ES&S Products do not conform to the 2002 VVSG

There is an open item on this matter. See: Retraction Withdrawn
The open matter on this item has been closed. See: System Identification as required by 8.7.1 and B.3 is not possible

ES&S Equipment does not conform to the 2002 VVSG. This is the statement of Steven V. Freeman in an email to Bruce McDannold of the State of California on December 29, 2005 at 8:10 PM.

In a related email Paul Craft on December 30, 2005 at 5:38 am states the firmware on ES&S equipment are unique and created as a custom executable for each Election/Jurisdiction combination to which ES&S has sold equipment. Mr. Craft further states that because the system software is customized and intendended for single use in a single jurisdiction, it was not possible for him to determine with certainty if the system delivered to him for inspection was or was not the system tested by the ITA lab.

Who are Bruce McDannold, Paul Craft, Steven V. Freeman and why should you care?

Bruce McDannold is the Interim Director of the Office of Voting Systems Technology Assessment for the state of California.

Steven V Freeman is a member of the Voting Systems Board of the National Association of State Election Directors.

Paul Craft is also a member of the Voting Systems Board of the National Association of State Election Directors.

Together, Paul Craft, Steven V. Freeman along, and Brit Williams, are the 3 members of the Technical Sub-Committee of the NASED VSB. The technical sub-committee of the NASED VSB is responsible for reviewing ALL reports generated by the ITA test labs and for oversight concerning the work performed by the ITA labs. As a matter of fact Sandy Steinbach, states: “Brit Williams, Paul Craft and Steve Freeman are my heroes. These three men are the heart and soul of the voting system testing program and they do this work for free. None of them has a salaried position. They work as consultants and their time is valuable. Brit Williams, Paul Craft and Steve Freeman do the lion’s share of the work and make a big sacrifice to do it.” This is from page 3 of Ms. Steinbach’s statement of February 6, 2006.

So, it is no trivial matter when two thirds of the NASED VSB technical committee tells the official in charge of voting system certification for the State of California none of the systems from ES&S comply with the 2002 Voluntary Voting System Guidelines. Nor is it a trival matter when that official ignores that statement regarding ES&S because he is more worried about the perception his is "picking" on Diebold.

If this was not enough, the truly outrageous part of this situation is an election system can fail to comply with the 2002 VVSG and still be qualified by NASED. This means there is no connection between the issuance of a system number by NASED and compliance to the 2002 VVSG. This is waiver process is defined in Appendix B.5 of Volume II of the 2002. The implications of this waiver mechanism are eloquently explained by Howard Stanislevic in this review. Who grants such waivers for non-conforming systems? Paragraph e of the appendix holds the answer and yes you guessed it.

The answer is Paul Craft, Steven V. Freeman and Brit Williams.