GAE Committee Hearing Transcript for 02/14/2005

REPRESENTATIVE CARUSO: As with all of our public hearings, we permit a three-minute period in which the public can come and testify before us. The reason for that is because of the long list of individuals who wish to testify.

Now the three-minute period by me is enforced, so when you hear the bell, please don't expect to talk another three minutes.

At that end of the bell, if you would just summarize what you have to say, and more than likely members of the Committees will have questions of you and that will extend your period of time a little bit more. So we're asking that you honor that.

Our first speaker, Andy Sauer.

ANDY SAUER: Good morning. My name is Andy Sauer. I'm executive [GAP - ~2 ½ minutes]

--each state retains the prerogative of deciding whether to adopt these standards for the procurement of voting systems.

So I think these were the two outstanding issues regarding voter-verified paper audit trail, and I think that now those bills have been resolved, I think we can move on. And I offer full adoption of this bill.

REP. CARUSO: Andy, EAC for the public's, is it, I hate acronyms.

ANDY SAUER: It's the Elections Assistance Commission. It was created by the Help American Vote Act.

REP. CARUSO: Okay. And you're going to submit the testimony that you have?

ANDY SAUER: Yes, Sir.

REP. CARUSO: Okay. Any questions? Thank you very much, Andy. Rich Sivel, is he here?

RICH SIVEL: Good morning, Mr. Chair, Members of the Committee. My name is Richard Sivel. I live and vote in West Hartford, and I appreciate the opportunity to address you today on S.B. 55. I'm strongly in favor of this bill.

This past November, the national election was again marred by numerous disparities, charges and countercharges by Republicans and Democrats alike.

Voters across the country are increasingly concerned about whether their votes are properly recorded and counted.

The integrity of our voting system is a nonpartisan issue and the very bedrock of our democracy.

As the nation as a whole is moving towards more modern and hopefully more trustworthy electoral system, we in Connecticut are at an historic crossroads. Choices that we made this year will affect our voting system for decades to come.

Andy mentioned the bill last year and some of the objections to it and some of the counters. I will not go into further detail on that except to say currently the federal situation is very much in flux.

Senators and Representatives on both sides of the aisle have introduced or will presently introduce bills to clarify and strengthen the Help America Vote Act.

I believe that many of these bills, if not all, require some form of voter-verified paper ballot, and I've submitted the list of specific bills with my written testimony.

I also understand that evolving federal standards are voluntary, allowing the states to define more stringent requirements.

Seven states, in fact, representing 25% of the U.S. population, already require voter-verified paper ballots. Most of these passed legislation in the last year.

Eleven other states besides Connecticut have similar legislation pending this year. Again, specific citations in my written testimony.

Connecticut can remain in the forefront of states with the most trustworthy and secure voting systems by doing the same, endorsing a voter-verified paper trail.

I appreciate the legitimate concerns of disabled voters for privacy and accessibility at the polls.

Technology has evolved to the point where modern election machinery can provide privacy, accessibility, and verifiability for all voters. Elections systems currently on the market meet these requirements.

So I appreciate the work of your Committee. Regardless of the direction Connecticut goes in terms of specific voting technology, we need to guarantee verifiability and accessibility for all voters. This can be done by means of a voter-verified paper trail. Thank you.

REP. CARUSO: Thank you, Rich. Any questions? Thank you very much. Americo Santiago. Phil Sherwood.

PHIL SHERWOOD: Good morning, Representative Caruso, other Members of the Committee. My name is Phil Sherwood. I'm the communications coordinator with the Connecticut Citizen Action Group.

CCAG is the state's oldest and largest public interest group. We have about 30,000 member families statewide now. And I'd like to comment just on a few bills briefly today.

We'd like to express our organizational support for S.B. 55. We're now moving towards new technologies that have the opportunity not only to be accessible to all voters, but also provide safeguards for the actual vote.

This bill will ensure that electronic voting machines will have a voter-verified paper trail. And this will obviously help the voter verify their intent of voting during the voting process.

As we know, HAVA is requiring that legislators this year make choices be made that will affect how citizens will vote for years to come.

And having a voter-verified paper trail will, I believe, instill confidence that the voting system they're using is trustworthy.

Citizen confidence in this new technology is particularly important given the many different types of technology that's currently out there and that might be distributed.

Secondly, we'd also like to voice our support for H.B. 5666. CCAG applauds legislative and this Committee's efforts in the past to extend a voting rights act for felons in 2001.

I believe this bill will strengthen that act and remove some of the processes that I believe undermine the intent of the original bill.

And lastly, I'd like to voice support for two more bills. And that's the increased training for poll workers and a voter guide for state elections.

I personally had an opportunity to discuss with a couple citizens, younger citizens my age who have just gotten involved in the election process during Election Day.

And they expressed that the training that they had, that they felt that it wasn't adequate and they were pretty nervous actually prior to Election Day, their abilities to do what they were being asked to do.

So I think this is a good thing, and it'll instill voter confidence as well.

REP. CARUSO: Any questions of Mr. Sherwood? Phil, thank you very much. You said gentleman and ladies of your age. Did you just turn 18, is that--

PHIL SHERWOOD: I did.

REP. CARUSO: Very good. Thank you. Next person, Bill Bunnell. Is Bill in the room?

I just want to remind [inaudible] if you have a cell phone on, please shut it off. We would appreciate it.

BILL BUNNELL: Good morning, Mr. Chairman and Members of the Committee. My name is Bill Bunnell.

I'm a resident and voter in Madison, and additionally a constituent of your colleagues Senator Ed Meyer and Representative Heinrich. Ms. Heinrich is a co-sponsor of S.B. 55.

I thank them for their help with our efforts to assure that future elections in Connecticut will be conducted using voting systems that are able to provide each voter with the confidence that their vote has been recorded as they intended it to be.

Because it can assure the implementation of a meaningful verification process, I strongly support S.B. 55.

When read, the experience of the elections of last November provide lessons which should not be ignored. My colleague, Dr. Fischer, will later cite several of these, or one of these.

Specifically, that was the loss of some 4,000 votes in North Carolina. Cause? One DRE machine with no voter-verification process installed was being used in an early voting period.

That machine had missed completing an upgrade of its software. The DRE, after processing some 3,000 votes, thought its storage unit was full.

The system then assumed it was finished and stopped counting and recording votes. Voters continued to vote, but their votes were never recorded, never counted. The result? The loss of 4,000-odd votes and a whole lot of national attention.

There is now an active RFP through which the state expects to buy 771 DRE voting systems with no voter-verification process installed, voting systems equivalent to the machine in North Carolina that lost 4,000 votes.

As recently described by Stanford-based Gardner Group, a highly respected computer technology consultancy, the installation of a voter-verification process simply corrects a weakness in the DRE technology.

These systems, if delivered on the basis of the state's RFP, will not incorporate any voter-verification process.

The timely passage of S.B. 55 appears to be the way by which the Legislature may be able to assure that the state does not process to squander $5 million or more of federal funds through the procurement of inadequately configured voting systems.

That really finishes my remarks. I appreciate the opportunity that you've allowed me to express my support in passage of S.B. 55 quickly is urged.

REP. CARUSO: We appreciate your coming up and testifying. Is there any question from members of the Committee? Thank you very much, Sir. Appreciate your time.

BILL BUNNELL: Thank you.

REP. CARUSO: Americo Santiago.

AMERICO SANTIAGO: Good morning, Mr. Chairman and Members of the Committee. My name is Americo Santiago. I'm an employee of DemocracyWorks here in Hartford, 44 Capitol Avenue.

I'm here to urge your support on S.B. 55, AN ACT PROMOTING VOTING SYSTEM ACCURACY, INTEGRITY AND SECURITY THROUGH VOTER-VERIFIED PAPER RECORDS.

I also ask you to support H.B. 5662, increasing training for poll workers, and H.B. 5666, procedures for restoring voter rights for felons discharged from confinement and parole.

Also in support of H.B. 5667, establishing a voter guide for state elections, and H.B. 6534, an act allowing elector time off from work to vote.

I want to make this very short. I know that you have quite a few people in front of you.

Well, everything has been said, as you can hear the news, what's happening in other the states. We really don't have an accurate account of when people using electronic voting machines.

The use of electronic voting machines in an election does not leave confident that the vote has been counted because we never see any physical proof on the screen.

Many computer programmers tell us that errors can be introduced easily by accident or some people can do it by malice.

Even our line merchant, when we go in line buying stuff, we also would like the customer to print out a receipt when they check out for their own protection.

DemocracyWorks advocates for a verified paper ballot for all elections, including primaries.

I know that here in Connecticut it seems that the Secretary of State's Office is not supporting a paper ballot trace, but we and most of the people who we have been meeting with, different groups through other states, do support a paper ballot.

Also, I would like you to support H.B. 5666, which is a procedure for restoring voting rights for felon [inaudible] State of Connecticut.

We passed legislation three years ago to allow people convicted of a felony to vote and if they are on probation.

The Secretary of State's Office has been working with us, as well as the Department of Corrections, Judicial Department, many state agencies, individuals and groups. We have provided a lot of information and brochures how to regain the rights.

According to the statutes right now, the Secretary of the State receives a list from the Department of Corrections saying how many people have been convicted of a felony and sentenced to confinement.

At the same time, when the person is released from confinement, the Department of Corrections is supposed to send this list to the Secretary of the State, which this list in turn is giving to the local registrars.

REP. CARUSO: Americo, if you could just summarize--

AMERICO SANTIAGO: Yes. So what I'm trying to just summarize is, Mr. Chairman, is that in Connecticut this information is already provided to the local registrars, which means that if a person is released from confinement, there's no reason for this person to be required to provide a certificate of release because this information is already supposed to be.

So we encourage you to pass legislation to remove this barrier. What it does is basically it saves money for the state because we don't have to do the research, the state doesn't have to spend the money doing that. And we'll get a lot of people to restore their rights.

We get hundreds of calls every time before an election on how to do it. And there was a gentleman, just before I finish, there was a gentleman that was released from prison in 1970, and you will see that in the testimony that we will provide to you, in 1970.

It took us two months for the Department of Corrections to restore their rights because they don't have a computer record for doing this, two months.

REP. CARUSO: Thank you, Americo.

AMERICO SANTIAGO: You're welcome.

REP. CARUSO: Questions of Mr. Santiago? Yes, Representative Giannaros.

REP. GIANNAROS: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Hi, Americo. I just wanted, if you can clarify for me, the Secretary of State's Office does not support a back-up system on paper?

AMERICO SANTIAGO: According to the latest information that we have, and you will hear testimony with other groups that are working throughout the State of Connecticut to try to make sure that you pass this legislation.

As far as we know, the Secretary of the State's Office is not presently supporting the paper ballot.

REP. GIANNAROS: And the technology today allows for, there are machines, in other words, that can print out a paper that can be retained for possible counting if need be.

AMERICO SANTIAGO: Yes. There is the technology right now. It's being used in other states. And let me just say that what we want is a verifiable, that the individual is not going to take possession of this paper. It's going to continue to be in the machine.

At the same time, the disability community is very much interested in making sure that when you pass this legislation they have the ability to verify that they have voted also.

By, if they're visually impaired, so they can hear it, or they can feel it. And this is very important for disability community. And we support that step.

REP. GIANNAROS: And wouldn't it be even better for the receipt to be a double receipt, one is taken by the voter so that there's a record? Presumably the identification has been juggled. And one retained in a closed box of some kind--

AMERICO SANTIAGO: Well, I don't know how that can be done. But, you know, your vote's supposed to be in secret.

And if you provide that information by you lose it or you might misplace it and somebody can take that information and say, Representative, you're not voting for, you know, somebody else.

So that's why when the person goes into the machine, even the poll worker that sometime they interfere and tell the person who to vote for, it's illegal. Nobody should be knowing who you voted for.

REP. GIANNAROS: Thank you.

AMERICO SANTIAGO: You're welcome.

REP. CARUSO: Further questions? Senator Freedman.

SEN. FREEDMAN: Good morning. Good to see you. I just had a question. How would you compare this to the machines that we're using right now on the absentee ballots for the scanning?

AMERICO SANTIAGO: The scanning machines?

SEN. FREEDMAN: Yeah. Do you have an opinion about that?

AMERICO SANTIAGO: Well, I don't know too much about the scanning machines, but as long as, if the machine's a scanning machine and as long as there is something that shows up how the person voted so they can check it.

And at the same time, as long as a person that is visually impaired or hearing impaired is able to verify we will have no problem with that.

SEN. FREEDMAN: Thank you. So it's not the machine itself. It's what the paper trail is.

AMERICO SANTIAGO: It's the paper trail, yes. It's not the machine itself. Thank you.

REP. CARUSO: Thank you, Americo. Next speaker is Christine Horrigan, followed by Richard Abbate, Scott Novakowski, and Michael Fischer.

CHRISTINE HORRIGAN: Good morning. My name is Christine Horrigan. I am the elections laws specialist for the League of Women Voters.

We thank the GAE Committee for holding this public hearing and for the opportunity to comment upon bills dealing with election reform, and specifically upon S.B. 55. And when I say S.B. 55, I'm referring to the Committee version of that bill.

Since the passage of the Help America Vote Act, the League of Women Voters of the United States has promoted election procedures that encourage each qualified citizen to vote and assure that each vote is counted accurately.

Last summer, at the League of Women Voters Annual Convention in Washington, D.C., concerned League members from throughout the country approved a four-point test for lending support to new voting technology.

Voting systems must be secure, accurate, re-countable, and accessible. The League of Women Voters of Connecticut supports S.B. 55 with the following caveats.

Voting technology is evolving, and a voter-verified paper trail is not a panacea. Many questions remain unanswered.

We would like to see improvements in electronic security generally and in the printing aspect of voting machines with voter-verified paper audit trails.

We also believe that there is a need for better human interfaces for electronic voting systems.

We are also concerned that the bill does not appear to address the issue of verifiability by people with visual and physical disabilities, limited English proficiency, and low literacy.

Finally, we'd like to note that the League is on record as supporting improved training of poll workers and the preparation of a nonpartisan voters' guide.

Therefore, in principle, we support Proposed H.B. 5662, AN ACT INCREASING TRAINING FOR POLL WORKERS, and Proposed H.B. 5667, AN ACT ESTABLISHING A VOTER GUIDE FOR STATE ELECTIONS.

Thank you for the opportunity to have input on these proposals.

REP. CARUSO: Are there any questions? Thank you very much for coming up. The next speaker, Richard Abbate.

RICHARD ABBATE: Senator DeFronzo, Representative Caruso, Members of the Committee, my name is Richard Abbate. I'm the president of the Registrars of Voters Association of Connecticut and serve as the registrar for the Town of Cheshire.

On behalf of our almost 400 members, I'd like to address two bills before you today, and briefly comment on several others if I have time.

Most important to us this year is H.B. 5662, regarding training of poll workers. We feel this is an important bill and the opportunity to address the entire issue of improved training not only for poll workers, but also for all election officials.

ROVAC strongly supports training for all election personnel. There is no ongoing training in this state for registrars, deputy registrars or assistant registrars.

Competency and efficiency can only be improved with proper training of those responsible for administering elections.

Toward this end, ROVAC has held a series of meetings with the Secretary of the State and both Representatives Mantilla and Representative O'Brien, who have cosponsored this bill.

And we've presented a plan, which is attached to our printed testimony, which incorporates these proposals into it.

With regard to S.B. 55, we support S.B. 55, which calls for voter-verifiable paper record to be retained with the machines.

But Section 1, d-4 of this proposed legislation raises a number of questions and potential problems.

The Section states that these paper records shall be available as an official record and be the official record used for all, for any re-canvass conducted under Chapter 148.

The particular concern we have there is that the way it is worded implies that the very first recount, with many of the DRE machines you have a record that's printed for the entire election on that machine, and you also have individual records for each voter.

We're suggesting that, is in the case now with our lever machines and our optical scan machine, the record be the first thing you look at and only in the case of a discrepancy that came out of that which would go to the individual pieces.

REP. CARUSO: Are there any questions for Mr. Abbate? Yes, Representative Mantilla.

REP. MANTILLA: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thank you for your testimony today. Could you give us just a very quick description for understanding what is in the hands of election officials right now?

What are the tools that are actually used, whether they're enough or not, but what are the tools that are available right now for either a registrar or any other election official to be trained?

RICHARD ABBATE: Well, currently, as I say, we do not have a comprehensive training program for the elected, appointed elections officials, the registrars, their deputies, and their assistant registrars.

There was a program that was established a few years ago by the Legislature to create a training program. That was passed. It was handed off to the Secretary of State's Office.

And unfortunately, that's where it's lay. A curriculum was put together, but it was never implemented.

What we're suggesting in our proposal, as you've seen it and as we've discussed with you, is that that committee that was formed be reconstituted, that the curriculum be revitalized, and that an actual ongoing program be established to take care of those officials, who then are going to be responsible for the training of the poll workers.

Not to go into a great amount of detail here today because you have so many people to speak, but you do have a copy of our written proposal.

It does address both the poll workers and the elections officials, and calls for the establishment of someone in the Secretary of State's Office to oversee the training of those people statewide.

REP. MANTILLA: Thank you.

REP. CARUSO: Further questions? Thank you, Mr. Abbate. Sorry for the pronunciation. I pronounce it in Italian, so--

RICHARD ABBATE: Well, in that case, Representative Caruso, as you are probably well aware, it should be Abbate, as it should be Caruso. Thank you, Sir. Oh, sorry. Yes, Senator DeFronzo.

SEN. DEFRONZO: Well, let me be the first then, Mr. Abbate. Let me ask you a question. The cost of training, do you have any estimate of what your proposal would--

RICHARD ABBATE: I believe we have incorporated that into the written proposal. Am I correct?

It's actually being worked on now to come up with a comprehensive plan for how many people would be needed, what that cost would be, who those trainers would be.

We're looking at the model that we currently have for moderator training, for example, where we have registrars who have been certified by the Secretary of State's Office to serve for the training of the elections moderators.

And we'd like to see that model used as the prototype for training not just the moderators, but also the registrars.

In fact, in many of the towns, in my town, for example, the registrars take the moderator training, and we have our deputies take the moderator training. We have our assistants take the moderator training. Because we recognize that training piece is so important.

But there is nothing right now that calls for that to be done. And we're saying that when we speak about poll workers we should also incorporate into that bill the recognition of the registrars, deputies, and assistants.

SEN. DEFRONZO: And are you proposing that the funding for the training be drawn out of the HAVA funding that we've received from the federal government under which training is an acceptable expenditure, or are you identifying some other source?

RICHARD ABBATE: Essentially that's the approach we've been taking from the beginning. In fact, I had a brief conversation with the Secretary of State about a year ago about that, and suggested that that would be the way to go in terms of using those funds not only for poll worker training, but also for the training of the broad group of elections officials.

SEN. DEFRONZO: Thank you.

REP. CARUSO: Further questions? Ciao, ciao, Mr. Abbate.

RICHARD ABBATE: Thank you, Signore.

REP. CARUSO: Next is Scott Novakowski, Michael Fischer, Ralph Morelli, in that order.

SCOTT NOVAKOWSKI: Good morning, Senator DeFronzo, Representative Caruso, Members of the Committee.

My name is Scott Novakowski. I'm a policy practice student at the University of Connecticut School of Social Work and an intern at DemocracyWorks.

I'm here today to speak in favor of Proposed H.B. 6534, AN ACT ALLOWING ELECTORS TIME OFF FROM WORK TO VOTE.

Active citizen participation in government is one of, if not the defining, characteristic of a democratic system.

As such, special care should be taken whenever possible to encourage people to exercise their right to vote.

Allowing workers time off to cast their ballots is one way to remove potential obstacles to participation and communicate to our citizens that voting is a civic activity that is valued and taken seriously.

While I'm aware that polls are open from 6:00 a.m. to 8:00 p.m. on Elections Day, even this seeming lengthy window of time may not be able to accommodate all interested citizens.

Those who work multiple jobs or simply have days that are especially busy with workplace tasks may not have the opportunity to make it to the polls during this time.

As a full-time graduate student working two jobs, I know from my own experience and that of my peers that it's sometimes difficult to make it to the polls during these hours.

Not all workers have the flexibility to arrive late or leave early from their jobs as well. This is especially problematic in the larger cities where lines to vote can be long, and it is not unheard of for citizens to have to wait in excess of an hour's time to cast their ballots.

Furthermore, those who work multiple jobs, many of which are part time or contingent labor, are more likely to be low-income citizens, a population that traditionally has lower overall rates of voting and civic participation.

If we are serious about increasing civic participation and removing the barriers that discourage participation, please consider allowing both part-time and full-time workers to have time off to go to the polls and cast their ballots.

REP. CARUSO: Thank you, Scott. Any questions of Scott? Thank you very much, Scott. Appreciate your time. Michael Fischer.

MICHAEL FISCHER: Good morning, Mr. Chair and Members of the Committee. My name is Michael Fischer and I'm a resident and voter of Hamden.

I appreciate the opportunity to address you this morning on S.B. 55. I am strongly in favor of the bill.

I am a professor of computer science at Yale University with research interests in distributed computing, cryptography, and computer security. I want to speak to some technical aspects of computerized voting systems.

Computer scientists understand that computers are far and away the most complex machines that mankind has ever built. Nobody can see what goes on inside a computer.

Nobody can understand more than a fraction of the hardware and software that comprise a computer system.

Even experts must hope that hardware and software perform according to their specifications, and they are always prepared for the possibility that they do not.

In a DRE voting machine, the kind that Connecticut is in the process of acquiring, the ballot is stored electronically inside the computer from the time it is cast until the polls close when a printout of the voting machine's memory is made.

There is no way to ensure that the ballot printed out at the end of the day is the same as the one cast by the voter.

In case of discrepancy, the official ballot is the one that the machine printed out, not the one cast by the voter, which, of course, has been lost.

The printout is meaningless for the purposes of auditing and recounts since it duplicates any errors that occur inside the machine.

People claim that regulations and procedures can ensure the computers will work correctly.

Machines will be tested before the election. They won't be connected to the Internet. They will have battery back-up power supplies. Source code will be on file and perhaps examined by a chosen few.

All of these measures are useful in reducing the incidence of problems, but it is naïve to believe that they can provide reasonable guarantees of correctness.

The numerous failures of DRE machines used in the November 2004 elections show that security concerns are not just hypothetical. For example, 4,438 votes were reported lost due to a programming error in a Carteret County, North Carolina, voting machine.

In evaluating a voting system, the primary focus should be on making sure that the voter's intent is accurately recorded on the ballot and that the ballot is not lost, damaged, or otherwise altered before it is counted and possibly recounted.

No DRE machine, even those using sophisticated cryptographic techniques can protect ballots from machine malfunctions or malicious computer code while the ballot remains hidden inside the machine. A ballot lost, whether encrypted or not, is still lost.

S.B. 55 will protect our votes by providing an official paper record of voter intent. The time to act is now.

The voters of Connecticut want trustworthy voting systems. They are looking to you, the Legislators of the state, to lead the way. You have the power and the responsibility to set appropriate policy.

I wish to thank Senator DeFronzo and Representatives Heinrich and Doyle for cosponsoring this bill and this Committee for their attention to the concerns of the citizens of this state.

Thank you for the opportunity to address you this morning. I would be pleased to answer any questions you may have.

REP. CARUSO: Thank you, Mr. Fischer. Any questions? Yes, Representative Giannaros.

REP. GIANNAROS: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Professor, I find it hard to believe these days that we cannot produce a machine that would be able to print out a receipt scrambled so that nobody can tell which way it is but only the computer can actually reverse.

Is that possible, scrambling the actual votes so that no one can tell which way you voted?

MICHAEL FISCHER: Well, what is critical is when this receipt is printed out, you can print out the receipt at the end of the day scrambled, but then what good is it because the machine can already have changed the ballot before the receipt was printed.

You could print out a receipt and give it to the voter scrambled, but then what good is it. Since it's scrambled, it can't be recounted.

REP. GIANNAROS: And I guess I implied that there's got to be a way also to unscramble if there's a question about the voting pattern.

MICHAEL FISCHER: Well, yes. I mean, it can be encrypted and then with the decryption key it can be decrypted, but then the encryption hasn't really served any useful purpose.

REP. GIANNAROS: So is your testimony basically saying that we're not ready for electronic balloting?

MICHAEL FISCHER: I'm saying that it must be supplemented with a voter-verified paper trail.

REP. GIANNAROS: I just wanted to make sure I understood. Thank you.

REP. CARUSO: Thank you, Representative. Further questions? Yes, Representative Fleischmann.

REP. FLEISCHMANN: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Professor, thank you for coming to testify, very valuable. I know that you have a busy schedule. We appreciate it.

MICHAEL FISCHER: Thank you.

REP. FLEISCHMANN: I want to ask you about open source codes. This is something that's often, obviously a voter-verifiable paper trail is one critical piece of this picture which allows us to go back and make sure that voters' will was actually properly executed and shows up in the algorithms.

Could you just explain to me and the Committee what impact having open source codes would have on our ability to have confidence in new electronic machines?

MICHAEL FISCHER: Open source code would very much increase our confidence. And I want to emphasize right away it is not a replacement for the voter-verified paper ballot, because even with open source code ballot machines can still fail and ballots can be lost.

But the, for the, for gaining confidence that the machine is operating properly, it is a proven technique for more reliable software.

REP. FLEISCHMANN: But for those of us who have less expertise in software than you do, there is a natural concern that might arise that if you have open source codes maybe more people can somehow fiddle with what's happening with the machines.

So could you just explain to me and others how it is that it actually gives us more confidence rather than more fear of someone playing games?

MICHAEL FISCHER: Well, what it does, and is rather than exposing weaknesses that hackers can exploit, it exposes weaknesses which then there the vendors have strong motivation to fix so that the open source code simply has fewer weaknesses to exploit.

And I should also add that it doesn't, that even without open source, people intent on attacking the system can reverse engineered software and they do so, that even proprietary systems, if they have bugs, the hackers will find them.

REP. FLEISCHMANN: Thank you very much. Very helpful.

REP. CARUSO: Thank you, Representative. Senator Meyer.

SEN. MEYER: Professor, just one quick question. Could you elaborate for a moment on the optical-scan system and what you view as its advantages and whether or not you see any disadvantages in an optical-scan system?

MICHAEL FISCHER: Well, at the current time the optical-scan systems seem to be the, to combine the best features of all of the systems, that they're, first of all, they're considerably more economical because it requires less equipment at each polling place.

The ballot-marking devices provide accessibility to the disabled. This is a device that looks like a DRE machine, has all the accessibility features, but it marks a paper ballot which is then scanned just like any other ballot, an absentee ballot, a ballot marked by an able voter. They're all scanned in the same way.

And the protections against mis-marked ballots and over-votes and under-votes are provided by a precinct-based scanner, which the voter uses to check the ballot before it's actually placed in the ballot box.

And these scanners can also be provided with disabled-access devices, audio-response units, so a blind voter can actually verify what is written on the optical-scanned ballot.

So it's the system that provides full accessibility for the disabled. It's very flexibly expandable for unexpectedly large voter turnout because it just is a matter of having more privacy booths, not more pieces of very expensive equipment.

SEN. MEYER: So would you conclude then that the optical-scan system is, appears to be the most effective system that we could implement because of its verification abilities, its flexibility, and its application to people with disabilities?

MICHAEL FISCHER: Yes, I would.

SEN. MEYER: Thank you.

REP. CARUSO: Thank you, Senator. Further questions? Senator DeFronzo.

SEN. DEFRONZO: I want to just explore, pick up where Senator Meyer's question left off about the optical-scan equipment being acceptable for use by the disabled.

Now there seems to be a good deal of disagreement over this topic and our, I think there was testimony from the Secretary of State last week, indicated that optical scan, you sort of described a machine a few minutes ago which a sight-impaired individual would be able to use an optical-scan machine for casting his or her ballot.

The Secretary of State seemed to indicate to us in her testimony that there is no such machine available on the market today and none apparently are interested in bidding in Connecticut for that reason, because none of them are compliant with HAVA standards.

Can you give us your opinion on that dilemma?

MICHAEL FISCHER: First of all, optical scan is an old technology, so there's a bit of an apples-and-oranges problem, whether one is talking about the optical scan of many years ago and which have been in use in the state in a few precincts for several years or whether one is talking about the emerging technology.

So the new things that are being added to an optical-scan system are the ballot-marking devices for the disabled and the precinct-based scanners, which also can, and I feel should, be made disabled accessible.

These devices are coming on the market now. They are available. I'm unsure exactly where they are in the certification process.

But as to whether any of those machines will be bid in a current RFP, if one reads the RFP it seems to exclude, it's a focused RFP for DRE machines.

DRE's right there in the title. The definitions of what an acceptable machine area, describes a machine with internal memory and so forth.

So it's quite likely that a vendor of optical-scan machines would not bother to submit a proposal in response to this RFP.

SEN. DEFRONZO: Thank you. That helps.

REP. CARUSO: Thank you, Senator. Further questions? Thank you very much, Sir. Our next speaker, Ralph Morelli, followed by Clark Allen, followed by John Friedlander.

RALPH MORELLI: Good morning, Mr. Chair and Members of the Committee. My name is Ralph Morelli. I live in Wethersfield. I'm a professor of computer science at Trinity College.

I strongly support S.B. 55, especially its call for voter-verified paper ballot.

Like many other computer scientists, I'm very concerned that the HAVA-supported adoption of paperless DRE machines will only serve to further undermine confidence in our electoral process.

There's two levels of confidence involved in voting. One is the individual's confidence that their votes are accurately recorded and counted.

Then as we've just heard, a DRE records the ballot electronically in the computer's memory. There's no way for the voter to see that or verify that.

And there's, unfortunately, many ways in which these machines can break or make mistakes, leading to lost votes or mis-tabulated votes.

DREs are complex machines, much more complex than the lever machines they would replace in Connecticut. And these kinds of computer glitches occur quite often, software glitches, hardware glitches, all kind of glitches.

Moreover, numerous studies by computer scientists have shown that DREs are also vulnerable to deliberate tampering. They have security flaws.

So whether because of mishap or mischief, we simply cannot trust what's inside the computer's memory to accurately count our votes, can't entirely trust that.

The only way to give voters confidence in their individual vote is to let them verify their votes on a paper record. That's why we need to pass S.B. 55.

A second level of confidence is the electorate's confidence that the election outcome is an accurate reflection of the voters' collective will. That's why every voting authority has recount provisions.

If we adopt paperless DREs in Connecticut, we will lose the capability to conduct independent manual recounts.

Lost or incorrectly recorded electronic ballots are in the computer's memory. Just printing that out, as the previous speaker, Professor Fischer, testified, isn't an independent recount.

And losing the ability to do these kinds of independent counts will seriously undermine voters' confidence.

So voter-verified paper ballots allow us to do independent recounts and that's another reason why we need to pass S.B. 55.

As I see it, this is not primarily a technology issue. Optical-scan voting systems provide voter-verified paper records and so can DREs.

Indeed, in 2003, a printer-equipped DRE system, a printer-equipped DRE system was used in Southington in a pilot study.

I'll just quote the registrar voters there who said the machines and printers performed flawlessly, plus, if anyone questioned the integrity of the machines, we have a record of each vote cast that was verified by the voter [Gap in testimony. Changing from Tape 1A to Tape 1B.]

--can and must be accessible to the visually impaired and those with language disabilities in conformance with the ADA. And systems such as that are becoming available.

I could, be happy to answer any questions. But I want to thank the Committee for taking the lead on this important issue in this Legislature. Thank you.

REP. CARUSO: Thank you. Questions for Professor Morelli? Yes, Representative Fleischmann.

REP. FLEISCHMANN: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thank you, Professor, for taking the time to testify.

I'm interested in the comments that you made about a recount involving DRE machines that lack the voter-verified paper trails.

It's my understanding that in the State of Ohio many such machines were used in this past cycle, and there were those who were seeking a full recount of Ohio.

In the absence of voter-verifiable paper trails, what kind of a recount can one have and what kind of confidence would you have in what we would derive from such a recount?

RALPH MORELLI: I would have absolutely no confidence. If there were a problem with votes getting lost or votes getting tampered with, it would be hidden in the machine's memory.

If you order the machine to recount the votes in its memory, it will just reproduce what it has. The error or the chicanery has already occurred before the votes were put into memory.

So therefore, just printing those out gives you no confidence that there was even a problem that occurred.

So that's what's most striking about the difference between going from lever machines where you can't do a manual recount to these machines.

With a lever machine, if someone tampered with it, you could open up the back and you'll see tampering.

With these electronic machines, just like you can't open up and look in your computer, you would never find these without serious forensic investigation.

REP. FLEISCHMANN: So just to follow up then, stepping back from the Connecticut picture to the national one, what is your confidence as a computer scientist in the results that we saw on Election Day from the State of Ohio?

RALPH MORELLI: Well, I have still questions about the process in Ohio. I'm not sure to what degree they used DREs in Ohio.

But it's significant that just recently the Secretary of State in Ohio, Kenneth Blackwell, announced that they would not be using paperless DREs in Ohio.

They're going to for optical-scan equipment. And this has been passed by the Ohio Legislature. So they're one of the states that is requiring a voter-verified paper record now.

And I don't know whether it's a result of the many irregularities that occurred there, but that's certainly suggestive that they've seen the light, as I think we have here in Connecticut as well.

REP. FLEISCHMANN: Thank you. That's extremely informative.

REP. CARUSO: Further questions for the professor? Thank you very much. Appreciate your time. Clark Allen, followed by John Friedlander then George Barnett.

CLARK ALLEN: Good morning. I'm Dr. Clark Allen. I'm not a computer specialist. I'm a concerned citizen who has been worried about computer-based voting since the 2000 elections.

I'm also part of a grassroots citizens organization in the Hartford area whose focus has been election reform.

In fact, our group, VOTER, meaning Voter Opportunity Through Election Reform, was instrumental in the development of the predecessor to S.B. 55, namely S.B. 388, which very nearly became law last year.

I'll try to make my remarks brief and to the point. Computers often fail for one reason or another, and when they do the data they contain is either distorted or lost beyond recall.

If we in Connecticut plan, as the Secretary of State apparently intends, to purchase DRE machines and only DRE machines, which are simply computers designed to record and tally votes, then it's imperative that our electoral processes gain from the convenience they offer but avoid at all costs their well-documented limitations and pitfalls.

The record of electoral processes across the U.S., which have been rendered essentially incomprehensible because of DRE failure, is very, very long. Yet there is a simple solution to at least one of the many problems that DREs bring.

Any DRE must come equipped with attachments that allow voters to verify their individual electronic votes before they leave the voting booth.

And each vote must be preserved as hard copy and deposited in a safe place to be used for comparison with electronic totals at any time, and finally, and as the final tally when there are close or contested elections.

In summary, if Connecticut buys DREs, as the Secretary apparently intends to do, we must insist that they always be equipped to produce a voter-verified paper ballot.

There is ample precedent for this, and close by. Our sister state of New Hampshire has had such an arrangement in place since 1994 and finds that it works easily and well.

Many other states, including Nevada, Ohio, Illinois, California, Vermont, Maine, and Alaska, have more recently passed legislation requiring such hard-copy back-up routines for any DREs used in their states.

If the panel members have questions about the details, let me suggest a sampling of reference sources. One, the book Black Box Voting by Bev Harris and David Allen, very well-known and very detailed.

Two, national websites on the Internet, www.votersunite.org, www.blackboxvoting.org, www.verifiedvoting.org.

Another very close and available rich resource is our Election Enforcement Commission, especially its director, Deputy Director Albert Lenge, Attorney Albert Lenge, who is extremely knowledgeable in both the technical and legal aspects of voting.

Fourth, the Secretary of State of New Hampshire, and especially Representative Leo Pepino, whom I spoke to last year, who proposed New Hampshire's bill over ten years ago.

And finally, a very comprehensive yet clear and readable handbook on the subject of electronic voting entitled Myth Breakers for Election Officials, a copy of which I offer to the panel for its use.

Note that it is subtitled, “A Collection of Information Essential to Those Entrusted with Making Decisions about Electronic Systems in the United States.” You folks should have a full copy of this as well as several limited copies.

What I did was I printed out so that anyone could order this or download it the title page, the two preface pages, which are a splendid summary of what is contained in this incredibly important document.

Everyone on this commission should know this [inaudible] have it available to him or her, and should be using it as a reference device.

And thirdly, there is a fine, fine summary page, the very last page in this 50-page document, also, that touches on so many of the questions you folks have been asking. Please read this document.

I have given the Chairs a copy of the full document and brief forms for each Committee member. Thank you very much.

REP. CARUSO: Thank you, Dr. Allen. Questions for Dr. Allen? Doctor, thank you very much for coming today and for your interest as well.

CLARK ALLEN: Thank you, Representative Caruso.

REP. CARUSO: Next speaker, John Friedlander, followed by George Barnett, Joyce Wojtas, and Dennis O'Neil.

JOHN FRIEDLANDER: Good afternoon, Co-Chair DeFronzo, Co-Chair Caruso. My name is John Friedlander. I'm a voter from Haddam. I also want to extend a special greeting to my Representative Spallone. Good to see you here, Sir.

I am here to speak in support of S.B. 55. Well-documented election problems nationwide justify many additional steps being taken to increase voters' confidence in the process of democracy.

As a former computer consultant, though without the credentials of Drs. Fischer and Morelli, who I thank for their excellent testimony, I'm more familiar with software development than many.

There's an old joke that two things you don't want to see being made, sausage and law. Add software to that.

Whether by action or intention, computerized voting machines are not the panacea we would like them to be.

Anyone who's ever tried to program a VCR, a cell phone, or figure out an unfamiliar microwave knows the frustration of having to depend on fingernail-sized chips of silicon programmed by people with alternative conceptions of reality, frequently documented by people who speak English as a second language.

There's another old joke that there are two kinds of computer users, those who have lost data and those who will.

The bottom line is technology is fallible. Technology in mission-critical applications like voting must have backups. Florida in 2000, Ohio and other states in 2004 prove the need for improvement in the voting process.

Voter-verified paper trails are one, but only one, step in that process. Other steps include requiring machines to be designed using open source code, as has been previously mentioned, random audits of results, as well as H.B. 5662, H.B. 5567, H.B. 5670, and H.B. 6534.

In conclusion, thank you very much for the opportunity to testify today. I support S.B. 55.

REP. CARUSO: Are there questions? Thank you very much for your traveling here and taking the time to testify. Next speaker, George Barnett.

GEORGE BARNETT: Good morning. My name is George Barnett and I'm a CPA and I have spent more than ten years of my career as a corporate auditor.

As an ex-auditor, I understand the importance of original source documents to back up computer-generated reports.

Public auditors of major corporations require source documents to verify financial results and will not attest to the accuracy of financial statements without such documents.

This is why I am strongly in favor of Proposed S.B. 55, which requires an individual, permanent voter-verified paper record for each elector casting a vote on the machine.

The state currently has an RFP to purchase DRE or touch-screen voting systems. The systems may provide a paper report that shows all the activity on the system for the day, but there's no requirement in the RFP or in state law that they use voter-verified paper ballots.

As you've heard today, experts on voting systems agree, the activity report absolutely does not provide sufficient safeguards over the voting process and does not provide voter-verified paper ballots.

These paper reports generated by the DRE touch-screen systems after the polls close do not allow voters to verify the accuracy of their intended vote before the ballot is cast. This is why Proposed S.B. 55 is so important and needs to be passed.

It is also important to note that when voter-verified paper ballots are used, the local precincts maintain the ability to perform meaningful recounts and to double check the accuracy of the machines of the voting systems.

If Connecticut chooses DREs without voter-verified paper ballots, that ability will be lost. Counting will be done by partisan private companies which use proprietary tabulation programs to count our votes.

In addition, these companies do not allow election officials, or anyone else for that matter, to review the software used to count our votes. Do we really want to privatize our voting system?

Voting without a voter-verified paper ballot is analogous to never balancing your checking account and trusting the bank to accurately calculate your balance.

Voter-verified paper ballots must be an integral piece of any voting system that our state uses in the future.

Please do everything possible to pass S.B. 55. Connecticut voters deserve to have auditable and transparent elections that are controlled by our state and not by privately held partisan companies that provide the DRE voting systems.

REP. CARUSO: Thank you, Mr. Barnett. Any questions? Yes, Representative Fleischmann.

REP. FLEISCHMANN: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thank you for testifying. And my question goes to your experience as an auditor.

Are there currently existing in financial systems mechanisms similar to the voter-verifiable paper trail that allowed you as an auditor to get underneath the summary output from a financial system?

GEORGE BARNETT: Definitely. I mean, as an auditor, when you would verify financial balances, you would have to, a computer report would supply the balance.

Let's say for the account cash you'd have to get bank statements. And then you'd go to actual checks cashed. You'd go down to the source document, a document that somebody actually signed and then you can trace that back up to the total that's referenced on a financial report.

And that's what I was getting at, you know, when I said, so, I mean, it's common practice in other areas to have a source document that shows the intent of the person that provided that source document. So I think it's critical to have it in voting systems also.

REP. FLEISCHMANN: Thank you. That's very helpful.

REP. CARUSO: Thank you, Representative. Further questions? Thank you very much, Mr. Barnett.

GEORGE BARNETT: Thank you.

REP. CARUSO: Next speaker, Joyce Wojtas, followed by Dennis O'Neil, then David Bauer.

JOYCE WOJTAS: Good morning, Mr. Chairman and Members of the Committee. My name is Joyce Wojtas.

I'm Director of Government Affairs for Connecticut Construction Industries Association, here today to speak on three bills, S.B. 1042, concerning bid extensions by the Department of Public Works.

CCIA is opposed to the change in Section 3 (b), which would allow the extension time from 60 days to 120 days to award contracts.

We all know that time is money, and in the construction industry material prices are volatile. I've passed in testimony and I've given you what happened last year from November to November.

And I don't know how you can expect contractors and subcontractors to hold their prices because that's a long time. We're adamantly opposed to this.

Last year with the affidavit fiasco in the beginning of the year, many contracts had to be re-bid and that cost the state money.

Also, H.B. 6665, concerning obsolete provisions in certain DPW statutes. You've heard lowest responsible qualified bidder, competitive bidding, and that's the way to go. There's still a major loophole in this bill, even after some provisions are removed.

We don't understand why contractors doing work at UConn don't have to be pre-qualified under the system. They're exempted from the pre-qualification system in Section 4b-91 of the statute.

There are other correctional facilities, community court projects, higher education facilities. You've got another bill that's going to address the fast-tracking issue and requiring a two-thirds vote.

I think you should revisit this section because it really doesn't make sense now, an out-of-state contractor can come in, get a job at UConn, and not have to go through the pre-qualification system that this Committee put in place.

H.B. 6667, improving the contractor pre-qualification program administered by DAS. We wholly support that, and we worked, we were a primary supporter way back in 2003. Actually we started in 2001, trying to get a pre-qual system on the books for these contracts.

I just would like to give you a definition of public building. I'm working on it. I haven't had time.

But we would like sewage treatment plants and water treatment plants to be included under that definition. We feel that's vital construction and they should have pre-qualified contractors.

If anybody has any questions, I'd be glad to answer them.

REP. CARUSO: Questions of Joyce? Senator DeFronzo.

SEN. DEFRONZO: Joyce, can you delineate for us the differences between the UConn pre-qualification program and the state pre-qualification program?

JOYCE WOJTAS: In a couple of sentences, no, except that the state's, the reason that it's important to have contractors pre-qualified under the state's program is because that will be a central source of information for any municipality or any state agency that's using contractors.

As it stands now, there's no communication. In other words, under the new pre-qual program that DAS is administering, every awarding authority has to respond to how the contractor performed on the contract.

That will be a central part of the renewal of their pre-qualification. UConn is out here somewhere.

And it just seems as though if you want uniform practices and procedures that everyone should be following the same rules, submitting the same information, and they should be submitting it to a central gathering place so that there is communication on problems that arise out in the field.

That was one of the reasons why municipalities were included, because many municipalities were having problems with contractors and yet nobody knew about it.

So in this industry we just feel that it's important to have that communication and to know if you've got a bad performer who's doing a number of things. That should all come out and be part of that central system. They're out there somewhere.

And I'm not saying they should have the awarding authority, but they should be using a contractor that's gone through a uniform pre-qualification system, plus the contractors that go to DAS, remember, are paying a fee.

They're paying, Connecticut-based contractors are paying up to $2,500 to pre-qualify here, where if someone from out of state could just come in, go to UConn, get the job and not even be part of that other system. So it's kind of not fair.

SEN. DEFRONZO: Well, actually, that's what I was trying to get at. Some of the distinctions between the two pre-qualification programs might be helpful for us to see.

I mean, there's been a strong argument made the UConn should be autonomous for a variety of reasons, principally dealing with the speed with which they can process construction projects.

JOYCE WOJTAS: Fast track.

SEN. DEFRONZO: Well, it's sort of, yeah. We won't, we don't like using that term--

JOYCE WOJTAS: Well, that's what it is.

SEN. DEFRONZO: But, for example, the, that loophole that you just mentioned there, the UConn pre-qual doesn't require the registration fee at all, right?

JOYCE WOJTAS: Right. Correct. And it also--

SEN. DEFRONZO: So one company applying for UConn status would not be required to pay the registration fee which may be $500 or $800, whereas if you come to the DAS system you're required to pay that right out of the gate.

JOYCE WOJTAS: Correct. And it also doesn't require any communication for that central collection.

So if a contractor is a bad contractor on a UConn project, unless we read it in the newspaper the rest of the contracting units of the state with state funds don't know about it.

SEN. DEFRONZO: In addition to UConn, are there other entities that you would identify for inclusion in it?

JOYCE WOJTAS: Well, I think that there are, I don't know if the quasi-public agencies are all included either because there are different ways of contracting.

Sometimes a private entity like manages the construction prior to turning it over to a quasi-public agency. And we would like to see that, everyone encompassed in the system.

Of course, highway, DOT work is not. That's because they have their, you know, they're under a lot of federal rules which are sometimes more stringent. So, plus it's a different breed of contractor too.

There's a big difference between vertical construction and horizontal construction. The contractor doing road, bridge, sewer line, waterline work does the majority of the work with his own forces. So he's performing probably 75% to 80% of the work.

Where when you get into building construction, it involves many more subcontractors and different levels of, there'll be a construction manager and then prime contractors and then subs and secondary subs.

And it's just a vast world of difference and the same people don't do both. The horizontal work is covered by DOT when it comes to roads and bridges.

Sewage treatment plants, of course, would be your metropolitan district commission or any of the other, those types of facilities, which I believe are mostly regional municipally controlled when it comes to sewer and water, some private.

But if they get, I think the key is if there's any state funds, and it's not, doesn't fall under a federal tie, then we believe they all belong under the DAS system.

And I want to compliment DAS. They've been working very hard. We've had more bugs, but as we go along we're improving, you know, we improve on the program.

And I always said it's probably going to take about eight years before we perfect it because it's taken Massachusetts that long. They have a somewhat similar program.

And it's just, you find it as you go along, the mistakes you made when you were working in the original bill. But it's working.

SEN. DEFRONZO: Thank you very much.

REP. CARUSO: Any questions? Thank you, Joyce. Our last two speakers, Dennis O'Neil, is he here? Final speaker is David Bauer.

DAVID BAUER: Good morning. My name is David Bauer. I'm a registered voter from Middletown, Connecticut.

I'm here today to oppose S.B. 55, not for the verifiable paper, but because of the use of machines at all.

We here have hundreds of years of experience in properly conducting elections with paper ballots.

I think the voting machines are strictly for convenience and I completely reject the notion that voting convenience has any merit or standing in this most critical act of our democracy.

It's not the voter who benefits from getting the vote process completed with any kind of great dispatch.

I do believe that paper ballots give the voter the greatest confidence that their vote has been applied correctly on the first count and in any subsequent recounts.

I heard a lot of experts testify today about all these potential liabilities. Why expose us to these at all? Our wallets and democracy would benefit from the best voting method, and that's paper ballots.

We are Connecticut, the land of steady habits. Thank you.

[APPLAUSE]

REP. CARUSO: Any questions? Representative Fleischmann.

REP. FLEISCHMANN: Just one question, if I may. You're clearly in support of paper ballots, and probably would prefer eye and hand counting of those ballots.

But there are optical scan technologies, as you may have heard, where someone bubbles in their candidates and then it's counted by an optical-scan device. Are you opposed to that as well?

DAVID BAUER: Well, I've heard of that going wrong. I remember all kinds of SAT problems and so forth. I am definitely old school.

If I could interject something else, one thing I'd suggest is everybody seems to be wringing their hands about low voter participation especially among the young.

Why not have our high school kids hand check the ballots and get an excellent education and introduction to the nuts and bolts of democracy?

REP. FLEISCHMANN: Thank you.

REP. CARUSO: Further questions? Thank you very much. That concludes our public hearing. At 2:00 will be the public officials' hearing.

We'll exercise the three-minute period as well, so I ask members to be on time if you have questions of the public officials. At 1:00, leadership will reconvene for screening. Thank you, all.

--for every public official. And then at that time, we ask that you summarize. And then if individuals of the Committee have questions, they can ask it at that time.

The reason we're doing that is fairness to the public. We asked the public for three minutes, and so we want to pass it on to the public officials as well.

Our first speaker is our Secretary of State.

SEC. OF STATE SUSAN BYSIEWICZ: Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. My name is Susan Bysiewicz, the Secretary of the State. And I will do my best to keep to my three-minute mandate here.

And what I'll do is I will provide the Committee with testimony on various bills, but I would just like to confine my three minutes to S.B. 55, AN ACT PROMOTING THE VOTING SYSTEM ACCURACY AND SECURITY THROUGH VOTER-VERIFIED PAPER RECEIPTS.

I'm very pleased to report that Connecticut is one of only nine states that have met the current deadlines of the Help America Vote Act.

As I have testified before this Committee previously, I continue to support voter-verified paper receipts, but I want to let the Committee know that we have to proceed in this area with caution.

There appears to be many questions about whether HAVA's requirement for a paper audit trail mandates a voter-verified paper receipt.

Very simply, HAVA does not mandate that. HAVA mandates a paper audit trail, which can be used to produce a paper record of each vote cast in random order after an election.

A voter-verified paper receipt is a paper record that each voter must visually review prior to casting the vote. So there is the problem.

If a paper receipt is to be counted as the physical ballot for any recount procedure, then the receipt itself is the vote.

A visually impaired voter is only able to hear a confirmation, and therefore cannot review a paper receipt.

So the essence of the voter-verified paper receipt argument is that a voter should have a second method for verifying his or her selections.

And to this, at this time there is not technology that our office is aware of that is able to do that.

I want to provide the Committee with some testimony from the American Association of People with Disabilities, and that organization opposes voter-verified paper receipts for the reasons that I just outlined. So I want the Committee to have that.

And I also want to give the Committee a copy of Senator Dodd's legislation that he has recently introduced into Congress that would require by 2009 that there be a voter-verified paper receipt voting requirement with accommodations for people with disabilities, for instance, an audio read-back of a visually impaired voter's selections.

REP. CARUSO: Any questions? Susan, thank you very much. We'll be talking privately anyway after today. So appreciate your time.

SEC. OF STATE SUSAN BYSIEWICZ: Thank you so much. And I'll be happy to leave the Committee with all our information.

REP. CARUSO: Thank you very much. Next, Senator Edith Prague. And, Edith, is it [inaudible]? Edith?

SEN. EDITH PRAGUE: Yes?

REP. CARUSO: The gentleman joining you, is it, the gentleman joining you--

SEN. EDITH PRAGUE: Is Mr. Richard Podurgiel, who is a City Manager of Norwich. Thank you very much, Representative Caruso.

Senator DeFronzo and Representative Caruso, for the record, I am Senator Edith Prague of the 19^th District. With me today is Mr. Richard Podurgiel who is the City Manager of Norwich.

We're both here to testify on Raised H.B. 6664. And out of respect for your three-minute limitation, I'm going to allow Mr. Podurgiel to state Norwich's position on this issue.

I just want to say for the record that I remember discussing this with former OPM Secretary Mark Ryan, and he assured the Mayor of Norwich and myself that there would be flexibility in this timeframe.

But having said that, I want to introduce Mr. Richard Podurgiel.

RICHARD PODURGIEL: Thank you very much, and good afternoon. My name is Richard Podurgiel, City Manager of Norwich.

It's a pleasure to be here to testify before you today on a piece of legislation that has great potential impact on the City of Norwich.

Raised H.B. 6664 is an important bill because it establishes the conditions under which the City of Norwich may purchase that portion of the Norwich Hospital property located within the city limits.

We understand the current timetable laid out in the statute that requires a transfer to be completed within 60 days after the property has been offered to the municipality.

We also deeply appreciate Commissioner Flemming's willingness to work with the City of Norwich and the Town of Preston to establish a realistic schedule for the transfer of the Norwich State Hospital property.

From the beginning, the state has tried to balance the needs of Norwich and Preston against the state's interest in disposing of the surplus land at the Norwich Hospital.

I received notice of the state's offer to transfer the property last fall. Since then, the Norwich City Council has appointed a Norwich Hospital Property Advisory Committee, and has voted to express the city's strong interest in purchasing the hospital property located in Norwich.

As you consider the legislation before you, I urge you to make every effort to provide maximum flexibility to the municipalities involved in the Norwich Hospital property transactions.

We need reasonableness, not arbitrary deadlines. Rome was not built in a day. A transfer of property as important as this should not be unreasonably rushed.

While we would like to proceed as expeditiously as possible, both the city and the state must ensure that all relevant conditions are known and understood.

This property has sat idle for more than a decade. It's going to take some time to investigate current conditions.

I thank you very, very much for your time this afternoon.

REP. CARUSO: Thank you. Are there questions for Senator Prague or Mr. Podurgiel? Thank you very much, both of you, for coming out.

RICHARD PODURGIEL: Okay. Thank you again.

REP. CARUSO: Jeff Garfield, Elections Enforcement.

JEFF GARFIELD: Good afternoon, Mr. Chairman, Members of the Committee. I'm Jeff Garfield, Executive Director and General Counsel of the State Elections Enforcement Commission.

I'll do my best Chris Berman impersonation to do this in three minutes.

S.B. 55. The Commission strongly supports this bill, considers it a priority for the Legislative session. A voter-verified paper audit trail will provide voters with the confidence that their votes have been accurately recorded.

While there are many potential benefits to computerized voting systems, there are concerns as well.

There have been documented problems with the use of DREs in other parts of the country, and it's important to have a paper trail to reconstruct the election if computer devices fail or electric power is lost.

Seven states have already instituted VVPAT requirements and many others are considering legislation to do so.

The concept enjoys bipartisan support across the country and should be enacted without delay.

Due to the critical importance of this issue, I've attached a more detailed statement and supporting documentation which I hope will be useful in your deliberations.

S.B. 416, we support it. We support disclosure requirements for candidate push polls that would inform the voter of the sponsor of the poll.

I've attached to my testimony a legislation that was enacted in May and which we think is worthy of your consideration. I'd be happy to work with the Committee to draft a bill.

Proposed S.B. 665, we support it, but we feel that it should apply not only to statewide candidates, but to legislative and municipal candidates as well.

H.B. 5205, we support it. It's a common-sense requirement. I know there was litigation concerning it this past election and H.B. 5205 is something that should be enacted.

I'll stop there and leave you with my written testimony on H.B. 5662, H.B. 5663, H.B. 5666, and H.B. 5667, and H.B. 5670, H.B. 6081, and H.B. 6534. I hope it will be incorporated in the record. And I'd be happy to answer any questions you have.

REP. CARUSO: Questions of Jeff? Yes, Representative Fleischmann.

REP. FLEISCHMANN: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Questions on two quick topics. One, with regard to the push poll legislation, would it pose a difficulty in terms of enforcement, or do you think that there are mechanisms out there?

Because I could imagine a circumstance where there's a call, a push poll, it's not identified, but, you know, it becomes difficult to figure out exactly where the call came from and who paid for it.

JEFF GARFIELD: Right. Again, in that regard, we think the main legislation is a model to look at. I don't, I'm not aware that they have had any problems enforcing that, Representative Fleischmann.

So I would encourage the Committee to look at the main legislation that I've attached as a good bench point.

REP. FLEISCHMANN: Gotcha. And then with regard to the voter-verifiable paper trail, I believe you were present when the Secretary of State evinced her concerns about being able to actually have a system that works.

To my knowledge, there are already a number of states that do have systems that work and that are accessible to people with disabilities.

Just interested to hear you opine on that one.

JEFF GARFIELD: Yes. And I understand her concern, and certainly the VVPAT requirement should apply to the disabled community.

However, our information is that not only do seven states have it and three have done it by virtue of their chief election officer, but that the technology does exist to have an audio headset for sight-impaired voters.

So we would encourage maybe a friendly amendment to the bill, because I understand in looking at the bill it didn't quite reach that issue of, it requires the paper record, but it doesn't get to the issue of the sight-impaired voter. And I think we probably want to build that into the legislation.

But I would encourage this Committee and the General Assembly to move forward with all deliberate speed in enacting S.B. 55.

REP. FLEISCHMANN: Thank you very much.

REP. CARUSO: Further questions? Representative Giannaros.

REP. GIANNAROS: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Hi, Jeff. On the issue of the push polling, is there a clear definition of what a push poll is?

JEFF GARFIELD: There is in the main legislation, Representative Giannaros, and I would refer you to that rather than try to reread it into the record of the Committee proceedings.

But I think the definition that the main legislature came up with is fairly clear. And we can certainly work to make it clearer, if need be.

REP. GIANNAROS: I'm just playing it in my head. Technically, any question can be interpreted by somebody else's having a bias in favor of one or the other. That's why I'm having a hard time.

I can, there's some polls that are pushed to the degree that anyone would agree that it's a push poll, you know, because they're talking clearly about the candidate's strengths while perhaps criticizing the opponent.

But some others are just, they're sort of passive in their bias perhaps--

JEFF GARFIELD: Well, I think the, one of the key elements of the definition in the main statute that I think is central is that the poll prefaces a question regarding support for a candidate on the basis of an untrue statement.

The push polls that I think we're all familiar with is those, something to the effect, you know, would you support Representative Jones if you knew that he beat his wife. That's the, you know, traditional push poll.

REP. GIANNAROS: Yes. So it has to have an inaccurate statement.

JEFF GARFIELD: Right.

REP. GIANNAROS: Okay. That's different than what I had thought of a push poll. Thank you.

REP. CARUSO: Thank you, Representative. Further questions? Jeff, thank you. And you have written testimony on different bills.

JEFF GARFIELD: Yes.

REP. CARUSO: And I think our staff also has copies too, so we'll consider your comments as we're drafting.

JEFF GARFIELD: Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

REP. CARUSO: Thank you. Our next speaker, Bob Congdon, the First Selectman of Preston, former colleague as well.

BOB CONGDON: Good afternoon, Representative Caruso, distinguished Committee Members. My name is Bob Congdon. I'm the First Selectman of the Town of Preston.

And I'd like to thank you for this opportunity to speak on Raised H.B. 6664, AN ACT CONCERNING THE SALE OF THE NORWICH STATE HOSPITAL PROPERTY. I've submitted written testimony and I won't read that.

The Norwich State Hospital property is a former mental institution in the Towns of Preston and Norwich, originally consisted of about 800 acres. About 400 acres have been carved out of that and protected in various open-space provisions.

On September 1^st of 2004, the Department of Public Works sent the City of Norwich and the Town of Preston a letter offering us the property for $1 if we would agree to accepting the environmental remediation of the property.

And one of the stipulations of the surplus property statutes is you have 45 days for the town to then notify the state whether you're interested or not. Both the City of Norwich and the Town of Preston complied with that portion of the statute.

But we were told that the state would not comply with the 60-day stipulation in the statute because it was impossible to comply.

The state could not comply with the property transfer act because a Phase II Environmental Study has never been done on the property, so there is no known extent of the environmental remediation needed to clean up the property.

I support Commissioner Flemming's efforts to clarify the statute and have some flexibility. But I think the Committee could address the surplus property statutes with two minor changes.

One, if the Committee changed the 60-day requirement to a timeframe of 60 days after the conditions of the transfer act are complied with, would then be able to apply to any piece of property in the state.

And the other would be to give the Commissioner of DPW the flexibility to extend that 60 days further if good-faith negotiations were taking place.

And I would suggest those two minor changes, and then you wouldn't have to carve out the state hospital. Thank you. I entertain any questions.

REP. CARUSO: Thank you, Bob. Any questions of Bob at all? Okay.

BOB CONGDON: Nice to see you.

REP. CARUSO: Bob, I hope you have your comments in writing.

BOB CONGDON: Yes, I do. I submitted comments.

REP. CARUSO: Great.

BOB CONGDON: Thank you very much.

REP. CARUSO: Thank you, Bob. Next, Representative Currey, Melody Currey.

REP. CURREY: Good afternoon, and thank you for allowing me to come before you this afternoon. It's dark in this room compared to outside, isn't it? I hope that doesn't mean you guys are kept in the dark.

The first bill is H.B. 5202, which is a bill cosponsored by myself and DebraLee Hovey. And it's the, involves the filing of endorsement for elections for candidates to the General Assembly.

And as you'll see in my testimony, Representative Hovey had a terrible experience with it and was not allowed to, had to go to court to be allowed to put on the ballot.

It's sort of a common-sense approach, I think, if we all were to file with the Secretary of State. It would make it much simpler and easier.

Also, given the fact that the public is not always aware of who's running from single-family, oh, single-family, single-town districts because of the fact that you don't file with the Secretary of State, it doesn't go on the web page until about two to three weeks after the conventions.

So I did have constituents calling and saying aren't you running or who's running against you, because when the 10^th District appeared, it appeared blank.

So I think it would be a way of also informing the public.

The second bill I'd like to address is AN ACT ESTABLISHING STATE CLAIM INTERCEPT PROCEDURES, S.B. 1043.

I had a similar bill that went to Human Services.

What this does actually is set up a procedure to allow us to implement the law which we have all voted for and passed in the past for windfalls, super financial benefits that someone receives from a court case.

What I discovered is if you go to the court system and you have had a reason to pay the state back some money and you go all the way through the system, you have to, the state comes after your portion of that, 50% of it.

If you settle out of court, you walk away with all of it without having to give a portion back to the state.

It just seems inherently unfair to me that you have a whole group of people doing that. I would like to see us set up a procedure to implement that.

And presently we collect about $15 million, which one estimate was 20% of it. So do the math. That's $75 million unexpected revenue that we could gain.

Thank you very much. Any questions?

REP. CARUSO: Thank you, Melody. Any questions? Thank you very much for testifying. Appreciate it. Our next speaker, James McGaughey, is it-- [Gap in testimony. Changing from Tape 1B to Tape 2A.]

JAMES MCGAUGHEY: --Members of the Committee. My name is Jim McGaughey and I'm the Executive Director of the Connecticut Office of Protection and Advocacy for Persons with Disabilities.

And I thank you very much for the opportunity to comment on S.B. 55, AN ACT PROMOTING VOTING SYSTEM ACCURACY, INTEGRITY AND SECURITY THROUGH VOTER-VERIFIED PAPER RECORDS.

I have submitted written testimony. I won't read it. But I just want to say that our office is taking absolutely no position on the issue of voter-verifiable receipt.

We just think that if there is, this bill goes forward or there's a requirement enacted for such a receipt that it should be, included in the bill should be language requiring that that receipt be accessible to people with disabilities, including people with visual disabilities.

And as you know, the Help America Vote Act 2002 contains provisions requiring the purchase of accessible voting technology to be put in place I believe by 2005 in all federal elections.

And the reason that that is so significant for people with disabilities is that historically there has been considerable under-representation by voters with disabilities in election processes.

The requirements for independent private voting are critically important to addressing that problem. We don't want to take a step backwards by not including any verifiable receipts in that requirement.

So if there are any questions, I'd be happy to answer them as best I can.

REP. CARUSO: Any questions? Representative O'Brien.

REP. O'BRIEN: If there is, if the technology that is authorized under the statute allows for a system that is verifiable by persons of disability groups, that would be acceptable?

JAMES MCGAUGHEY: If it does, I don't know that, I believe the requirements for, or the standards for accessibility are contained I think in, I'm not the greatest HAVA expert. I think it's Title 3 of HAVA.

And it does identify the requirements for privacy and independence in casting a ballot.

There is no reference there that I'm aware of to having a voter-verifiable paper receipt.

But there is a requirement, as I understand it, that voters would be able to verify how they're about to, before their vote is actually cast the equipment has to be able to tell them how it's going to record that vote.

And, of course, in most of the technology I'm aware of, that's done through headphones for people with visual impairment.

You know, technology is, I'm always amazed at what technology can do. And I see no reason that you couldn't develop technology that could easily, you know, scan a paper receipt and read it back.

But I don't believe that the funding that's associated with HAVA now provides for that. I think the way that HAVA is worded you can only spend that funding on technology that's required by HAVA, and that piece of it is not required.

So I don't know if there would be like a fiscal impact. I think the Secretary of State's testimony was to something to that effect, there would be fiscal impact on trying to purchase that additional scanner technology.

But I think the technology probably could be developed fairly quickly, because it's very--

REP. O'BRIEN: I think there's quite a lot of really legitimate concern about making sure that each individual voter can verify that their vote is recorded in the way that they intended it to be recorded.

And certainly, for example, somebody with a vision impairment should certainly have that same right too.

It seems that that technology, there's a couple different roots that I'm aware of now that that technology could be made possible.

And certainly, you can't, to say that, for example, with the earphone technology, just having the voting machine spit out verbally what it is recording itself is not necessarily a double check.

There would have to be some kind of an independent machine that would double check on the actual digital recording machine.

JAMES MCGAUGHEY: Yeah. I have not seen, I've seen a number of these electronic voting machines demonstrated.

I have only seen one where there was a read-back, and that was a technology that actually printed out the ballot and then, and I'm not sure that that even complies with all the requirements of HAVA.

There's all these, you know, different technological roots that were followed by different manufacturers.

But, you know, I'm sure that if the mandate existed and the funding existed, that there would be no problem, there would be no shortage of vendors that would be lining up to develop it.

REP. O'BRIEN: Right. Thank you.

REP. CARUSO: Further questions? Senator Freedman.

SEN. FREEDMAN: Yeah, just a thought. And I'm sure probably is something that may be in the process.

But for the hearing impaired, you use the TTY machines, right, on the telephone so that they can communicate? And does that come out in something that's printed, something that they translate with their hands?

JAMES MCGAUGHEY: There is. There usually is a tape that comes out with the printout, but that's a, once again, if you're visually impaired how that gets read back to you in a private way that maintains your--

SEN. FREEDMAN: Well, if you're visually impaired would you not be able to use some sort of Braille or something that you already understand in terms of the skills that you have?

JAMES MCGAUGHEY: There are, Braille literacy is one of the big tension points, I guess, in discussions about education for people who are blind.

There are many people who lose their vision late in life who never learn to use Braille, so that's a limitation there.

SEN. FREEDMAN: Thank you.

REP. CARUSO: Other questions? Thank you very much, James, for testifying today. Next speaker is Doug Moore, followed by DebraLee, Representative Hovey, and then followed by Senator McKinney.

DOUG MOORE: Good afternoon, Chairman Caruso and Members of the GAE Committee. For the record, my name is Doug Moore.

I'm the Legislative Program Manager for Public Works, and I'm here to testify in favor of S.B. 1042, H.B. 6664, H.B. 6665, and H.B. 6668, which are DPW's legislative proposals for 2005.

S.B. 1042 increases the amount of time that DPW has to award a contract to the lowest responsible and qualified general bidder from 60 days in the current law to 120 days.

Given changes in state contracting law, DPW needs additional time to review bid proposals and have those bids approved.

S.B. 1042 also will allow us to rotate membership on selection panels in the awarding of certain specific contracts. The current law requires the panels be created once a year and serve for the duration of the year.

To best ensure the integrity in the award of contracts and to better utilize staff time, DPW feels that such panels should change for every contract being awarded.

In this way, more staff can learn about the projects that are being undertaken in the state and use their expertise and become involved in helping to assure the hiring of the most competent firms and individuals.

Further, by rotating the membership, if a corruption of any particular staff member should occur, the potential for the contract to be influenced is dramatically reduced.

Finally, the participation of staff on award panels is a time-consuming process. It is impossible for the same staff member to be fully allocated to a year to serve on a panel without their job duties being significantly impacted.

Finally, Section 2 of the bill corrects what we believe was an inadvertent, overly broad reference in legislation that originated in 2003, now codified in Section 4b-100a of the general statutes.

That section provides for selection panels amongst other things, applying them to 4b-91 and 4b-100, which is our competitively bid statutes, which we don't believe it should apply to.

There are several other bills, but I'll be happy to answer questions.

REP. CARUSO: Thank you, Doug. Any questions of Doug? Doug, you have written testimony, right?

DOUG MOORE: Yes.

REP. CARUSO: Okay. Get that into us and make sure our staff has it as well and we'll take your thoughts into consideration--

DOUG MOORE: Thank you very much.

REP. CARUSO: Thank you. Representative Hovey, followed by Senator McKinney, and then Jim Neil. Welcome, Representative.

REP. HOVEY: Thank you. This is a short chair. Good afternoon, Chairman Caruso and honorable colleagues. I'm State Representative DebraLee Hovey, and I am here to testify on H.B. 5205.

As many of you are aware, I was almost not included on the ballot this election cycle due to a mistake in filing by the chairperson of my convention.

As you may or may not know, if you are running from a single-town district, you file with the town clerk. If you run from a multi-town district, you file with the Secretary of State.

In my case, the chairperson neglected to recognize that my paperwork needed to be filed with the Secretary of State, and it was filed with the town clerk.

I had to sue the Secretary of State and show proof of the fact that I was the unanimous candidate for the Republican nomination for State Representative for the 112^th District.

Not only was it a nightmare, it was also a costly endeavor. It is my understanding that similar situations have occurred or almost occurred on several occasions.

To make all the paperwork uniform and so as to eliminate any confusion, Representative Currey and I have proposed H.B. 5205, which would have all individuals running for a state office sending their paperwork to the Secretary of State, one form, one receiver.

As all of you know, we are reliant on the help of volunteers, individuals who are devoting their free time to assisting us.

By simplifying the process it allows for everyone to eliminate the red tape and allow for the democratic process to work more smoothly.

This concept has a great deal of support from the General Assembly, and I appreciate your serious consideration of the bill. I thank you in advance for your support.

And I did bring my decision, because I thought you'd all be interested in seeing what an $8,000 decision looks like. Thank you all very much.

REP. CARUSO: Questions for Debra? Yes, Representative Ferrari.

REP. FERRARI: Hi, DebraLee. Just a couple of quick questions. Did not the town clerk notice that it wasn't supposed to go to her or him?

REP. HOVEY: Actually, my situation was one debacle after another, but my town clerk went on holiday and her assistant had no clue what the piece of paper was that was sitting in front of her. So it stayed there and never ended up being filed. It was stamp-dated though.

REP. FERRARI: So it was in on time, although it was in the wrong place.

REP. HOVEY: Right, right.

REP. FERRARI: And one final question. The, if the bill passes and it's filed with the state, the Secretary of State's Office, then the Secretary of State's Office would be required to let the town clerk know who would be in the district, I mean who was running in the district.

REP. HOVEY: Right. It would follow the exact same process that it does now for the single town. So it would come up on the website immediately and everyone would be informed.

Part of what happened for us was that, you know, we kept looking for it on the website and it didn't show up and it was like, oh, my gosh, what's going on. I mean, just, you know, it just was a mess, a costly mess.

REP. FERRARI: It's hard enough to run, but it's almost impossible when you don't get--

REP. HOVEY: Well, let me just say I've learned a lot of lessons.

REP. FERRARI: Thank you very much.

REP. HOVEY: Thank you.

REP. FERRARI: Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

REP. CARUSO: Further questions? Representative Giannaros.

REP. GIANNAROS: Thank you, Chairman Caruso. DebraLee, I'm in the same situation, that one-town type of district. And I'm afraid that could happen to me, obviously.

But what is the reason anyway for having it different? Was there a logic that was stated to you?

REP. HOVEY: It's actually, it's in the statute. This is a change. The Secretary of State does support it.

And although, you know, I think the reason why she just didn't kind of go along with it in the fall was that she felt that she couldn't set a precedent around the acknowledgement, even though it did have the time, date.

But the judge clearly understood that it was just a common-sense measure. And it's one of those things that, you know, will eliminate any confusion on the part of the candidate and the people that are volunteering for them.

REP. GIANNAROS: Yeah, I used to have a two-town district and I didn't have to go through this process.

And then when I found out that I had to, I just could not understand why we're filing with the local town clerk and the rest of the state more or less is filing, but anyway. I support your idea. Thank you.

REP. HOVEY: Great. Thank you very much.

REP. CARUSO: Further questions? DebraLee, thank you very much for your time.

REP. HOVEY: Thank you very much.

REP. CARUSO: Next is Senator McKinney. Is he here? Next is Jim Neil, followed by Henry Jovanelly, and then finally Jan Murtha.

JIM NEIL: Good afternoon, Representative Caruso and Members of the GAE Committee. I'm Jim Neil from the Department of Administrative Services.

I'm here today to testify in support of three separate bills, H.B. 6666, H.B. 6667, and S.B. 1041.

First, H.B. 6666, AN ACT PROTECTING THE INTEGRITY OF THE PROCUREMENT PROCESS. We believe this bill is critical to our ability to effectively negotiate contracts on behalf of the state.

As many of you know, DAS and other agencies issue Requests for Proposals, or RFPs, when we're looking to enter into a contract for certain goods and services. Potential vendors then submit proposals in response to these RFPs.

Currently, there is no exemption under the Freedom of Information Act for procurement documents, so we're required to fully disclose all the details of each proposal to anyone who asks, even during negotiations.

This situation can greatly harm the state's ability to effectively negotiation contracts and get the best contract value for taxpayers.

As a quick example, imagine a company submits a proposal to an agency in response to an RFP and after the evaluation process the agency chooses that company to begin negotiations for the contract.

During that negotiation time, the company itself requests from the agency all of the other proposals that the state received.

The company could then receive during negotiations terms and pricing submitted by all of its competitors, a situation that certainly places the state in a considerable disadvantage during the negotiation.

Such requests have been made in the past to DAS. I'm be happy to elaborate at the end of my testimony if you so choose.

DAS strongly supports public access to agency documents. However, we believe it is reasonable to delay disclosure of documents until after negotiations cease in order to maintain the integrity of the procurement process.

We respectfully ask for you support of this important legislation.

H.B. 6667 is legislation that improves the contractor pre-qualification program that is administered by DAS.

As many of you know, this is a new program established by the Legislature in the 2003 session requiring contractors to be pre-qualified by the DAS for baseline experience and integrity before they can bid on state construction projects.

Since the program went into effect this past October, we are now identifying some minor modifications that would make the program run more efficiently and effectively.

REP. CARUSO: If you could just summarize.

JIM NEIL: To summarize, then there's one other issue on H.B. 6667 as well that I think is important to note, and that is that there is no enforcement provisions right now in the contractor pre-qualification law.

While awarding authorities, municipalities can simply contract with whoever they like and sort of skirt the law. We would like to close that loophole as well.

S.B. 1041 simply cleans up DAS statutes for some items that we no longer do, such as warehousing and so forth.

REP. CARUSO: Any questions of Jim? Jim, you have everything in written testimony.

JIM NEIL: Yes, Sir, I do. Yes.

REP. CARUSO: Make sure the clerk and the staff have it so we'll consider it when drafting.

JIM NEIL: Will do that.

REP. CARUSO: Thank you very much.

JIM NEIL: Thank you, Sir.

REP. CARUSO: Next, Henry Jovanelly. Is he here? After Henry will be Senator McKinney.

HENRY JOVANELLY: Good afternoon, Representative Caruso and Members of the GAE Committee. My name is Henry Jovanelly. I'm a Reimbursement Manager with the Department of Administrative Services, DAS.

And I'm here today to testify in support of S.B. 1043, AN ACT ESTABLISHING STATE CLAIM INTERCEPT PROCEDURES.

S.B. 1043 will improve the process by which DAS collects debts owed to the State of Connecticut, will make the process more fair, and we believe will greatly increase the amount of revenue that we are able to collect for the State of Connecticut, as Representative Currey also just testified.

By way of background, DAS has been statutorily charged with collecting certain debts that individuals owe to the state.

Generally speaking, these debts stem from un-reimbursed aid or care provided by the Departments of Social Services, Mental Health and Addiction Services, Child and Families, Mental Retardation, and Correction.

We are authorized to collect these debts by placing liens on such sources as inheritances, decedent estates, and causes of action.

S.B. 1043 relates to the process by which we collect debts from the money individuals receive through the cause of action.

Currently, the only way that we're able to identify and lien a cause of action is when we are notified by Connecticut courts that a lawsuit has been filed in their system.

To date, we have not been able to consistently identify and lien causes of action that are settled short of the judicial process.

This reality create an inconsistency in that only those who choose to pursue their claims in court must repay their debt to the state, while those who settle out of course avoid the debt-collection process.

S.B. 1043 fixes this problem and gives DAS a method to identify out-of-court settlement dollars received by those who own money to the state.

Specifically the proposal require insurance companies to check with DAS prior to paying a personal injury or worker's compensation claim over $5,000 to determine whether the claimant owes a collectable debt to the State of Connecticut.

I want to point out that S.B. 1043 does not in any way change DAS's authority regarding what we can and cannot collect. It merely changes the process by which we collect debts.

Thank you very much for the opportunity to testify today. And I would be happy to respond to any questions that the Committee might have.

REP. CARUSO: Further questions? Yes, Senator Freedman.

SEN. FREEDMAN: Do you have many debts outstanding from the people that you're working with?

HENRY JOVANELLY: Absolutely. The way the process works is people receive necessary care from the State of Connecticut and they are billed at that time only if they have an asset, money or insurance to pay for that.

That un-reimbursed care basically sits in the background. They still owe the money, and statutory language is already in place, but we do not actively pursue it unless there is an asset, a cause of action, an inheritance, etc. from which we could recover that money.

SEN. FREEDMAN: Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

REP. CARUSO: Thank you very much, Henry. [inaudible] Senator McKinney, followed by Jan Murtha [inaudible] good to see you, Senator.

SEN. MCKINNEY: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. For the record, John McKinney, State Senator from the 28^th District.

I want to appreciate and thank you for having a hearing on S.B. 665. This is actually my first time under your new schedule here and I applaud you for it. I think this works out very well for the public to go first and then public officials in the afternoon.

Very briefly, we have over the years changed the law regarding public officials appearing in what I would call public ad campaigns.

I think most recently we changed it to prohibit their appearance five months prior to their election. I think we should prohibit the practice of public officials altogether.

I apologize. The bill I submitted was more conceptual. I was speaking with Mr. Garfield. I would agree that it should also extend to municipal officials, mayors, first selectmen and the like.

The reality is, and no disrespect intended, but having our state's Governor appear in a tourism ad isn't going to increase tourism any more than just a tourism ad.

Having our Treasurer appear in an ad for the CHET Program isn't going to better educate people about CHET than a CHET ad would.

What it does do though is it uses public's money, quite frankly, to promote those individuals, which in the day and age where we're dealing with important ethical issues, that you're dealing with campaign finance reform issues, would be to the benefit in the hundreds of thousands of dollars spent on that individual's name identification.

I think we should stop the practice. Admittedly, with all of the difficult ethical and campaign finance reform issues you're dealing with, this falls lower down on the priority list.

But I think it's a positive step to make. I don't think it'll hurt us in any way. And I just think it sends the right message. And I thank you for your time.

REP. CARUSO: Thank you, John. Any questions of Senator McKinney? Thank you very much for your time, John. Appreciate it.

SEN. MCKINNEY: Thank you.

REP. CARUSO: Let's see. Jan Murtha. Is she here? And Jan, followed by you is going to be Keith Robbins.

JAN MURTHA: I'm just disappointed I'm not last. So are you. We always save me for the end. But anyway, here I am. You all know who I am, Jan Murtha, Registrar of voters in South Windsor.

And I couldn't help but ask to speak to you this afternoon after hearing some of the testimony this morning on the mark-sense machine and hope that I can answer some of your questions of the questions that were asked earlier.

And also, because many of you were not on this Committee when we in South Windsor did the first test vote back in November 8^th, 1994. It's been that long we've been trying to get new machines.

Anyway, we had a wonderful experience with the mark-sense machine. The voter liked it. We did an exit poll of which 1,232 people were kind enough to answer.

And of the 1,232 opinions, 951 were in favor of that particular machine and the change from the old machine that we use now to that machine.

One hundred and eighty-six were not. And most of those who were not were people who said we have something that works now, why change it.

And 95, we couldn't kind of make out which way they were. But those were the stats that came in.

We did have a recount that year, which proved to be very interesting, because, if you remember, some of you who might have been here then, that was when Senator LeBeau lost to Senator Rennie by six votes.

So obviously, the tension at the recount was incredible, with attorneys representing both factors and, in fact, I think it was Representative Farr that represented Senator Rennie at the time.

And they really were kind of all over us as to what was going to be counted and what was not.

The first district took us four hours to count, primarily because the attorney for Senator LeBeau insisted that if the whole bubble was not filled in, it had to be hand counted.

It actually worked out that on that first district it came out identical to the way the machine count was. So the next six districts we just plowed through in no time at all.

So we have had that experience. It worked very well. And it's nice to have that hard copy.

Some of the comments that came from the public were, gosh, I actually saw how I voted. And that meant a lot to them.

Because I can tell you, folks, from my own experience, and I'm sure you can too, how many times have you gone into our current machine and said, jeez, I forgot to vote the question, or, gosh, did I leave the pointer down.

So they could actually see what they did and they really liked the machine. And I think it's very, very important to have a hard copy.

I was going to take a little time to finish Richard's testimony that he didn't get a chance to, but you have it in writing. So if there are any questions, I'll be glad to answer them.

REP. CARUSO: Any questions? Jan, thank you very much.

JAN MURTHA: You're welcome. Hopefully it sheds some light.

REP. CARUSO: Our final speaker, Keith Robbins.

KEITH ROBBINS: Representative Caruso, Senator DeFronzo, I'm Keith Robbins, the First Selectman from Bozrah. Thank you for having me, Members of the Committee.

I'm here to speak in favor of S.B. 423, which deals with funding for capital expenditures to municipalities for the Help America Vote Act.

I spoke to this Committee against the mandated new voter technology, I was one of those people who said if it's not broken let's not worry about fixing it, a year or so ago. And the lever machines have been very good to me in Bozrah for these last three times.

However, that being said, one of the points against the technology that I had was the increased costs to cities and towns for maintenance and the purchase of new machines.

I am convinced that the funding stream will run short long before the needs of all cities and towns are met.

Similar to the promised special education funding from the federal government that is pitifully short compared to what was promised and the needs.

When the funding runs short, as is always the case with mandates, other services will need to be cut in order to fund the mandate, or, if the populous so desires, raise the property tax to continue level services.

I urge the Committee to support S.B. 423 and I also urge all members to support any legislation that defeats mandates to cities and towns that are unfunded.

REP. CARUSO: Any questions? Keith, thank you very much.

KEITH ROBBINS: Thank you. Have a nice afternoon.

REP. CARUSO: Just before we close this hearing, this coming Wednesday at 11:00, this Wednesday at 11:00 will be a meeting to raise bills, just to inform the Committee Members. We'll get more information out to you.

I want to thank everyone and close this public officials' hearing.