I try and stay away from publishing rumors, but this one requires some airing. Over the last week or so, Democrats have been hearing that Secretary of State Rebecca Vigil Giron, who ended up the last elected official standing in the state's official pastime of Electoral Musical Chairs, may find her soft landing afterall.
As the rumor goes, Giron may be appointed to a national position involving election oversight (there aren't that many possibilities). The real kicker, however, is the possibility that Giron may decide to bounce before the end of her term, leaving the Governor in yet another awkward situation where he may have to select her replacement.
Giron was on the receiving end of criticism yesterday for her office's acceptance a contract with vendor , Office Automation Solutions Inc., in 2003 that failed to include penalties in the case of the company's failure to meet certain deadlines. According to the New Mexican's article yesterday,
"The contract ended in June of 2005, with the secretary's office paying half of the $120,000 contract price. The office entered into a second contract with the company that includes penalties for delays."
Secretary of State Rebecca Vigil-Giron said she hopes to have most of the reports available online by Monday night, although without a search function, the Albuquerque Journal reported in a copyright story in Sunday's editions.
Vigil-Giron blames the delay on inadequate funding. She said the $120,000 appropriation wasn't enough to start an online campaign finance reporting system from scratch.
"We were able to do what we did with the amount that was appropriated," she said. "For us to build an electronic interactive system, it will take us a lot longer to build. The vendor is actually building the system."
So is Becky saying that the Legislature is at fault for failing to appropriate sufficient funds to get the job done on time? I could see petulant legislators with holding funds for the system. I could also see a vendor saying something like, "well for that much we can put your reports on line, but you won't be able search them."
Regardless, New Mexico's been getting the short end of the stick lately when it comes to outside vendors. In the case of Accenture, which has pretty much packed up it's N.M. operation, New Mexico constituted the company's single most lucrative contract (relative to work performed). But it's the vendors who contracts allow them to charge large fees without providing quality services promised that leave the state in a lurch, and companies that provide election services are the worst because when things start heading south, the public is almost always the last to know...usually after the problem spun out of control.
Take for example the vendor contracted by the SOS to establish a statewide voter file, ES&S (Election Services & Systems). Last week ES&S burned up BradBlog.com, with reports from Indiana, West Virginia, Ohio, Nebraska, Pennsylvania and other states that use the companies election management software and hardware with reports from local news affiliates of one calamity after another:
THE BRAD BLOG: "BREAKING - ES&S MELTDOWN CONTINUES: Legal Actions ...The ES&S Meltdown around the country which The BRAD BLOG exclusively covered ... In Indiana, the a formal complaint has been filed today against ES&S by the ...
THE BRAD BLOG: "EXCLUSIVE - ES&S MELTDOWN: Texas SoS Office ...
EXCLUSIVE - ES&S MELTDOWN: Texas SoS Office Advises Election Officials to Create 'Emergency Paper Ballots' for Upcoming Elections! ...
THE BRAD BLOG: "INDIANA TV NEWS: ES&S Breaks State Law -- Again ...INDIANA TV NEWS: ES&S Breaks State Law -- Again! No Early Voting Ballots Provided, Just Electronic Touch-Screen Voting Machines that Don't Work ...
THE BRAD BLOG: "30% of ES&S Voting Machines Fail Recent Test in Ohio"
The Akron Beacon Journal announced today that ES&S has isolated the problem ... How many of the problems with ES&S machines in Texas on Tuesday are a result ...
THE BRAD BLOG: "ES&S MELTDOWN: More Problems Now Emerge in West ...On top of Brad's earlier report today on the ES&S meltdown in Texas, and loads of other states, we find out that still more problems with ES&S have been ...
THE BRAD BLOG: "ES&S Vote Machine Memory Card Failures Spread to ...
OH have discovered massive problems with memory cards on ES&S Electronic Voting ... ES&S, the largest voting machine provider in the country, attributed the ...
But we haven't had any problems here in New Mexico, right? Our voter file is working just perfectly, right? No voters missing from the rolls or present twice... right? I mean we haven't heard of any problems, so why shouldn't we believe the system to be in tip top shape? I mean, its not like we bought all ES&S voting machines, right?
Bottom line is that New Mexico should be watching closely what's going down across the nation with vendors whose products don't live up to their promises, or worse, fail entirely, throwing a cloak of electronic static over the legitimacy of our democratic process.
Technorati Tags: Congress, corruption, Elections, New Mexico
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