County to choose voting system
Three companies ed as eligible vendors

By LACHELLE SEYMOUR
Advocate Reporter

NEWARK On Monday, Secretary of State J. Kenneth Blackwell's office announced that Ohio counties may upgrade to electronic voting systems with three companies.

Licking County's first choice, Sequoia Voting Systems, of Oakland, Calif., was not one of them.

Diebold Election Systems, Election Systems and Software, and Hart InterCivic are eligible vendors, pending contract approval by the state Controlling Board in March.

Electronic voting systems are required by the federally mandated Help America Vote Act of 2002.

Seventy-one of Ohio's 88 counties must choose one of four vendors initially identified as possibilities by Ohio Secretary of State J. Kenneth Blackwell's office including Sequoia, said Carlo LoParo, office spokesman.

After Licking County chose Sequoia, that voting vendor and Blackwell's office could not agree on final contract terms. Champaign, Clark and Darke counties also had chosen Sequoia.

J. Michael King, chairman of the Licking County Board of Elections, would not comment on which company will be chosen next, although all of them have contacted the board, he said.

"We have a few things in our contract that benefit the state and taxpayers" that Sequoia did not agree to, LoParo said. "We were able to negotiate for the best pricing in the nation for election systems, and included in that pricing was the best warranty terms, best service and maintenance terms vendors have ever agreed to.

"One of the issues Sequoia did state to election officials is they didn't want to be tied to Ohio's low prices.

"We also have the stipulation if they offer another government entity a price that is lower than Ohio, they would have to give Ohio a discount."

Blackwell's office also retained the right to terminate the contract.

All counties who chose Sequoia and those who have yet to make a decision must now one of the three to receive tentative approval.

Blackwell's office has an approximate $133 million allocation for systems in Ohio: $5.8 million funded by the state Legislature, the remainder supplied by Congress, LoParo said.

"We consider that amount sufficient to meet all requirements of the Help America Vote Act and transfer all Ohio counties to more accurate, more reliable and easy-to-use voting devices," he said.

In November, Canton-based Diebold showed its displeasure with Licking County's decision to use an out-of-state vendor by sending letters to every member of the Licking County Chamber of Commerce.

Mark Radke, director of voting industry at Diebold, said Licking County officials should pick Diebold because it has a plant in Newark, even though the plant does not manufacture voting machines.

The deadline for statewide implementation is January 2006. Some counties, yet to be determined, will have the new equipment for this August's special elections.

Reporter Lachelle Seymour can be reached at 328-8546 or lseymour@nncogannett.com