Issue

Jack Killingsworth, DEM

Deborah Clark, REP (Incumbent)

Partisan Political Decisions

It should not be about politics, but many of Ms. Clark's decisions give an advantage to the Republican party.

1. Purging 20,000 mostly Democratic voters as upon the request of Katherine Harris in the year 2000.

2. Emphasizing Absentee Voting where Republicans had a 15,000 vote advantage in 2004, but cutting Early Voting where Democrats had a 3,000 vote advantage in 2004.

3.  Ms. Clark's allocation of election resources leads to long lines in working family precincts.

"It is not about politics" but when a politician says that it is not about politics we all know that it really is about politics.

Early Voting Sites

It is required by law to offer in-person early voting at the three SOE offices. It is allowed to offer early in-person voting at public libraries and city halls.  Starts 15 days before the election for 10 week days and 2 weekends.

Currently there are 210,457 voters per early voting site, the most of any county in the state.

Jack will add at least 11 other sites, public libraries and/or city halls.  This would reduce the number of voters per site to 45,098.

"Early Voting is not worth the cost"

The three required sites are not convenient to a majority of Pinellas citizens, especially to citizens in North County.   

Early Voting Hours

8 hours per week day and

8 hours per weekend

Weekdays -

11:00AM until 7:00PM

Saturday and Sunday -

Noon until 4:00PM

8:00AM until 4:00PM Monday through Saturday.

Great for the courthouse gang.

Not convenient for working families!

Voter Turn out

The research is clear.

1. Voting Convenience increases turn out.  Since 2004 more than 100,000 Pinellas voters have found it more convenient to vote early.

2. Voter confidence in the election process increases turn out.

1. Early voting does not increase turn out.

2.  Her record of election errors does not inspire confidence.

College Education

Bachelor of Electrical Engineering from Georgia Tech

Master of Business Administration from Florida Institute of Technology

None, but that does not disqualify her.  Experience would matter if she had demonstrated competent leadership. 

Candidate/public training classes on election law

Monthly during general election years and upon request.

Once, two weeks after close of qualification period

Experience

Over 40 years designing mission critical computers and managing computer systems where errors are not allowed.

See what the St. Petersburg Times had to say about her record on Jack's home page.

Outsourcing Vote Tabulation  

Not acceptable and not required by a competent SOE

"Pinellas Elections office needed eight private contractors for its electronic voting system. For the primary elect it was 13."  St Petersburg Times 11/09/2006. 

Election Errors

Both Human errors and machine errors can be avoided with well designed and peer reviewed processes, procedures, and oversight. Eliminating errors is cheaper than fixing them!

Human errors happen and we'll have to live with them.  Blames errors on voters, poll workers, staff, and the legislature.

Touch Screen Voting Machines

Jack believes that the optically scanned paper ballot is the best technology for Electronic Voting.  In the 2000 presidential election 42 of Florida's 67 counties were already successfully using optically scanned paper ballots. 

Ms. Clark still defends her $14 million purchase of unreliable, high maintenance, and untrustworthy Touch Screen machines.  The new optical scan machines for paper ballots cost less than $3 million.  She recently stated that the Touch Screen machines are a better way to vote.