Sunday, January 19, 2014

IMPORTANT READ

Especially for Winchester voters.

Your rights are at stake


Your votes: Cast in secret, counted in secret, kept in secret.
Are the latter two transparent? Does this instill confidence in your voting system?
A public hearing took place in Concord, Tuesday, Jan. 14, before the N.H. House Election Law Committee, to receive citizen input in regards to HB1357, recently introduced to the House to restore the public’s right (and responsibility) to know that all is right with our elections.
As a result, an amended version of HB1357 will be submitted to Legislative Services for discussion and adaption to legislative language.
The N.H. secretary of state opposes this bill, claiming it invites corruption. Former Jaffrey election clerk Deborah Sumner argued New Hampshire citizens have a “constitutional right” to view ballots to verify election results.
Why do we need to restore that right?
Because voting consists of two parts: 1) the right to cast the vote, and 2) the right to sort, count and easily authenticate voting results.
One without the other renders the voting process meaningless.
Our Founding Fathers knew the importance of the “people” overseeing the count in open meeting, and expressed it in the N.H. Constitution (Part II, Article 32). Yet New Hampshire has ignored the citizens’ constitutional right to sort and count votes in public ( RSA 659:63).
Instead, most New Hampshire vote counts take place in computerized voting machines, contradicting our Constitution by sorting and counting votes inside the machine, the count completely hidden from public view. The result, a summarizing printout that does not verify that the calculation was correct, and votes were not manipulated. Without the means to examine the ballots, we, the citizens, must blindly trust the printout result.
Access to our paper ballots would provide the traceable means for the “people” to easily verify their election results. But making matters worse, in 2003 the N.H. Legislature quietly stole from its citizens this traceable means, by exempting paper ballots from the Right-to-Know Law (RSA 91-A). What had previously been described as mere “policy” — used to withhold ballots from public examination — became law with the passage of HB627 FN.
It is fair to say many legislators may not have been aware of what they were voting on, when this exemption was quietly slipped into a bill that dealt with residency. And had the public known, could it have voiced its concerns about this unconstitutional act? Not likely, since although citizens today are told they had a chance to speak out at the public hearing, no evidence has been found of any public hearing having taken place in 2003 to discuss a ballot exemption.
Keeping paper ballots in secret further complicates the issue, as currently citizen access to cast ballots can be attained only by court order. This process became complicated when Sumner petitioned the court for access to Jaffrey ballots from the November 2010 election. After requesting the ballots be held for her examination, she learned they had been destroyed between three to five months before their required retention period had ended.
It should not be illegal to exercise your constitutional right (and responsibility), to know election results are accurate. You, the public, own and paid for those ballots. They need to be restored to their rightful status: easily accessible public records. Gaining access to the paper ballots allows citizens to do exactly what they should be doing, examining the actual votes and either verifying the certified results, or bringing to the public’s attention any discrepancies that need a closer look.
Citizens still have a chance to speak out. Please contact the House Election Law Committee Chairman, David Cote, at david.cote@leg.state.nh.us, or 271-3319, and voice your concerns about regaining your constitutional right, and civic duty, to easily access paper ballots to verify election results.
Committee action is expected by Feb. 6, so there’s not much time!

Janice Sevene
Protect the Count NH
77 Old Leonard
Farm Road
Swanzey
 
 

8 comments:

Anonymous said...

This is worth repeating.

Starlin quoted as saying,

“Those who vote decide nothing. Those who count the vote decide everything.”!

Anonymous said...

Why we the people would want fair and honest elections in Winchester? While it seems the majority of the voters are content with allowing Gardner and Tedford to fudge the elections, while complaints to the secretary of state and the attorney generals office falls on death ears where they refuse to get off their lazy-asses to investigate only to take the easy way out “no fault found” which gives the clique the high it is OK to get the results the clique desires.

A fair and honest town election where the number of voters cast do not tally with the number of votes. What good would paper ballots do only to help our corrupt town's leaders have a wider inconsistency of votes to voters.

. WE can not even have a voice vote without Ken Harvey the town moderator being dishonest about doing the job he was elected to perform. Every voice vote at the deliberative session must be followed up with a paper vote.

Why on earth would we want to clean up our elections and improve the town's repetition. I think the town’s people enjoy being the pun of other town's jokes.

Anonymous said...

Really Anonymous (1/21/2014 How can you be dishonest when your up in front of idiots like yourself, please feel free to explain...
Go back to where you came from its people like yourself that put the town to shame.

Anonymous said...

To insure an honest and fair town meeting or deliberative session the moderator is the key person who must be honesty have integrity be none impartial toward one side or the other. You do not have to be a very bright voter to witness Mr. Harvey has neither. It is such obvious he is one of the clique and what he does is an abuse of power by not adhering to the Roberts Rules of Order and our rights to a honest and fair assembly . After a discussion someone will make a motion and someone will second the motion. A voice vote is taken yea or nay. If the libtards do no agree with the motion and do not want the motion passed they will yell louder, Just because they are louder does not pass the motion but Mr. Harvey with his clique affiliation has many times excepted their louder vote as the majority vote and this makes him very dishonest in his authority as town moderator. Mr. Harvey has passed his welcome and should just resign to better our town.

Anonymous said...

How can you be dishonest when the lawyer is at the meeting.. like I said your an idiot... keep complaining your are getting no where... just making matters worse...

Anonymous said...

Ref: "How can you be dishonest when the lawyer is at the meeting".. Are you serious? What frig’n planet are you from? Bart Mayor is so crocked he can not lie in bed straight. Mayor is just another member in the den of thief's. the selectmen will lie and Mayor will swear to it. Mayor told a friend of mine in Hillsboro and this is the truth …the people in Winchester are so stupid they will make sure I will live in a grandest home and my children with attend the best of school with the money I take from that town.

Your clueless! Alone with your Harvey friend. Oh! One other thing about Harvey, he will like fall asleep at the podium, loose his place and the selectmen must get him back on the right page to what motion was made, . sometimes he doesn't know if he is on foot or horse back. It's people like you that are so stupid you keep the clique in office.. Please you do not need to rely because your not worth the energy it takes to type.

Tracy said...

I am not clueless, I will defend my father as I am sure you would do the same if it was your Father! So put that in your pipe and smoke it.. if you think you can do a better job please feel free to run for town moderator this year, I would love to see my Dad not have to stand up in front of a bunch of idiots in this town.

Sincerely
Tracy!

Anonymous said...

That bunch of idiots is mostly employees, friends and family. Couldn't agree with you more.