Re: Multi-page ballots and turnout percentages

-----Original Message-----
From: owner-support@dieboldes.com [mailto:owner-support@dieboldes.com] On Behalf Of Mark S Earley
Sent: Friday, October 11, 2002 9:09 AM
To: Support
Subject: Multi-page ballots and turnout percentages

How have people handled Election Night Reporting in accounts with multi-page ballots? The Turnout percentages are misleading as everyone knows. What have others done or expect to do in this situation?

I’d like to hear from all interested parties on this. Here are a few comments of my own.

Multi-card ballots have always been weak in many ways in GEMS. You should avoid them at nearly all costs. Have a look at the lengths Rob Chen went to avoid them in California – attached.

This has an interesting feedback loop however. People avoid multi-card elections at all costs because GEMS multi-card support is weak. That makes multi-card elections very rare. Since multi-card elections are very rare, improving GEMS is always a low priority relative to common pressing problems. So GEMS multu-card support remains weak. Rinse, repeat.

I am considering advising the counties to turn off the Cards Cast feature, and keeping the Times, Totals, and Registered Voters options turned on. This will put the county-wide races near the beginning of the reports, giving an accurate appraisal of the numbers of voters. This will work well on the Summary Reports where the Times Voted for each race gives a percentage.

Right. You have reinvented the standard operating procedure. A jurisdiction-wide race will always give you the numbers they want.

The SOVC Report does not have a comparable percentage stat on it within the races. Most users are used to the SOVC showing the Turnout percentage in the third column, and turning this feature off will likely upset them and the reporters they serve.

Hmmm, indeed. SOVC should show the percent as well. I will create a new RCR to that effect and get this assigned.

One workaround is to export the precinct results, import into Excel, massage the formatting and use the times counted for countywide races as the turnout. For one county this will be manageable. For many counties and remote support, this will be problematic.

Tab is working on fixing the cards cast problem.

Mark Earley

850 422-2100 - office/fax

850 322-3226 – cell

Ken