Sudbury woman worries about integrity of election after getting two voter cards

Kelly Perry is happy to be able to vote from the comfort of her home in Sudbury’s municipal elections. But she was surprised when two voter information letters – each with a different PIN for voting online – arrived in the mail.

« One was addressed to Kelly Levesque, which is my maiden name, and the other was addressed to Kelly Perry, which is my married name. So I was a bit surprised to realize that I could vote twice, » Perry said.

Sudbury is one of five northeastern Ontario municipalities offering online voting for Monday’s election. In Sudbury, voting has already been underway since October 14.

Perry has yet to vote and will only vote once, but said it was « incredibly concerning » that mistakes like this could affect the integrity of the election.

Electoral fraud “very rare”, according to the city clerk

The City of Greater Sudbury said in a statement that issues with omissions, duplicate or incorrect voter information « are common and historic issues encountered in every election, » adding that a fraudulent or duplicate vote could result in a $25,000 fine or six months in jail. .

The city added that online and paper-based voting systems « have a verifiable audit trail and built-in mechanisms to flag whether a voter has voted more than once or voted incorrectly. »

CBC requested an interview with the city clerk to learn more about this system, but he was not available.

In an interview with Radio Canada earlier this week, Eric Labelle said that in every election there are usually one or two issues reported to the police for investigation, but fraud is « very rare ».

The city’s online voting page says any duplicate voting cards should be discarded or returned.

Perry said she was still in favor of online voting because of the accessibility it provides and the potential to boost turnout, but said her confidence in the election results may now be slightly diminished. .

« I think we’re Canadians and we generally follow the rules, and I think everyone will be well-intentioned by doing that, but it certainly raises questions about the integrity of the election. And I don’t think it there’s room for that in our democracy. . I think we have to have a very, very strong assurance that a person has a vote, » she said.