Dear Voter,

Over the past decade we have seen our voting system come under political attack to the point that it would be unrecognizable to our founding fathers.  It’s time to stop and ask ourselves, what have we done to our election system?  According to media reports we’ve sued it, abused it, threatened it, stole it, manipulated it, polarized it and politicized it. Is this any way to treat the basis of our democracy?  We read the headlines.  Groups are accused of trying to cheat to gain an advantage.  If a chosen candidate doesn’t win, then sue the other candidate.  Is this where all our elections are headed, to the courts?  It’s time to stop, take a deep breath and step back to take a hard look at the root cause of our voting debate.

If you take the time to time to analyze it, the problem can be described in three words – lack of trust.  Lack of trust where?  Basically in two areas, lack of trust in those who conduct our elections and secondly, lack of trust in technology.

Let’s look at the trust issue with regard to those who run our elections.  The individuals who serve us when we vote are our neighbors and friends.  They start their day at 5:00 in the morning and end it after 8:00 that evening.  They work long hours for meager pay.  They are there because they believe in the process.  I know, I am proud to say that I was a poll worker for several years.  These individuals deserve our respect and admiration.

After the votes leave the polling place, they go up to the next step in the election ladder, to one of eight-eight County Board of Elections.  Over the past few years this group has been much maligned.  They have had to deal with conflicting directives, court orders, as well as having to implement new voting procedures that they are sometimes ill equipped to provide.  Let me make this point very clear.  The eighty-eight County Board of Elections and their employees are an asset, not an obstruction.  County Board of Elections should be listened to, not dictated to.  They are government’s link to the voter and should be treated with respect.  As your Secretary of State they will be treated with that respect.

Let’s move on to the second area of concern, voting technology.  If you are one of those looking for the perfect voting system, you are not going to find it.  It does not exist.  Experts admit there is no perfect voting technology.  That being said, however, those companies in this field of voting technology have developed innovative and practical ways for us to cast our votes on election day.  Trying to prove that each of these systems isn’t perfect isn’t going to get us anywhere.  There are those who find a fatal flaw in all technology, but then again there are those among us who still believe that the earth is flat.  Reasonable doubts should be addressed but there is no room for paranoia in our voting process. Election technology is only as reliable as the individuals who run it.  Ohio has the great fortune to have capable and experienced people serving in a bipartisan program running our elections.

What we have lost is trust.  What we need to regain is trust.  The politicization of the Secretary of State’s Office over the past years has destroyed that trust.  I am asking for your support in my run for Secretary of State.  If you grant me this honor, I will get our election process off the front page and out of the courts.  I will restore the trust.

                                                                                                                                         Sandy O’Brien