Statewide voter database is done
The statewide voter database is now done. The AP has the story:
Oregon has put the finishing touches on a new statewide database of registered voters, a $10 million project that’s aimed at preventing the potential for duplicate votes in the state’s vote-by-mail elections.Creation of the new system brings Oregon into compliance with a 2002 federal law that requires states to upgrade their registration and balloting systems.
Read the rest. Discuss.
|
Dec. 27, 2005
Posted in in the news 2005. |
More Recent Posts | |
Albert Kaufman |
|
Guest Column |
|
Kari Chisholm |
|
Kari Chisholm |
Final pre-census estimate: Oregon's getting a sixth congressional seat |
Albert Kaufman |
Polluted by Money - How corporate cash corrupted one of the greenest states in America |
Guest Column |
|
Albert Kaufman |
Our Democrat Representatives in Action - What's on your wish list? |
Kari Chisholm |
|
Guest Column |
|
Kari Chisholm |
|
connect with blueoregon
Dec 27, '05
I wish to congratulate Bradbury and all his staff, particularly John Lindback on completing this task on time. As someone who dealt with a lot of people who got two ballots from two different counties last and had to wonder which registration was most recent and therefore valid, this is a most welcome announcement.
I'll admit that I personally was skeptical when Vote by Mail was first passed as to whether it would be successful, but it clearly has been. With this step, yet another potential criticsm of the system is being removed. It is nice to know we have a safe, secure system that relies on paper ballots in case of needed backups.
Dec 27, '05
Why is this a $10 million project? I understand it's complicated to merge databases, but can someone help out on what cost so much? That's more than the annual budget than many state agencies.
Thanks for the explanation.
3:22 a.m.
Dec 28, '05
I don't think complicated even begins to describe this process.
The counties all had different ways to tracking things, coding things, etc. So you couldn't just merge databases.
A lot of work had to be done to all 36 databases to get them even close to being able to be merged.
And there's the fact that you had to have somewhere for the data for all 36 counties to be hosted-- currently it was being hosted by each county. And it had to be able to handle all 36 counties connecting to it at once-- with dozens of connections coming from each county. I can't tell you how many times we crashed during October & November last year-- and that was with just the Multnomah County people connecting to the data.
I'd imagine there was also software to be bought-- I'm not sure they're going to be running the same software as we used in the November 2004 election.
There was a lot more to this than just "merging databases."
3:29 a.m.
Dec 28, '05
And by "hosted at each county" we're taking about 5x7 notecards in some cases. There was serious scanning and data entry going on in this project.
I do recall, though, that they were able to hire a local firm to do the work -- and that firm has now become the leading company in the country doing this stuff for states.
3:35 a.m.
Dec 28, '05
I wouldn't be surprised if some counties were working off notecards as opposed to computer databases.
I can just imagine how much data entry there was to do across the state. I feel for them-- I did hundreds of hours worth of data entry for the county elections office last year.
I was actually surprised to see such a huge project only cost $10 million. Probably comes from the fact that this company is the leading company in the country, which means they have lots of experience.
Dec 28, '05
Great! Maybe now we can start allowing people to sign petitions without having to have separate sheets for each county. All the signatures could be verified off the same database, so why not?
Dec 28, '05
Now, will they audit that database to remove ineligible voters? (You know, illegal aliens, felons, etc.)
4:38 p.m.
Dec 28, '05
Jon--
Looks like you need some education on voting:
"May I vote if I am in prison or if I have a felony conviction? Anyone who is not currently in the custody of the state Department of Corrections may vote. If you are situated in any other part of the criminal justice system (for example, if you are serving a misdemeanor sentence in a county jail, on parole or probation, or are a pre-trial detainee) then you have not lost your voting privileges and may participate in all upcoming elections. If you are a felon serving a sentence(s) totaling less than 12 months, then you also are not in the custody of the Department of Corrections and retain your voting privileges. Only those felons currently in the custody of the Department of Corrections may not vote." -- Oregon Secretary of State's web site
4:43 p.m.
Dec 28, '05
Becky--
I wouldn't think they'd start doing that, but I could be wrong.
The reason they wouldn't want to do that is Multnomah County would likely end up with the bulk of the work, causing it to take a lot longer to verify signatures (there are only so many computers/employees to do this work). Having the sheets go to each county lessens the load on each county's elections office. It also means that more signatures are being verified at a time, making the process go a lot faster.
It would also mean that whatever county got the bulk of the signatures would be expending taxpayer dollars for that county, when in fact they're doing work for the entire state.
Dec 29, '05
Jenni -
Maybe I don't get how the process would work, but it seems to me that having one central database with one central signature-checking group would be the way to go. As I see it, it would take all the burden of signature verification for statewide elections off the local governments. They would only have to verify signatures for their own county or city petitions.
10:26 a.m.
Dec 29, '05
Becky, you're probably right. That would be more efficient. But, of course, that would require substantial additional staffing at the Elections Division -- funding for which has not been allocated by the Legislature.
11:30 a.m.
Jan 1, '06
Congrats to John L., Paddy, John K., and others in the county and state office. This is an area where Oregon truly is a national leader. Most everyone knows that Oregon is among the few states with the highest quality, reliable, and relatively inexpensive (John L--the prices for the voterfiles are now going to go down, right??) election data.
I think that Oregon is also among the very few states that have met the HAVA requirements (statewide registration systems in place by 1/1/2006).
7:30 p.m.
Jan 1, '06
Kari--
Very true. It would be nice to have a centralized location for this. However, as you said, it's not going to happen without the legislature allocating a good amount of money. They'd need to hire numerous people, purchase additional computers, likely would need more space, etc.