Conflicts of Interest between disability and election vendor communities

This is from an editorial in the New York Times from 11 June 2004 entitled, "The Disability Lobby and Voting". I had been discussing with a colleague why we couldn't bridge the gap between the verified voting and disability rights communities... well, this definitely complicates that.

The National Federation of the Blind, for instance, has been championing controversial voting machines that do not provide a paper trail. It has attested not only to the machines' accessibility, but also to their security and accuracy -- neither of which is within the federation's areas of expertise. What's even more troubling is that the group has accepted a $1 million gift for a new training institute from Diebold, the machines' manufacturer, which put the testimonial on its Web site. The federation stands by its ''complete confidence'' in Diebold even though several recent studies have raised serious doubts about the company, and California has banned more than 14,000 Diebold machines from being used this November because of doubts about their reliability.

[...]

Some supporters of voter-verifiable paper trails question whether disability-rights groups have gotten too close to voting machine manufacturers. Besides the donation by Diebold to the National Federation of the Blind, there have been other gifts. According to Mr. Dickson, the American Association of People with Disabilities has received $26,000 from voting machine companies this year.

Update [2004-07-14 06:54:31]: In a post to a voting list, Amanda Lang (via Jody Holder) pointed out that this year's Fall conference by the Election Center will be heavily bankrolled by election systems vendors. Take a look at this schedule of events (DOC) and note the sponsors. Diebold, Sequoia and ES&S are all sponsoring their own events for elections officials from monuments-by-night tours to cruises on the Potomac. (I've saved copies of these documents so that, if they change, I'll have the originals)