City ready to launch new voting machines
Optical scanners to be used March 2

By Phil Santoro, Globe Staff, 2/5/2004

For more than a half-century, wheelchair users who arrived at a polling place in Everett to cast their votes were handed a 2-foot-long rod with a hook on one end. That's what they used to reach the top-most levers on the city's mechanical voting machines.

But by March 2, when residents vote in the presidential primary election, the old rods will become suitable for the Historical Commission. That's because all of Everett's 19,000-plus registered voters who show up to vote will use a new system to cast their ballots, one that makes it easier for both handicapped voters and election officials.

''It's quite a system," said City Clerk John Hanlon of the 20 desktop optical scanners (one for each of 18 precincts plus two backups) the city has purchased to replace the 112 hefty lever machines used since 1948. ''It will be a benefit for everyone."

Voters will be given paper ballots to mark with pencil and then feed into the scanners, which electronically tabulate the results. Tables with partitions will serve as the new voting booths. The machines will be demonstrated at the city's 10 polling places in the next few weeks, and Everett Community TV has produced a video that shows viewers how the system works.

Everett will spend $130,000 for the system, including the two-hour training sessions that are required of its 288 election wardens, clerks, inspectors, a dozen tellers who tally the votes, and five machine custodians who are responsible for maintaining them.

Most of the estimated $99,000 cost will be reimbursed with federal funds that were allocated by Congress in 2002 when it passed the Help America Vote Act. That's the measure lawmakers established in response to the ''hanging chads" controversy in Florida during the 2000 presidential election.

Massachusetts received $1.5 million in the federal funds to help cover the expenses of 18 communities, including Everett, which must replace lever machines with systems that provide equal access to all voters, according to Brian McNiff, spokesman for the secretary of state's office. Boston replaced its lever machines with a new system in time for last November's municipal elections, McNiff said.

''There's nothing more accurate than our old machines," said Hanlon, who has presided over the local election process for 15 years. ''We haven't had one problem with them in terms of counting. But things change. We would have never changed them without the [federal] funding."

Hanlon can attest to the accuracy of the old machines, not only as city clerk, the city's chief elections officer, but as a candidate who lost two close mayoral races, each by about 300 votes, in the past three years. Though he asked for recounts in both races as a matter of formality, he knew the results would not change significantly. He expects the new machines to be just as accurate.

In addition to its benefits for handicapped voters, there are other advantages to the new voting system. For example, Hanlon and his employees will no longer have to transport the bulky, 820-pound lever machines, which are essentially individual voting booths with a metal voting board and a curtain that can surround the voter. Though these ''automatic voting machines" were set on cast iron wheels, ''you really had to put your back into it," Hanlon said.

The optical scanners can be wheeled around on carts. ''It's nice and easy," Hanlon said.

Also, the new system will eliminate late nights for election workers. The optical scanners can provide election results by about 9:30 p.m., 90 minutes after the polls close, improving on the typical 11 p.m. time.

The system also provides more privacy, according to Hanlon. Under the old system, in a party primary election voters were directed to either a Democrat or Republican voting booth or were handed paper ballots to vote in other parties. With the new system, voters are handed a ballot of the party of their choice, making it impossible for an observer to know in which party a person was voting.

''The only problem with these new systems," said Hanlon, ''is, like everything else with electronics, they're obsolete the day you put them in. Something new and better will come along tomorrow. We'll be replacing these in another 10 to 15 years."

When they can take their place alongside the rods.
© Copyright 2004 Globe Newspaper Company.