OAKLAND, CALIFORNIA- On February 26 Alan Dechert, president of the Open Voting Consortium, spoke at the National Teach-In on Election Rigging and How to Fix It. He was among the many election reform activists to speak at the event which included Bob Fitrakis of the Ohio Free Press, Medea Benjamin of Global Exchange, John Giddeon of Voters Unite!, Jonathan Simon of Verified Vote, Bob Kibrick of Verified Voting, Jim March of Black Box Voting.org, and Kathy Dopp of US Count Votes (for a full program of the event see the Democratic Renewal website at www.democraticrenewal.us).
Alan Dechert spoke towards the end of the event as part of the Actions section. "From what I'm hearing at this event, you all want an open voting system," Dechert said to the crowd. "You don't want paperless electronic voting machines, you don't want proprietary software that you can't inspect and you don't want your voting system controlled by entrenched corporations. You want an open voting system that's publicly owned and runs on open source software and we're going to help bring that to you!"
OVC volunteers Laura Perkins, Patti McCarron, Tom Fordham and Director of Development Lara Shaffer gathered contact information from 90 new people who are interested in staying involved with the Open Voting Consortium- 30 of them who said they definitely want to sign up to be members.
Lara Shaffer also got the following people to officially endorse OVC in writing: Mandeep Gill (Citizens Act), John Giddeon (Voters Unite), Bob Kibrick (Legislative Analyst for Verified Voting.org), Greg Hewlett (Mainstreet Moms Operation Blue), Jim March (Member of the Board of Directors for Black Box Voting.org), Kathy Dopp (President of US Count Votes) and Allyson Washburn (US Count Votes). She also introduced the OVC system to Jonathan Simon (Verified Vote, exit poll analyst) who said, "I think it's a good system. I think it's great! The trick will be to get it implemented." She also talked briefly with Bob Fitrakis and Medea Benjamin and will work to get their endorsements tomorrow at the Teach-In in Los Angeles. Jim Borcus (OVC supporter) also spoke about OVC with Bev Harris at an event in San Diego today. Lara will be seeking her official endorsement tomorrow at the L.A. Teach-In.
Story also posted on website at: www.OpenVoting.org