Posted on Fri, Feb. 11, 2005

Petro vs. Blackwell

The attorney general offers a lesson in local control

http://www.ohio.com/mld/ohio/news/editorial/10873417.htm?1c

Faced with a deadline for replacing punch card ballots, limited dollars and an added legislative requirement that electronic voting machines produce paper receipts, J. Kenneth Blackwell abruptly changed course on voting reform in Ohio. In January, the secretary of state told county election boards they would have to choose between two types of optical scanning equipment.

Their deadline? Last Wednesday.

All but a handful complied with the directive, abandoning the prospect of modern computer technology for one in which voters fill in ovals on paper. The ballots are saved, thus providing paper backup.

Yet, as the deadline approached, five counties resisted. After a more careful analysis, Attorney General Jim Petro opened the door for the boards to choose electronic touch screens. Petro concluded that Blackwell had exceeded his authority. Two counties, Franklin and Portage, where electronic voting is in use, won court orders blocking Blackwell's order.

Blackwell snapped that his rival for the Republican nomination for governor in 2006 traded in mere opinion, that he, Blackwell, had the final word regarding compliance with federal voting law. Yet Petro recognized the essential point Blackwell made in defending the integrity of November's presidential vote: Ohio's election system is highly decentralized, with bipartisan local boards given wide powers. In this situation, Petro noted, county boards ultimately buy voting equipment, not the secretary of state.

Boards that wish to keep electronic voting or those that would like to skip optical scanning, clearly a stop-gap technology, should be allowed to do so. They will have to find the money and a system that produces a paper trail, neither easy. Still, Kenneth Blackwell should not stand in their way.