Polygon, the Dancing Bear

Occasional notes on politics, history, technology, architecture,
and the life of a county clerk

2002:
May / June / July
August / September / October
November / December

2003:
January / February / March
April / May / June / July
August / September / October
November / December

2004:
January / February / March
April / May / June / July
August / September / October
November / December

2005:
January / February / March
April / May / June / July
August / September / October
November / December

2006:
January / February / March
April / May / June / July
August / September / October
November / December

2007:
January / February / March
April / May / June / July
August / September / October
November / December

2008:
January / February / March
April / May / June / July

Current entries

Wednesday, November 22, 2006, 4:27 pm

Bob Guenzel's letter to the Ann Arbor News. Today, County Administrator Bob Guenzel wrote as follows to the Ann Arbor News, copied to other county officials:

From: Bob Guenzel
Sent: Wednesday, November 22, 2006 2:41 PM
Subject: Concerns about the News' reporting

November 22, 2006

Mr. Pepple,

I am writing to you today to make you aware of a very real perception - mine as well as others' - that the people of Ann Arbor and surrounding communities are not being well served by the Ann Arbor News in your coverage of public safety and justice, namely the need for expansion of the Washtenaw County Jail.

I personally have been disappointed by the newspaper's lack of coverage on what I consider to be the now critical issue of jail overcrowding, and the Sheriff's handling of the same. The jail has been chronically overcrowded for more than two years, experiencing "official" overcrowdings dozens of times, leading to the early release of inmates. The current "lockdown" is the second declared by the Sheriff in the last three months. The status prohibits new arrestees from being booked into the jail, creating a dangerous situation not only for the community, but for jail staff and the inmates themselves.

In spite of this serious situation, the Sheriff refuses to act pursuant to Section 7 of the Jail Overcrowding Statute, which mandates that the Sheriff shall reduce all sentences by up to 30% in order to alleviate overcrowding. Three inmates are now suing the Sheriff because of the situation. Numerous members of the law enforcement community, the judiciary, and the Board of Commissioners have expressed to me their frustration at the Sheriff's refusal to act, some considering it a serious abrogation of official duty. These facts have been discussed at numerous public meetings, yet the Ann Arbor News has only given passing reference to the topic.

Instead, the News found it useful to report the Sheriff's assertion that I attempted to "stack" the Criminal Justice Collaborative Council (CJCC) with the appointment of former Commissioner Robert Brackenbury. Your reporters accepted this assertion as fact despite never having attended one of these regular public CJCC meetings, checking the web site for the roster of members, or speaking to any of the other CJCC members regarding their opinion of the matter.

In fact, if anyone had approached the Chair of the CJCC, the honorable Archie Brown, I am sure he gladly would have provided you with the letter he recently sent the Sheriff in which he expresses (on behalf of the entire CJCC) disappointment in the Sheriff's persistent refusal to participate in the Council. Your reporters have relied on information provided by a person who does not even attend the forum on which he presumes to comment.

I suppose what has moved me finally to write to you today was the lead in the recent story regarding the jail bond issuance. Your reporters relied on information provided by the Sheriff in stating that the jail bond issuance included funding for a new District Court which, of course, it does not. When I complained about this error, the News responded with a two-sentence correction buried in Saturday's paper.

Seriously concerned as I am about misstatements such as these (the "stacking" of the CJCC, the inclusion of funding for a new District Court in the jail bond issuance, and other instances that I could reference upon request), I am more bothered by what continues to be unstated by the News.

The implication of silence on important issues such as the Sheriff's refusal to carry out his duty, the ramifications of impediments to expansion of the Jail, as well as other vital aspects to these stories, is alarming. Without all the information, without an opportunity to get all the facts, our community will continue to face competing agendas that do not serve the common good.

My fear is that people who do not have the facts, but who have great concerns over public safety and justice, will seize on this informational vacuum to launch yet another campaign to prevent the expansion of the jail, which has been and continues to be an urgent priority for this community. Missing information or disinformation undermines the hard work of very dedicated individuals.

If you need access to more information on most of these topics, I would urge you to contact any one of the diverse 17 members of the CJCC (cjcc.ewashtenaw.org) which includes the judiciary, the Prosecuting Attorney, the Public Defender, private attorneys, elected officials, and others.

As always, my door is open to you and your staff. If there's something more I can do to be more welcoming or accessible, or to ensure that you are receiving all the information that you need, please do not hesitate to let me know.

I sincerely look forward to working with your reporters.

Bob Guenzel

....Posted by Lawrence Kestenbaum —

Tuesday, November 21, 2006, 6:31 pm

Yesterday's message to my staff.

We have all been telling each other what a short week this is, with Thursday and Friday off. Thanksgiving is not just a time for seeing family and giving thanks: it is also the last day of autumn as culturally defined, and the kickoff of the holiday season, followed all too soon by Hanukah, Christmas, Kwanzaa, and New Year's.

Our office, like most offices, isn't open the day after Thanksgiving, but all the retail stores will be. When I worked at the Lord & Taylor department store in Briarwood Mall, we were made to understand that this was the biggest sales day of the year. In other words, it was all hands on deck. Nobody in the store could have that day off, from the management office to the sales floor to the loading dock. And it was a very long day, too.

So when you do your shopping this Friday, spare a thought for all the hard working folks who are ringing up your purchases, stocking those shelves, and vacuuming the aisles. Sooner or later, each of them will come to see us, whether to pick up a birth certificate or to serve on a jury, and the roles will be reversed: they will be the customer, and we will be at their service. Courtesy and respect smooths the process, no matter which side of the counter we are on.

Individual meetings with nonsupervisory staff continue. I'm hearing feedback that it's easier to respond if you're named out in the open, so here's who I'd like to see in the next week or two: [names redacted]. Please arrange a half-hour with your supervisor and my schedule (via Outlook) for a meeting in my office.

Let's have a great week and a Happy Thanksgiving!

....Posted by Lawrence Kestenbaum —

Saturday, November 18, 2006, 12:57 pm

Belated press clippings. Last Sunday, November 12, the Ann Arbor News printed a Q & A about the election:

Insider's view of Election Day
Sunday, November 12, 2006
BY DAVE GERSHMAN
News Staff Reporter

As the supervisor of elections in Washtenaw County, Lawrence Kestenbaum discusses how the midterm elections went and why voter turnout here may be even higher than you think.

Q: Procedurally, how did the election go?

A: We had a very smooth election, I'd say. We had some scattered problems in particular areas. We had some tabulators which had to be replaced because they broke down, particularly in one jurisdiction where the tabulators were a little bit older than the tabulators in the rest of the county. But we got those replaced in the morning and, on the whole, things went very smoothly.

Q: Any specific problems at the polls?

A: There were some complaints, really scattered complaints, about voters being challenged on grounds that seemed spurious, but I don't think there was a systematic problem. I think there were some scattered places where there were issues. Very few of them even came to us. They didn't really blow up to the point that they thought to involve the county clerk as opposed to the local clerk.

Q: What was the voter turnout in the county?

A: Countywide we had just over 135,000 voters, which is a significant increase over four years ago, the last comparable election, when we had just over 108,000 voters. It was a smaller increase in the percent turnout, from about 47 to about 54 percent of the total registered voters.

Q: What do you attribute to the increase in the turnout?

A: I think that this was an election which had nationally a relative high turnout. There were some areas I heard about - not around here - where the turnout was actually higher than the 2004 presidential election, which would be amazing, given that the 2004 presidential election had a very high turnout.

We had a smaller increase here over (the last midterm election in) 2002 partly because we had less of a ceiling here. Washtenaw County has a higher turnout to begin with, and so there's not much room for a further increase.

And also because I think that unlike a lot of other areas, we didn't have a lot of contested local races on the ballot. Most of the interest in Washtenaw County was directed at the state and national level - governor, U.S. senator, and the ballot proposals, especially Proposal 2.

Q: Can you talk about the specific demographics of the county and how that might affect turnout?

A: Washtenaw County is the 10th most highly educated county in the United States out of 3,000 counties, and so it has a highly educated electorate which has a tendency to turn out. Educational attainment is the No. 1 highest correlate for voting. ... We have a lot of people here with post-graduate degrees, and certainly with bachelor's degrees ... so the turnout here is high and the turnout here doesn't vary as much from year to year as in other counties.

We also have a relatively transient population. There's a tremendous flow of people, students, and faculty and other folks who come here and leave - who move out of the area, move out of state - which creates issues with maintaining voter records for them. ... If someone leaves the state, chances are their voter registration is going to remain, even if the person thinks that they've canceled their Michigan voter registration. (And if) they've moved to New Jersey or Ohio somewhere, the other states usually don't bother to send back notice that the person has re-established themselves in another place and so the number of registered voters here is somewhat inflated. ...

I think that depending on how high of an estimate you make of the deadwood on the voter rolls, it could be more like, I'm guessing, more on the order of a 75 percent voter turnout (in Washtenaw County).

Q: There's no easy way to get those old names off the voting rolls?

A: No. Between state law and federal law and just the practicalities of trying to enlist the cooperation of other states, it is really quite cumbersome. I know that the state of Michigan has come under some criticism and some pressures from the Justice Department over just the sheer number of registered voters we have statewide. The number of registered voters is threatening to overtake the size of the eligible voter population. That is implying that we have tremendously more names on the rolls than we have people who are eligible to vote because of deadwood, because of registrations that have basically become outdated or spurious for one reason or another. The federal government's position is that having people on the rolls who are guaranteed not to vote is an invitation to, potentially, fraud.

Q: What's the trend you're seeing in terms of absentee ballots?

A: Absentee ballots are being used more widely over time and you can see the percentage creeping up little by little year by year. That may also have to do with the aging population as well. If you're 60 years of age or older you're automatically eligible to use an absentee ballot without having to state another reason.

And people certainly are aware of the fact that if you choose to vote absentee you can put down that, yes, you plan to be out of the jurisdiction on Election Day even if those plans later change. There has been a movement in the Legislature to enact basically freedom to use an absentee ballot instead of showing up in person without having to state a reason. That legislation, although supported by virtually all of the county and municipal clerks in the state and supported by the secretary of state, did not move forward in the Legislature in the last couple of years. It may in the next one.

Q: And you support that?

A: Oh, absolutely. ... If people want to vote absentee they should be able to vote absentee, and the notion of swearing to a reason is really pretty superfluous.

Q: How are absentee ballots processed?

A: Absentee ballots in almost all of Washtenaw County and probably now in most states are processed in the same precinct where you would normally vote if you were voting in person. They're delivered to the precinct, they're opened in the precinct, and the ballots are handled and processed in the precinct in the same way as other ballots. It's probably slightly more paperwork for the election workers. On the other hand, the people who vote in person need to be handled right away and the absentee ballots can be handled during slack periods. If it's an extremely busy day, that means that at the end of the day, the polls close and there's still absentee ballots to be handled and that may delay the results.

Also in the Sunday Ann Arbor News, a wrap-up article about the election results (not online), titled "Granholm's popularity only went so far Tuesday," pointed to the small number of counties to vote against Proposal 2, the anti-affirmative-action initiative, and quoted me as follows:

"Ingham and Washtenaw counties are the two most liberal counties in the state, so it's not unusual to se ethem go one way and everyone else the other way," said Washtenaw County Clerk Larry Kestenbaum, a former county commissioner in both constituencies.

"But it's hard to say, even imponderable to determine who and what issues Granholm brought along through the polls."

Kestenbaum said voters analyze candidates and proposals in different ways.

"People do pay attention to what newspapers and political leaders do say concerning candidates, but when it comes to rpoposals, people look at the paper ballot and the ballot language, and interpret what it means for them. That showed in the case of Proposal 2," Kestenbaum said.

....Posted by Lawrence Kestenbaum —

Monday, November 6, 2006, 8:00 pm

Yesterday (Sunday, November 5), the Ann Arbor News published my op-ed piece about election security:

Vote with confidence
State's optical scan system provides paper-trail backup

BY LAWRENCE KESTENBAUM

With congressional elections coming up, we've all heard a lot about the possibility of voting problems, glitches or even fraud. Many local residents have been concerned enough to contact me and ask about Washtenaw County's election procedures.

The good news is that every Michigan jurisdiction uses the optical scan paper ballot, similar to the forms used in standardized school tests. Candidate names and issues are printed directly on the ballot. This is the ideal "voter-verified paper trail": clear, trustworthy and fully recountable by hand. This is better than punch cards, better than old-style paper ballots and enormously better than unrecountable methods such as mechanical voting machines or touch-screen computers with internal counters.

Concerns have been raised over the optical scan ballot tabulating equipment, which some argue is open to manipulation, either by the vendor or by partisan computer hackers. I do wish the tabulators had been engineered with security in mind, and I would have preferred open-source rather than proprietary software on these machines. But there are safeguards against fraud.

First of all, every precinct has its own tabulator. These tabulators are each put through a public accuracy test before the election, and are under the direct supervision of a bipartisan team of election workers throughout the voting day.

When the polls close, the results in each precinct are printed out and posted or announced right in the polling place, where they are collected by campaign and media representatives. Those organizations maintain their own set of totals as a check on the official ones - an important security precaution.

A hypothetical conspiracy to steal a big election, without getting caught, would have to break into and modify hundreds of individual precinct tabulators. Such a task would require a whole lot of complicit technicians. The more people involved, the greater the chance that the secret would get out.

Decentralization of the counting process, which goes on simultaneously in every precinct, makes it inherently more difficult to steal an election, because the number of votes the thieves would need to change the outcome isn't available until the precinct results are reported. Polling is much too crude to tell this number in advance.

The vendors who provide the tabulators have not escaped suspicion, particularly Diebold, whose CEO was infamously quoted as "committed to helping'' Republicans win Ohio in 2004. Washtenaw County has used Diebold Accuvote tabulators for years.

But the sharpest concerns are with Diebold's no-ballot touch-screen voting machines, which are not used in Michigan. Moreover, if Diebold were caught fiddling with election results, that would be the end of the company, the end of the careers of its executives and the end of billions of dollars in shareholder value. By itself, that doesn't prove Diebold is trustworthy, but it sets up some powerful incentives against cheating.

Finally, if there is any doubt about what transpired during a Michigan election, the ballots themselves are fundamental and available to be counted. Any losing candidate can file for a recount; any citizen can file for a recount on a proposal. The fee is $10 per precinct, one of the lowest rates in the nation. Recounts are done by hand. And the results as certified in past recounts have been extremely close to the tabulator counts.

Ideally, there should be hand-count audits routinely after every election. In the absence of enabling legislation, recounts can serve this function.

With the 2002 Help America Vote Act, election consolidation, new equipment and new scrutiny, there have been a lot of changes in the conduct of elections in recent years. Washtenaw County has come through these changes ahead of the curve. We upgraded training for election workers and reached out to recruit more of them. In August, we did a pilot hand-count audit in five precincts. We have AutoMark machines in each polling place to help disabled voters mark their ballots. We have put up a Web site - WashtenawVotes.org - with sample ballots, so that voters will know what choices they have. And we have improved election night reporting of results.

When you vote in Washtenaw County, you can be confident that your vote will be correctly counted.