County critics question their own tactics.
Every advocacy group goes through a period of self-doubt, questioning and internal dissent. For local election reform group Verified Voting New Mexico that time is now.
The group's soul-searching is the result of fallout from a failed December attempt to meet with Santa Fe County Clerk Valerie Espinoza to try to ***image1***dissuade her from purchasing 57 new Sequoia "Edge" touch-screen voting machines for disabled voters.
Following the failed meeting, some VVNM members lashed out at Espinoza for shirking her public duty [Outtakes, Dec. 7:
].
One prominent member of the group, Leland Lehrman, didn't. Lehrman sent a Dec. 30 e-mail urging a less confrontational approach and also suggested that Chief Deputy Clerk for Santa Fe County Denise Lamb, who has clashed with VVNM in the past, was actually a fair and knowledgeable figure who could be counted on to explain the nuances of a complicated issue. Lehrman tells SFR he felt VVNM misrepresented the views of disabled voters, whom the group claimed did not support the Sequoia machines (in fact, the New Mexico Commission for the Blind tested a Sequoia and two machines made by ES&S and liked all three).
"I was noticing the type of spin coming from the activist community that you would typically see from a politician, and to me that was wrong," Lehrman, who sits on the state's election reform task force, says. "We need to demonstrate a greater commitment to non-litigious, less confrontational modes of conflict resolution. This was a call for the activist community to improve itself."
An extensive e-mail debate followed Lehrman's e-mail. Charlie Strauss, a VVNM founder, says he liked that Lehrman was questioning the group's tactics and agreed no aspect of VVNM's work should be politically untouchable. But, he says, VVNM members have heard from disabled voters who didn't like the Sequoia and preferred ES&S' AutoMARK machine.
"I think his points needed to be taken in context," Strauss says. "Every side has a persuasive argument."
Strauss also disagrees with Lehrman's assessment of Denise Lamb as a potential ally.
"I can't agree with that," he says. "She has a lot of experience but is conditioned by that experience in ways that don't allow her to see the entire picture. I think she sees the public as a pain."
Lamb, who had no idea she was the subject of so much e-mail chatter, praises Lehrman for "his ability to think critically about these issues."
A hearing is scheduled for Jan. 18 to determine whether election reform group Voter Action's lawsuit against New Mexico Secretary of State Rebecca Vigil-Giron and a slew of local county clerks (including Espinoza) over the use of Sequoia machines will be dismissed. Earlier this month, Voter Action reached an agreement with Vigil-Giron to temporarily hold off on purchasing any more Sequoia machines.
