously in the House and Senate and signed by an enthusiastic Governor Bredesen in 2008 – would have given Tennessee voter the three things which are almost universally accepted as ways to ensure fair elections:

1) Tennesseans would vote on paper ballots (which would capture our actual intent)
2) The paper ballot would become the ballot of record in case of a recount. (The paperless electronic voting machines we have now only have one mechanism in place for a recount – press the same button again and get a repeat of the exact same totals you got before).
3) Mandatory random post-election audits in 3% of precincts (to insure that the Optical Scan machines are functioning properly).

This year, after Republicans took control of the House for the first time in about 140 years, they decided this legislation supported overwhelmingly by both parties should be repealed. Rep. Curry Todd carried the legislation for the new secretary of state, Tre Hargett, and state election coordinator, Mark Goins, but after a complete repeal encountered some push back, they decided to try for a “delay of implementation” until 2012.

To push the delay they tried several different arguments. But after the first few fell flat, they settled on the fastest way to derail a bill on the Hill (especially during these economic times) – they attached a humongous fiscal note. But the note wasn’t for the cost of buying the new ballot counting machines – the optical scan machines – because that was a discussion that was had over and over and over again during the debate of the original bill and it was well known that this cost for the machines was being covered by 25 million dollars of federal funds (out of a total of 35 million available) leftover from the Help America Vote Act.

And so, a plan was hatched. Let’s survey the counties [xls] and see what they think it would cost to switch over to paper ballots. The resulting fiscal note [pdf] states that it will cost Tennessee counties over $11.7 million to conduct the 2010 elections using paper ballots counted on optical scan machines. But there’s a bit of a discrepancy with the numbers that produced the multi-million dollar figure. Just look at the range of “extra” costs:

Privacy booths (cost per booth):

$10.00 (Haywood)
$19.50 (Blount)
$20.00 (Meigs)
$200.00 (Nine counties)
$700.00 (Putnam)
$750.00 (Cannon)

Training staff

$400.00 (Cannon)
$520.00 (Decatur)
$700.00 (Houston)
$22,200.00 (Putnam)
$25,000.00 (Smith)
$38,739.00 (Williamson)

Security containers (cost per container):

$25.00 (Haywood, Johnson)
$36.00 (Coffee)
$44.95 (Scott)
$2,800.00 (Williamson)
$3,085.00 (Blount)
$5,200.00 (Putnam)

Delivering scanners:

$144.00 (Bledsoe)
$200.00 (Sequatchie)
$240.00 (Marshall)
$10,800.00 (Carter)
$20,000.00 (Wayne)
$20,400.00 (Sumner)
$21,420.00 (Williamson)

Printing Manuals:

$50.00 (Benton)
$110.00 (Marshall)
$160.00 (Van Buren)
$5,000.00 (Grundy, Sevier, Smith)

Storage of ballots

$0 (Davidson)
$50.00 (Houston)
$203.00 (Cocke)
$300.00 (Hawkins)
$7,152.00 (Sumner)
$10,000.00 (Johnson)
$70,000.00 (Campbell)

Audit

$100.00 (Moore)
$136.00 (Anderson)
$160.00 (Haywood)
$6,600.00 (Davidson)
$10,000.00 (Dyer & Tipton)
$13,000.00 (Campbell)
$15,750.00 (Hawkins)
$15,840.00 (Washington)
$20,000.00 (Knox and Smith)

Privacy booths will cost $10 apiece in Haywood county, but they will cost $750 apiece in Cannon county. Security containers will cost $25 a piece in Johnson county, but they will cost $5,200 apiece in Putnam county. Cannon county can train their staff for $400, but Williamson county will spend $38,739 to do the same thing. And on and on and on. Bottom line: The numbers are not trustworthy and do not provide a reasonable basis for delaying the implementation of this legislation.

In addition, studies in North Carolina, Maryland and Florida have shown that voting with paper ballots (counted by optical scan machines) is 30-40% cheaper than voting on paperless electronic voting machines like the ones we use now. Why? Because a precinct only needs one machine to count the paper ballots as opposed to the multiple machines – 4, 8, 10, 20, etc. – needed to accommodate voters now. This reduction in the number of machines also means a reduction in expensive programming, software, maintenance, and storage costs. In other words, fewer voting machines means real cost savings.

So the two questions the members of the House Budget subcommittee should ask Coordinator Goins during tomorrow’s meeting are, “why the disparity in the numbers” and “what’s with all the excuses?”

My suggestion to House Dems is to let Rep. Curry Todd’s original bill pass so that Republicans follow through with their original plan of repealing the Tennessee Voter Confidence Act. Or in the words of Rep. Henry Fincher (D, the fightin’ 42nd!) during today’s House Democratic Caucus meeting, “let them drive the bus off the road” because this bus comes with almost unanimous support and doing so would be the opposite of a popular thing to do. Tennesseans, no matter what ideological stripe – want their paper ballots.