[Massachusetts-NFB] a view supporting H3577

Sat Sep 30 04:20:18 UTC 2023

Hi Al and everyone,

There are other states that allow everyone to use the electronic ballot marking devices. When I lived in Hawaii and Pennsylvania, the default was that everyone used a machine to mark their ballots. You could ask for a paper ballot if you wanted, but the default for everyone was voting on a machine. It wasn’t a problem. Lots of people used it for all the reasons mentioned in the testimony we submitted. People in Hawaii and Pennsylvania were smart enough to figure out how to vote on a machine. Even a Yankees fan would be able to handle it. I’m sure a lot of Massachusetts voters could handle it, too.

I remember being a sighted kid in the Sturbridge area and going into the voting booth with my mom. I remember watching her push the levers next to the names of each candidate that she wanted to vote for. At the end of making all of her selections, she pulled a big lever that submitted the voting information, reset all the little levers, and opened the curtain back up. There was never a paper ballot in that process, at least as I recall it. Those votes still counted, and there was no paper ballot. She could have chosen to fill out a paper ballot, but she chose the machine. I am not aware of a way that those machines would have been made accessible to a blind person short of someone going into the booth with you, reading you the names and talking through the votes with you. That takes away the private and independent concepts that we can celebrate with the accessible ballot marking devices today. Why did I share this story? Because sighted voters been using voting machines for a very long time. In places that make it obvious to the sighted people that this option is intended for them, too, not just for blind people, lots of them choose to actually use it, and they don’t have a problem with it.

Once lots of nondisabled people are voting on the same machine that disabled voters use, then we will all be in the same boat, and we won’t be treated differently. Separate-but-equal doesn’t actually work, and we have been against separate-but-equal in the NFB since at least the 1950s.

Have a good weekend,

Justin

Justin Salisbury (he/him)
2117 Chestnut Hill Ave
Athol, MA 01331
Phone: 808.797.8606
Email: President at Alumni.ECU.edu<mailto:President at Alumni.ECU.edu>

From: Massachusetts-NFB <massachusetts-nfb-bounces at nfbnet.org> On Behalf Of Al and Masha Sten-Clanton via Massachusetts-NFB
Sent: Friday, September 29, 2023 2:07 PM
To: NFB of Massachusetts E-mail List <massachusetts-nfb at nfbnet.org>
Cc: Al and Masha Sten-Clanton <sweeties2 at verizon.net>
Subject: Re: [Massachusetts-NFB] a view supporting H3577

Well, you seem much more certain about who will or won't use the machines if they're available than I am of mine.  What I suppose is that even if only a few other people use them, we'll have some metaphorical trees to hide behind.  If these things have touchscreens, as I understand some do 9to go along with the keys that folks like me need), they probably wouldn't be all that daunting.

Now, I don't claim to know what would happen, but I doubt anybody else does, either.

Best!

Al

On 9/29/23 12:47, Jeanette Kutash via Massachusetts-NFB wrote:
There is no value in the extra expense of more machines because quite frankly people who don’t think they have the need to use them won’t and it would be a waste of money. While I want as much autonomy as possible, unless you demand that all sighted people type, you will never bridge the gap with write-in ballots. Quite frankly  I don’t think people are looking that closely at the ballots to see whose response looks typed versus which response is hand-written and if the hand written one is not readable it won’t be counted anyway.

For sighted people with no vision issues our machines are pretty daunting and while we can encourage people to use them, I think the likelihood that they will is slim to none.

I am with Justin here: people will start using the machines  more as their vision deteriorates if they have  no other way of voting but often as not they will get around that by having someone help them vote or by doing absentee ballots.

I say let’s get it as close as possible to get it done but not to get into an analysis paralysis situation. At that point nothing gets accfomplished and I am more in favor of getting the job done.

Jeanette

From: Massachusetts-NFB [mailto:massachusetts-nfb-bounces at nfbnet.org] On Behalf Of Mary via Massachusetts-NFB
Sent: Friday, September 29, 2023 11:11 AM
To: 'Justin Salisbury'; 'NFB of Massachusetts E-mail List'
Cc: Mary
Subject: Re: [Massachusetts-NFB] a view supporting H3577

I wrote back to Justin’s message last night, but it doesn’t seem to have made it to this list.  I hope this message does.  I apologize, Justin, if you see this twice, or if it did reach this list but somehow didn’t make it to our e-mail here.

Al

COPIED MESSAGE:
Greetings!

Justin asks a fair question:

Al, if you really want to have uniform ballots, do you have a plan in mind for how we are going to make those ballots truly uniform? When people add the names of write-in candidates, how is that going to become uniform between those who marked the ballot with a device and those who Input the candidate’s name in their handwriting?

My answer is that I can live with the differences, which will be less and less frequent if more people find the machines worth using.  If people are indeed being “invited” to join us in using those machines, and not in some way being forced to do it, I’d expect that change will be gradual anyway.

I think Resolution 2019-05 referred to a bill then in the Senate that would restrict use of voting machines to people with disabilities.  I have not heard that this became law, so I don’t know what the state of Federal or Massachusetts law is on the point.  If making those machines available to all voters requires changing the law, and if we can get more of them, then I’d happily support that:  not only is that in line with NFB policy, but it makes good sense generally to me.  I’d guess that can be added to H3577, but it also can be a separate bill and is not to me a reason to oppose H3577.

Best!
Al

From: Justin Salisbury <PRESIDENT at alumni.ecu.edu><mailto:PRESIDENT at alumni.ecu.edu>
Sent: Thursday, September 28, 2023 7:12 PM
To: NFB of Massachusetts E-mail List <massachusetts-nfb at nfbnet.org><mailto:massachusetts-nfb at nfbnet.org>
Cc: Al and Masha Sten-Clanton <sweeties2 at verizon.net><mailto:sweeties2 at verizon.net>
Subject: Re: [Massachusetts-NFB] a view supporting H3577

Good evening!

Clearly, some time and effort went into that email, and I am grateful for the willingness of our members to put in that time and effort.

Al, if you really want to have uniform ballots, do you have a plan in mind for how we are going to make those ballots truly uniform? When people add the names of write-in candidates, how is that going to become uniform between those who marked the ballot with a device and those who Input the candidate’s name in their handwriting?

I cannot figure out how we are supposed to make ballots look exactly the same.

What we have managed to do in other states is allow and invite sighted people and otherwise non-disabled people to join us in using the ballot marking device. Then, it’s not only us using it.

When something is only the domain of a marginalized group, it is maintained less effectively than something that is the domain of all.

Thank you for your contribution to this very important discourse.

Justin

Sent from my iPhone

Justin Mark Hideaki Salisbury

Mobile: 808.797.8606
Email: 808salisbury at gmail.com<mailto:808salisbury at gmail.com>
ResearchGate: https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Justin_Salisbury
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/justin-salisbury

“In the End, we will remember not the words of our enemies, but the silence of our friends.”

Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

On Sep 28, 2023, at 1:01 PM, Al and Masha Sten-Clanton via Massachusetts-NFB <massachusetts-nfb at nfbnet.org<mailto:massachusetts-nfb at nfbnet.org>> wrote:
Greetings!

Given that we are testifying on H3577 as individuals, I wrote in support of the Bill last Tuesday.  I believe it aligns with NFB policy, though it doesn't go as far as some of us thing it should.

H3577 would require a uniform ballot.This doesn't eliminate the differences between the hand-marked and machine-marked ballots, but it does go some way in reducing the separateness of our ballots and should make it less likely that somebody looking at ballots will know ours from those of our sighted peers.    If there are more machines available and more voters are persuaded to use them, and if they actually work well, then I think our privacy, our anonymity, will be secured.

I doubt that we need to make machines the primary way to vote in order to have our privacy.  Resolution 2019-05 does call for that, and if it happens by way of persuasion, then that will be great. Having more  such machines and more voters using them won't guarantee that poll workers will know how to help us blind folks use them, since we will need the headphones that sometimes go missing and the speech output that other voters won't need. Still, it should help us vote without trouble at the polls most of the time.  I also suspect that many if not most voters will usually want to mark their ballots by hand, if only to avoid dealing with a machine.  I would myself if I could.  If I'm wrong about most voters, so be it:  I've certainly done no survey to find out.

What I don't want is for most people to vote using regular ballots and us to vote using machines that spit out bar or QR code receipts.  That's the very opposite of uniform.  I believe that this is why H3577 contains the language concerning these things. If all voters used machines that produced these code, we'd have uniformity, but I seriously doubt that most voters would like paper ballots they can proofread with their eyes to be replaced by paper receipts with cryptic codes they can't read.  Now, I've never read a ballot of mine after voting, and certainly could not have read the paper ballots created by my online votes.  (I've read that you can proofread your ballot with the current Automark machines, but I didn't know that until last week.) Still, I have no interest in denying my sighted peers the ability to check directly with their eyes the paper ballots on which they have voted.  I have read Resolution 2019-05 several times, and it has no reference to bar or QR codes, so I see nothing in my view on this that is out of line with our policy--at least as set forth in that resolution.

I note that if I'm wrong about these codes, somebody who knows better should feel free to correct me.  I stress that I have no idea whether they'd cause security problems or not, only that receipts containing these codes would not be readable in the way a normal ballot now is.

Justin makes a good point about market competition, but I think that point applies only if you want what's on offer.  I hope there are several voting machine companies whose devices handle regular, uniform paper ballots.  Unless somebody can show me the error of my ways, however, I do not want Massachusetts to buy as its choice of machine one that, if I understand correctly, substitutes receipts with codes on them for ballots.  I'm very glad that Democracy Live has enabled me to vote from the privacy of my home, but I have no wish to give it any special political advantage: that's often a good way to raise prices and lower quality.  I just want a certain quality of voting machine.

Incidentally, for over twenty years I've been annoyed repeatedly with the emphasis many people have put on paper ballots.  I'd hoped that we could all vote online if we wanted, and that the electronic votes cast could be counted almost instantly.  I still hope that can happen, but it hasn't and may never happen.  Indeed, in the midst of the conspiracy storms about voting machines, paper ballots may be necessary.  If this is true, then those ballots should be easily readable by those who cast them.

Finally, I do not see the issue here as "separate but equal," at least, not primarily.  Rather, as I said earlier, it's about our privacy, about the anonymity that makes that privacy possible. I've voted twice online, and that system is to some degree "separate," and, I hope, equal:  in order to use the system, I needed to say that my reason was a disability.  I'd be happier if I didn't have to do that, but unless that information goes to those counting the votes, the system should give me the secret ballot I claim a right to.  It certainly draws a lot less attention to me than using a voting machine at a polling place does.  Also, since others do vote online, we blind people can hide among them.

In closing, I hope people who plan to send in testimony on H3577 will consider what I have written and then testify as they think best.  I hope this piece of writing does the job I intend for it.

Best!

Al

On 9/27/23 16:45, Justin Salisbury via Massachusetts-NFB wrote:
Fellow Federationists:

After extensive deliberation within the affiliate, we finally have an approach to signing on to the full testimony in opposition to H-3577. We still have a few more hours to submit testimony. I plan to submit at the end of the night. This bill that will perpetuate a separate-but-equal approach to voting for blind people in Massachusetts under the guise of supposedly doing good things that the bill actually would not do. This testimony will not be a unified affiliate testimony. It will be a bunch of individuals who have decided that NFB policy is something that they support.

Here's the plan:
If you read the attached document with a draft testimony, and if you like it, reply to this email or send me a fresh email or text message to tell me your name, any letters that go with your name, like PhD, and the town in Massachusetts where you live. This way, the names signed at the end of the testimony will be specifically only those people who reached out to say they wanted to sign on. It will be like a petition.

At the end of the testimony, it will look like this:

Sincerely,

Justin Salisbury, MEd, NOMC, NCRTB; Athol, MA
John Doe, MBA; Springfield, MA
Barack Obama, Esq.; Cambridge, MA
Jill Biden, EdD; New Bedford, MA
Elizabeth Warren, Esq.; Cambridge, MA
Giles Corey; Salem, MA
Nomar Garciaparra; Boston, MA
etc.

I hope you'll be willing to sign on as individuals.

Thank you,

Justin

Justin MH Salisbury, MEd, NOMC, NCRTB
English Pronouns: he/him/his
Phone: 808.797.8606
Email: President at Alumni.ECU.edu<mailto:President at Alumni.ECU.edu>

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