2007-033: Supporting Open Source Technology for Electronic Vote Counting

Resolution 2007-033

Supporting Open Source Technology for Electronic Vote Counting

WHEREAS the Democratic Party of Oregon Platform section on Election Reform has a statement of principle opposing privatization of the vote and guaranteeing transparent elections that reflect the will of the people;

WHEREAS public confidence in the integrity of the election system in the United States is declining; and voting machines and the computers that add vote totals are being run with computer programs or software that can substantially change vote totals in subtle ways that are difficult to detect; and

WHEREAS we the people have the right to know exactly how votes are processed, to have transparent elections, and to have computer scientists analyze open source code for malicious code which could manipulate elections; and

WHEREAS proprietary computer software, such as the optical scanning systems used to count Oregon's votes, denies us this right to know, inner workings of the computerized vote counting hardware are secret;

WHEREAS the counting of votes is a public function and is part of the commons that all citizens should have access to;

WHEREAS Oregon has a vibrant Open Source software community and also institutions supporting Open Source software development including the Open Source Center in Beaverton and Open Source Labs at Oregon State University in Corvallis;

WHEREAS the Democratic Party of California passed a resolution in support of Open Source software for elections on July 26, 2007;

THEREFORE BE IT RESOLVED, that the Democratic Party of Oregon calls upon the Oregon Secretary of State, and all Oregon state legislators to support, pass, and implement legislation requiring that all technology used in processing our votes shall be publicly disclosed; and that such technology shall end secrecy in vote tabulation, produce a paper ballot as the official record of the vote, be scientifically verifiable, be multi-lingual, be handicapped-accessible, and be designed to accommodate non-traditional voting schemata such as Instant Runoff Voting (IRV) when required; and

BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED, that copies of this resolution should be distributed in accordance with the policies of the Democratic Party of Oregon to the proper parties.

Submitted by Kathy Jackson, Dave Jackson, KC Hanson, Deb Whitcomb and Betsy Salter, Multnomah County

Adopted by State Central Committee of the Democratic Party of Oregon on February 9, 2008

August 26, 2007 Platform and Resolutions Committee Recommendation: Approve as amended.