Hawaii troops eligible
to cast votes on WebThe pilot program covers
personnel outside the mainland
More than 600 Hawaii Army National Guard and Army reservists serving in Iraq and Afghanistan have the opportunity be among the first servicemembers to vote via the Internet for president in November.
That is because Hawaii is one of seven states and 50 counties participating in a $22 million Pentagon project covering about 100,000 overseas voters.
Betty Stevenson, U.S. Army Pacific voter assistance program manager, said the pilot program covers servicemembers and their dependents who live outside the mainland. She said military personnel and their families living in Hawaii and Alaska are eligible to participate in this program.
Besides Hawaii, the other states participating are Arkansas, Florida, North Carolina, South Carolina, Utah and Washington. Stevenson cautioned that not all of the counties in the seven states are participating.
Dwayne Yoshina, the state's chief election officer, said that every county here is part of the experiment.
Yoshina said no state funds are involved and the federal government will provide the hardware and the software.
"We decided to participate because we have a large military contingent in the state of Hawaii and because there are several groups of reservists who have been activated," he said. "It's free for us, and it is a good opportunity."
Yoshina said the Hawaii Army National Guard, which will send 200 aviators and crewmembers of the 193rd Aviation to Iraq in March, already has requested a briefing.
Also interested is the Army Reserve, which will be deploying nearly 400 soldiers of the 411th Combat Engineer Battalion (Heavy) to Iraq two months from now. Both units will be in Iraq for a year.
"It will be good for our folks," said Brig. Gen. John Ma, Pacific Army Reserve commander.
Stevenson said this will be first time that Army soldiers in foreign locations will be able to vote by the Internet.
"In the past, they have been able to register and request an absentee ballot, but this the first time they can vote by the Internet," she said.
She said that a soldier here or overseas whose state and county are part of the system will be able to vote via any Windows-based computer.
The soldier will be required to have a digital signature, which will verify his or her identity and will help to ensure voter privacy and the security of the voting process.
Meg McLaughlin, president of Accenture eDemocracy Services, which is building the system, said a servicemember will use his or her current identification card to begin the registration process.
"The servicemember will be asked questions, which will be used later to verify their identity," McLaughlin said in a phone interview from the company's headquarters in Reston, Va.
Yoshina said he is trying to avoid confusion between the normal absentee paper ballot voting procedure and this special Internet system, which is open only to a limited number of participants.
This year, the primary election is on Sept. 18 and the general on Nov. 2. Applications for absentee ballots are accepted 60 days before any election and voters can apply up to seven days before the polls open.
To help Hawaii voters who live in foreign countries, the state has begun to accept applications for absentee ballots, but will not process them until 60 days before the election. Overseas ballots are mailed out 35 days before the polls open.
Despite an adverse minority report that the Pentagon Internet voting system is vulnerable to attacks, Yoshina said he has confidence in it.
"However, if it is going to be expanded, then it has to be upgraded," Yoshina said.
Four out of 10 security experts asked to study the Secure Electronic Registration and Voting Experiment, or SERVE, issued the report. The other six declined to comment.
The risks cited include the possibility that hackers can learn how a person voted, and possible problems with verifying if the vote recorded via the Internet is the same one cast by the voter.
McLaughlin said once a person has voted, he or she will be asked to confirm the vote and then be asked a second time.
She said the report "didn't raise anything new we didn't think of."
"The military voters are greatly disenfranchised," McLaughlin told the Star-Bulletin.
Studies have shown that 20 percent to 29 percent don't get a ballot or are unable to get their ballots to election officials on time, she said. Another 20 percent are just "discouraged" with the entire election process.
Yoshina said there will be other safeguards to prevent a person from voting twice -- via the Internet and a paper absentee ballot.
The Pentagon said the first test of the system will occur Feb. 3 at South Carolina's primary election. The Michigan Democratic Party is using an Internet system in this year's presidential caucuses on Feb. 7
Four years ago in Florida, ballots arrived from foreign countries that could be counted in the presidential election.
For more information on the Pentagon's voting system, visit the Web site www.serveusa.gov/public/aca.aspx .
The Associated Press contributed to this report.