New York State / Department of Justice
Lawsuit Update, April 21

A submittal by the Department of Justice in response to New York State's proposed plan for HAVA compliance was due to be submitted on April 20. Instead, the DOJ submitted a request for an extension [click here for ~88kb PDF] until Friday, April 28 to submit their response. The Court is expected to grant this extension.

On April 10, the New York State Board of Elections submitted a proposed plan to the Court which would keep NY's lever machines in use for the 2006 elections, and require a ballot marking or vote by phone accessible voting system to be placed in one or more locations in each county. The Court called for the DOJ to respond to the State's plan by April 20, 2006.

The NYS Board also submitted to the Court the results of the county responses [click here for ~395kb PDF] to their plans for implementing the proposed state plan. Most counties indicate that they will purchase only a single accessible device per county, the minimum required by the State's plan. Even New York City proposes to have only 20 to 30 accessible voting devices in separate locations throughout the city, rather than one device per polling place as called for by HAVA. If the counties plans are accepted by the DOJ as is, there would be less than 500 accessible ballot marking or vote-by-phone systems in the entire State of New York for the 2006 election.

It is unclear whether the DOJ will accept the state proposal, or be content with the counties plan to place only a single accessible device at a central location in each county.

-Bo Lipari