I found new connections/evidence in Ohio

[kuozzman]

This stuff can't be a coincidence.
On my website:
http://ignorantusa.tripod.com/

[sunnystarr]

1. Great catch! If we keep investigating maybe we can

connect all the dots and identify all the players.

[Harlequin]

2. could somebody please distill that stuff into a few sentences... brain fry

[kuozzman]

5. How about I cut it in half?

It seems like eGovNet, which has direct ties to the key players in Ohio politics/Bush Campaign 2004 and also have only a few dozen employees and have at least 1,000,000 Ohio residents in their database (and also has the Florida House of Representatives as a client!) is involved with something fishy.

Jonathan Allison replaced Brian Hicks as Gov. Bob Taft's Chief of Staff in Aug. of 2003. Allison worked previously for Taft as legislative and communications director during most of Taft's second term as secretary of state, which ended in 1998. Allison also ran a government and public affairs consulting firm and worked for a Columbus-based Internet company specializing in products for government.

The name of the company is eGovNet http://www.egovnet.com/

Thread about Hicks/Taft:
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=203&topic_id=235940&mesg_id=235940


In February 2004, eGovNet became part of cboss Government Services, a division of cboss, Inc.

cboss developed and maintains the State of Ohio's Online License Plate system. By the end of 2004, the site will have processed over 1,000,000 transactions and $70,000,000 in revenue. (Citizen information)


E-government solutions by cboss include Cuyahoga County Ohio and numerous county and municipal agencies, twelve Boards of Election in Ohio and Pennsylvania, Florida Department of Business and Professional Regulation; the Florida House of Representatives.

The firm uses the programming languages XML and Java to develop software that can run on several operating systems, allowing users to update and move data stored on legacy systems to Internet-based applications.

[chorti]

3. Meet the Zerbonia family

The same outfit also works on electronic election results in Rhode Island - funny - the Rhode Island results seemed way out of whack to me in favor of Bush.

I posted this about cboss on November 16.

<http://www.indybay.org/news/2004/11/1705577.php>

Universe Central Corporation helps counties put their election results online live at http://www.electionohio.com. They (http://www.universecentral.com) did this for nine Ohio counties, including four in the more populous northeast - Geauga, Mahoning, Trumbull, and Portage. These four especially seem a little suspicious to me because they all showed movement toward Bush and pretty big movement (except for Geauga). Yet neighboring counties like Cuyahoga, Summit and Stark moved toward Kerry and Lake and Ashtabula saw basically no movement either way. See my full article on Ohio county statistical anomalies at:

http://www.indybay.org/news/2004/11/1704769.php

What does it mean to put election results live on a website? Well, it means that his company had access to the election results of these 9 counties before they became official and before they became public. He had to because he was publishing the results live as more and more precinct results came in on Nov. 2.

Universe Central Corporation is also known as CBOSS. In 2000 they published the elections results live for Rhode Island and most of the same counties in Ohio and Lawrence, Pennsylvania. They have run the Mahoning Health Dep. website since 2000 and the whole county's website (since when?). They also recently (when?) re-did the website for the Mahoning Tourism and Convention Bureau.

The owner of this company is Ralph Zerbonia. In October 2003 he made a $2000 contribution to 'Bush/Cheney 04'. See: http://www.city-data.com/elec/elec-POLAND-OH.html. It could mean that he may have been trying to buy access. But wouldn't a contribution to the local parties rather than a national campaign give you more access if you are a software firm trying to get into the county government market? Could it have been a quid-pro-quo? I.e. "You give $2000 to Bush and we'll give you this contract." It would be interesting to find the dates when the contracts were signed between his firm and Mahoning County and the Convention Bureau.

Contribution:

ZERBONIA, RALPH R. MR. (UNIVERSE CENTRAL CORPORATION/MANAGE), (Zip code: 44514) $2000 to BUSH-CHENEY '04 (PRIMARY) INC. on 10/29/03

But I also found these contributions:

Zerbonia, Ralph (Universe Central Corporation/CEO), (Zip code: 44514) $1000 to TIM RYAN FOR CONGRESS on 03/31/03

Zerbonia, Bonnie (Youngstown Clerk of Courts/Adm Assi), (Zip code: 44514) $500 to TIM RYAN FOR CONGRESS on 09/24/03

Zerbonia, Bonnie (Youngstown Clerk of Courts/Adm Assi), (Zip code: 44514) $500 to TIM RYAN FOR CONGRESS on 09/24/03 (twice on that day)

Well, Tim Ryan is a Democrat from Ohio's 17 Cong. District, who was running for re-election and won with 77% of the vote. Why would Zerbonia and, most likely, a family member (Bonnie), make contributions to Ryan, a local Democrat, in March and September, 2003, and then a contribution to Bush-Cheney for the maximum of $2000 in October 2003?

On the one hand, if he contributed to Ryan it may show that he is not an ideologue and not a likely source for fraud. But then again it should be investigated - his company had access to the election results before they became official.

[chorti]

4. his wife is Admin Asst to Mahoning Clerk of Courts

[eowyn_of_rohan]

6. I find this extremely interesting

in large part because it seems Wisconsin (where I live) has also hired cboss. Wisconsin was also one of the few states to contract with Accenture to develop a statewide voting list. The deal was being made this fall while we were distracted by the election (though "finalized" more recently amidst a LOT of protest)... This is not the only deal that was shuffled through while we were distracted. In October and November of 2001, Wisconsin elections board shuffled in ES&S and Sequoia voting equipment, and this year, when I tried to find out what brand of equipment we used,it was VERY difficult to tell, because the info is not made public on the Elections board website...I read earlier today on a link from one of the threads that 5 states (I believe) had been BRIBED by ES&S and Sequoia.

[mulethree]

7. Implication?

A corporation that provides services to governments is politically connected. That seems to sum it up.

I suppose there must be 50+ such corporations around the country.

I'm sure its not a coincidence, there are probably kickbacks, under-the-table info on how much to bid to win a contract, companies telling contract/spec writers what needs to be added or deleted to disadvantage their competition. Seems pretty common in politics and business.

But is there more to it than getting a business more contracts and juicier ones?