When Senate Bill 43 was signed into law on April 12, 2021, it triggered forensic audits of the Windham ballots and machines that were used in the November 2020, general election. It also triggered a 45-day clock that mandates a deadline for the audit to be completed.
An audit that is necessary to determine the cause of the “Windham Incident” – where 1,363 election day votes were changed after a hand recount of the State Rep race nine days later. No one knows the cause of the discrepancy… and that has been troubling and unacceptable.
Related: What The Heck Happened In Windham’s November Election? (Part 1, Part 2, Part 3)
What was more unacceptable was the secret process the Windham Board of Selectmen had initially defined for selecting the forensic analysts to perform the forensic audits.
Related: DISTURBING: Windham Officials to Choose “Windham Incident” FORENSIC AUDITOR in SECRET!
The Selectman met Monday evening and implemented phase one of their four-part plan. They interviewed every applicant who expressed interest in being chosen, with three candidates (IMHO) standing out as being worthy of consideration; Andrew Appel, Allied Security Operations Group, and Cyber Ninjas.
Each of those three analyst/teams made credible presentations, but that was not the real story of the evening.
The big news was released at the beginning of the meeting. Chairman Ross McLeod announced the Selectmen had decided it was more appropriate to forego their non-public (secret) meeting and choose their forensic analyst in public view at next Monday’s meeting.
That decision was triggered by a considerable amount of public input and addressed concerns that the process should be transparent to reflect legislative intent.
The massive number of emails that were received by Town Hall represented the enormous displeasure of the public.
The important message to take away from this story is that the Selectmen listened. Many thanks are due to Chairman McLeod for quickly turning a negative situation into a positive one. That’s how our representative government is supposed to work.
Please consider sending an email to the Selectmen to express your appreciation. You can reach all of them with this one email address: BOS@WindhamNH.gov.
