An article in the August 30 Vancouver Sun, Cities push province for electronic voting, says that three BC municipalities are trying to get the influential Union of BC Municipalities to endorse the idea of internet voting.
The UBCM should say "no" to this idea. So should Elections BC, the Federal government, and all provincial governments. We shouldn't accept any voting arrangement that doesn't provide paper ballots that can be counted in the presence of multiple election officials and scrutineers, and can, if necessary, be recounted.
Here's a better idea. We got an excellent turnout with the mail-in ballots used in the recent HST referendum. Oregon has been using mail-in ballots since 1998, and Washington State started using mail-in ballots last year. It has worked well for them; voter turnout has gone up, and the cost of conducting elections has gone down. Let's go with something that works, and can be trusted.
