Electronic Voting For Local And Federal Government

Electronic voting is essential for diplomacy technology in both local and federal level government meetings. There are various electronic voting solutions for council chambers, legislative office buildings, and executive boardrooms. Using the electronic voting solution, participants can cast their vote on various agenda items, with the results to be shown to the public and archived immediately.

There are various features to consider when choosing the right electronic voting solution:

Reliability

When the resolution is up on the screen and the vote is in process, the participants are pressing Yay/Nay/Abstain all at the same time. The voting solution should recognize each input and confirm them, at a very fast speed, back to the device. The data processing method should be secured and robust. The other factor in the reliability of a system is redundancy on the system. Should any of the components fail, there is a back up in the system to replace automatically for continued operation without any interruptions.

Scalability

The voting solution should be modular and scalable. So the components are off-the-shelf and could be replaced, upgraded, and expanded when needed. Ordering custom designed solutions would limit us to only one vendor. There will be restrictions if any changes are needed in the room configuration, voting member addition, or service and repair.

Hardware vs. Software

Electronic voting solutions are either hardware based or PC/Software based. There are pros and cons for each solution. The hardware solutions are more robust and not dependent on the PC network and usually windows operating system, however the software based solutions are less expensive when there is an existing PC/laptop available per voting member.

Flexibility

For various applications, the voting solution should be adaptable and flexible depending on the requirements. We should be able to setup the pass rate and voting weight. The vote result can be shown in various formats depending on the meeting, agenda, and number of audience. The various formats available are bar chart, pie chart, summary, and individual votes.

Ballot vs. Nominative

Depending on the resolutions and application for the electronic voting solutions, there should be an option to cast the vote as either ballot or nominative. A ballot vote is similar to secret vote or anonymous; there will be no record of individual votes in the system. On the nominative vote, all the individual votes are being recorded. The vote result can be displayed for the public in a name list format. Also the system can print out the vote result based on the resolution number or the name of the voting member.

Security

The security is also an important feature. The vote results should be stored in secured database. During the vote, the latest voting solutions use an IC card per voting member as verification for the participant. The voting rights, voting weights, and all the personal information are recorded in the IC card for the voting process to be secure.

The most reliable electronic voting solutions are the ones that are hardware based within a private network, expandable, yet standard off the shelf.