STAND. COM. REP. NO. 1219
Honolulu, Hawaii
, 2005
RE: H.B. No. 1740
H.D. 1
S.D. 1
Honorable Robert Bunda
President of the Senate
Twenty-Third State Legislature
Regular Session of 2005
State of Hawaii
Sir:
Your Committee on Judiciary and Hawaiian Affairs, to which was referred H.B. No. 1740, H.D. 1, entitled:
"A BILL FOR AN ACT RELATING TO ELECTRONIC VOTING,"
begs leave to report as follows:
The purpose of this measure is to make amendments to Hawaii's electronic voting law.
Specifically, this measure:
(1) Prohibits the use of an electronic voting system in any election unless the system produces a paper ballot that may be inspected and verified by the voter before that voter's vote is cast;
(2) Establishes conditions under which the Chief Election Officer may rely on electronic tallies generated by an electronic voting system;
(3) Creates a new election fraud offense to include individuals who directly or indirectly, personally or through another, willfully design, alter, access, or program any electronic voting system to inaccurately record, tally, or report votes cast; and
(4) Makes an appropriation to the Office of Elections to acquire electronic voting systems capable of producing a verifiable paper ballot.
Testimony in support of the measure was submitted by the Office of the Governor, the League of Women Voters of Hawaii, Safe Vote Hawaii, and six individuals. The Office of Elections and the Disability and Communication Access Board provided comments on the measure.
This measure requires that any electronic voting system be capable of producing a verifiable paper ballot that may be inspected and corrected by a voter prior to that voter's vote being cast. Your Committee finds that this measure also imposes specific requirements on the use of electronic tallies to ensure both the accuracy and reliability of these results.
Your Committee has amended this measure by:
(1) Establishing four distinct requirements that must be satisfied if the Chief Election Officer wishes to utilize or rely upon electronic tallies generated by an electronic voting system. These include:
(a) Subjecting the electronic voting system to inspections, audits, and experimental testing by qualified individuals;
(b) Prohibiting any upgrade, patches, fixes, or alterations to an electronic voting system thirty days after an election;
(c) Requiring the Chief Election Office to conduct a post-election, pre-certification audit of a random sample of at least ten per cent of the precincts employing an electronic voting system; and
(d) Permitting the Chief Election Officer to conduct an expanded audit in the event discrepancies appear in order to determine the extent of misreporting in the system; and
(2) Changing the expending agency to the Department of Accounting and General Services.
As affirmed by the record of votes of the members of your Committee on Judiciary and Hawaiian Affairs that is attached to this report, your Committee is in accord with the intent and purpose of H.B. No. 1740, H.D. 1, as amended herein, and recommends that it pass Second Reading in the form attached hereto as H.B. No. 1740, H.D. 1, S.D. 1, and be referred to the Committee on Ways and Means.
Respectfully submitted on behalf of the members of the Committee on Judiciary and Hawaiian Affairs,
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____________________________ COLLEEN HANABUSA, Chair |
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