Secretary Griswold and County Clerks should publish the actual probabilities that the RLA will miss an incorrect outcome for every contest in Colorado.
Agreed, signature verification is not reliable, which is why we need in-person voting with a valid picture ID. Larimer County no longer uses machines to confirm signatures on ballot envelopes, it is all done by election judges. The first review is conducted by Level I signature verification judges, who accept about 90% of all signatures. This is the only election judge position in Colorado that is a solo judge and not a bi-partisan pair. The 10% of signatures not accepted by Level I judges are reviewed by Level II signature verification judges, a bi-partisan pair of judges, who have access to many other reference signatures. They usually accept 90% of the signatures they review. Having served as a Level I signature verification judge in 2 elections, I can assure you that our training is not sufficient to detect even bad forgeries and as an election watcher I have observed considerable variation in Level I judge acceptance rates. I heard first hand accounts from friends who intentionally altered their signatures on the ballot envelopes to see if they would be accepted, and most were accepted.
Thanks for an illustrative article on the RLA. The elephant in the room, in my opinion, as an experienced elections observer in two states, is that there is no visibility in seeing what the scanner's signature acceptance is.
Put another way, there is no way for an observer, judge or Political party, to ascertain the validity of the signatures that were accepted and not seen by signature verification judges.
From my experience, the signatures that make it to the judges for adjudication are somewhat different to grossly different from the latest exemplar of the voter's signature. What about the signatures that were different, but accepted by the scanner.
Is this why we have a "gold standard" for elections accuracy? I wonder...
There is a sensitivity setting to signature acceptance by the scanner. There is no visibility into this setting.
Agreed, signature verification is not reliable, which is why we need in-person voting with a valid picture ID. Larimer County no longer uses machines to confirm signatures on ballot envelopes, it is all done by election judges. The first review is conducted by Level I signature verification judges, who accept about 90% of all signatures. This is the only election judge position in Colorado that is a solo judge and not a bi-partisan pair. The 10% of signatures not accepted by Level I judges are reviewed by Level II signature verification judges, a bi-partisan pair of judges, who have access to many other reference signatures. They usually accept 90% of the signatures they review. Having served as a Level I signature verification judge in 2 elections, I can assure you that our training is not sufficient to detect even bad forgeries and as an election watcher I have observed considerable variation in Level I judge acceptance rates. I heard first hand accounts from friends who intentionally altered their signatures on the ballot envelopes to see if they would be accepted, and most were accepted.
Thanks for an illustrative article on the RLA. The elephant in the room, in my opinion, as an experienced elections observer in two states, is that there is no visibility in seeing what the scanner's signature acceptance is.
Put another way, there is no way for an observer, judge or Political party, to ascertain the validity of the signatures that were accepted and not seen by signature verification judges.
From my experience, the signatures that make it to the judges for adjudication are somewhat different to grossly different from the latest exemplar of the voter's signature. What about the signatures that were different, but accepted by the scanner.
Is this why we have a "gold standard" for elections accuracy? I wonder...