Florida Ballot Review Delayed

By: (AP) A media review of uncounted Florida ballots in the 2000 presidential election has been delayed indefinitely as a result of the recent terrorist attacks.

A group of news organizations, including The Associated Press, had planned to publish stories in late September based on a review of uncounted ballots in the race between George W. Bush and Al Gore.

But the attacks on Sept. 11 have consumed the efforts of computer data analysts, editors, and reporters at the participating news organizations.

"Once the events of that day unfolded, it was obvious none of us would be able to turn our attention to the ballot review for some time," Jonathan P. Wolman, AP vice president and executive editor, said Tuesday.

In addition to the AP, the group includes The New York Times, The Washington Post, CNN, The Palm Beach (Fla.) Post, the St. Petersburg (Fla.) Times, The Wall Street Journal, and Tribune Publishing, whose newspapers include the Chicago Tribune, Los Angeles Times, Newsday, Orlando Sentinel, and South Florida Sun-Sentinel.

"The problem is very simple. All the people we would have working on the project are working on the war," said Doyle McManus, Washington bureau chief for the Los Angeles Times.

The group hired the University of Chicago's National Opinion Research Center to review the 180,000 Florida ballots that didn't register a vote on machine counts.

Although NORC has finished compiling its database, the findings have not been made known to the news organizations. And those organizations haven't decided when they'll be able to return to the ballot project.

"Everyone's attention and everyone's resources shifted the moment those planes hit the World Trade Center," said Steven Goldstein, a vice president at Dow Jones & Co., parent company of The Wall Street Journal. "We've got other priorities right now."

The problem was compounded for the Journal when its staff was forced out of its New York headquarters in a building directly across the street from the World Trade Center.