Lack of electronic voting didn't slow down election in county 
2004-11-18 
By Nick Claussen 
Athens NEWS Associate Editor 
 

With the 2004 presidential election come and gone, Athens County does not appear to be any closer to getting electronic voting machines than it was several months ago.

And while the county is still using the old punch-card ballot system, those older machines may have helped Athens County avoid the long lines and voting problems experienced by some other counties in Ohio.

For the last several years, the Athens County Board of Elections has been working toward replacing the punch-card ballot voting machines with electronic voting machines. Federal and state mandates were requiring that the county make the change, and the Board of Elections talked to vendors and examined several different electronic options.

In the fall of 2002, the Board of Elections held an open house for area residents to come in and try out the various voting machines and give their opinions on which ones they liked best. Last January, the board voted 3-1 to choose the Diebold touch-screen voting machines for the county.

Throughout the process, local officials thought the county might have new voting machines in place for the 2004 general election. After the massive problems in Florida with punch-card ballots in the 2000 election, many believed that Ohio needed electronic machines to avoid similar problems.

So what happened to the new machines, why didn't Athens County use them in the recent election, and how did the lack of electronic voting machines affect the election?

SUSAN GWINN, CHAIR of the Athens County Board of Elections, explained Monday that while the board was going through the process of purchasing new voting machines, state officials stalled the process by changing the rules and requiring that new voting machines leave "paper trails" or paper evidence of the votes.

"Right now, I think we are just on hold," Gwinn said. The state is still changing the requirements for the voting machines, so the counties cannot do much with the new voting machines, Gwinn said.

"We're not anxious to make a switch here anyway," she added.

Gwinn explained that the punch-card ballot machines work well, and that she and other members of the board have concerns about how much money the new voting machines will cost the county.

Elections officials around the state differ on the need for the new voting machines, though, with some arguing that the new machines will be easier to use, have fewer problems, and will help the election process.

Board of Elections member Howard Stevens said that Athens County eventually may be able to use the Diebold voting machines the Board ed, but nothing has been decided yet. The county could have new machines in place for the primary or generally election in 2005, but it is too early to know, Stevens said. All along, Stevens was reluctant to use the new machines in the 2004 presidential election.

"We did not want to use the new machines in a big, big turnout like we just had," Stevens said. Whenever the county does get the new machines, Stevens hopes they will be used for the first time in a primary with a light voter turnout.

Voters will want to take their time with the new voting machines the first time they use them, so it will be better to use them during a relatively simple election, Stevens said.

Gwinn expressed concerns that Athens County will not be able to purchase enough voting machines to meet the demand here. This is because the rules are currently set up to purchase a number of machines based on the number of voters in a governor's election, not a presidential election. As a college town, Athens has a disproportionately higher number of voters in presidential elections, so Gwinn believes that the number of voting machines should be based on the figures from presidential elections.

IN PREPARING FOR the recent election, the county bought extra punch-card ballot machines three weeks before the election.

"We were able to buy 30 new voting booths for $1,900," Gwinn said. By comparison, each electronic voting machine costs around $4,000 or $5,000, she added.

If the county had electronic voting machines in place, it might have been able to purchase a few extra machines, but probably not an additional 30, Gwinn said.

Stevens agreed, saying that the board was able to prepare for the large turnout with the old machines, but might not have been able to do so as well with the new voting machines.

"If we would have had (the new voting machines) on top of the big turnout, it probably would have been a little messy," Stevens said.

Knox County, where students from Kenyon College had to wait in line for hours to vote, had electronic voting machines, according to Gwinn. She said she talked to elections officials from Knox County, and found that the main problem at the precincts with long lines was insufficient voting machines.

Kenyon College is located in one voting precinct, Gwinn said. That precinct has 300 permanent residents and 800-900 registered student voters. The precinct had a high turnout and just a few machines to handle the voters, which led to the long lines.

In Athens County between 6,500 and 7,000 students voted, and that does not include students who voted with absentee ballots in other counties, Gwinn said.

The Board of Elections set up 30 voting machines in Baker Center for student provisional voters and another 15 machines in the board office on South Court Street for provisionals, Gwinn said.

Student turnout and the total turnout was high, but because the board was able to plan for the election and put enough of the old voting machines in place, the county didn't experience any major problems, Gwinn said.

Stevens said he visited 18 precincts in the county on Election Day, and he was pleased with it all went in the county.

"I think it was one of the smoothest elections I have been involved with in my seven years on the board," Stevens said. Some polling places had lines, but most weren't too long and the people in the lines were generally in good moods, he said.