CItizen Center sues Colorado Secretary of State and 6 county clerks

Read the actual court complaint as filed here: CitizenCenter_complaint_as_a_pdf

A new non-profit in Colorado sues SOS and 6 clerks over unconstitutional ballot traceability. Supportive documentation is located here: http://bit.ly/citizencentersuit

I learned only at the last moment of this project by The Citizen Center http://thecitizencenter.org (a new non-profit organized recently by Marilyn Marks) to bring  a suit in federal court against 6 Colorado counties' clerk and recorders as well as the Secretary of State and saw this specific information this morning. 

The counties include Eagle county, the county where I live and often serve as Canvass Board member. A number of county clerks (but not all) included in the suit have published specific details of the traceability of ballots apparently for the purpose of supporting arguments that ballots should be kept private to election officials and not made available to the public. An approach that acknowledges traceability and fails to achieve anonymity of ballots appears to be inconsistent with two constitutions. That is I believe the basis of the argument this suit will make.

Ballot transparency a statewide debate; poll favors transparency

Ballot transparency a statewide debate

Issue might wind up before Colorado Legislature

Janet Urquhart
The Aspen Times,  Aspen, CO Colorado

ASPEN — A candidate's request to inspect ballots cast in Aspen's 2009 municipal election has set in motion similar efforts around Colorado. The end result might be new rules that govern the review of ballots or that withhold them from public inspection altogether.


Meanwhile, Aspen resident and 2009 mayoral candidate Marilyn Marks is expected to review on Tuesday 100 ballots cast in Pitkin County's Nov. 1 election. Rather than simply eye the ballots, though, Marks has suggested that county Clerk and Recorder Janice Vos Caudill and a group of election officials look over 100 to 200 ballots with Marks and discuss whether any of them are “identifiable.”

The potential to link a voter to a particular ballot via various election information that is available to the public through the Colorado Open Records Act (CORA) has emerged as a concern among county clerks across the state as they respond to ballot requests from Marks and others.

Go with the constitution: a letter to editor by Harvie Branscomb

http://www.aspendailynews.com/section/letter-editor/150357

Go with the constitution

Friday, November 25, 2011

Carolyn Sackariason’s article, “Litigious days at City Hall” (Aspen Daily News, 11/21/11), includes a mystifying yet illuminating sentence: “The city, however, contends that releasing the ballots, even if they’re kept anonymous, will substantially injure the public interest because voters could potentially be identified.”

This sentence captures the essence of an epic controversy over who should see ballots. Aspen has withheld the prepared CD of the 2009 ballot scans that could have accompanied disks I and others received of the vote patterns and GrassRootsTV’s recording of ballot scans projected at City Hall on election night.

The sentence reveals the prevailing misunderstanding about why democracy needs anonymity and what ought to be secret in our voting method that is quirkily, but inaccurately, known as secret ballot. It isn’t what’s on the ballot that’s supposed to be secret — it’s the identity of the person who voted it. Our state constitution calls it “secrecy in voting,” never mentions a secret ballot, and specifically requires that no one can know who voted a particular ballot. That’s anonymity. It is a beautiful thing that Aspen may have forgotten.

Why insist on secrecy but dismiss anonymity?

http://www.aspentimes.com/article/20111124/COLUMN/111129937/1021

Maurice Emmer and Harvie Branscomb: Guest opinion

Why insist on secrecy but dismiss anonymity?

November, 23 2011
Maurice Emmer and Harvie Branscomb
Special to The Aspen Times
Aspen, CO Colorado

We both write repeatedly about the importance of election transparency. We present facts. We don't make things up. Stories about revealing ballot “secrets” often sound like scary tales told to children. They are designed to frighten, not inform. Jack Johnson's scary story recently published in another paper might trigger your instinct to fight, but that's what fiction and political propaganda are intended to do.

Johnson's column, and recent announcements by the city of Aspen, misconstrue election and open-records law as well as misrepresent the Marks v. Koch case and the Court of Appeals' unanimous opinion in favor of ballot transparency. As untrue assertions have become Aspen's norm, here we try to separate fact from fiction.

A little history, not made up: