Board wants out of vote machine contract 
2005-01-13 
By Nick Claussen 
Athens NEWS Associate Editor 
 

The Athens County Board of Elections is discussing electronic voting machines again, but this time is hoping that the county won't be forced to purchase any of them.

After the 2000 election, state and federal officials pushed for new voting machines to replace traditional punch-card ballot machines used throughout the state and country, and the Athens County Board of Elections studied proposals for voting machines from different companies.

In January 2004, the Athens County Board of Elections voted 3-1 to purchase electronic voting machines from Diebold Election Systems, and at one time local officials thought new voting machines might be in place in time for the November election.

Replacing voting machines in Ohio was delayed in many counties, though, and the process is currently on hold.

After seeing a successful election in Athens County with the punch-card ballots, while some counties in Ohio with electronic machines had problems, the Athens County board members on Wednesday said they're reluctant about any possible move to the electronic machines.

A representative of the Ohio Secretary of State's office attended the meeting, and the board members asked her if she can determine if the board is bound by the contract it signed last year with Diebold. The election board members do not think they are bound by the contract, since the state changed the rules for purchasing approved voting machines after the contract was signed.

Susan Gwinn, chair of the board, said that she now favors optical-scan machines over the electronic machines, if the county has to make a change. Gwinn had cast the one dissenting vote against the contract with Diebold for the electronic voting machines last year.

"I think we need to go back to the drawing board," Gwinn said about the process of choosing new machines.

Board member Dick Mottl said that he wants to learn more about the optical-scan machines if the county has to make a change.

Gwinn said that one negative to the electronic machines is that they cost so much more than the punch-card machines. In the November election, Athens County was able to afford additional machines for the high voter turnout, she said. Counties that used the electronic machines often could not afford to get all of the machines they needed, and they ended up having long lines on Election Day.

Optical machines are generally less expensive than electronic machines. One negative about the optical-scan machines is that they use a lot of paper, Gwinn said. With these machines, voters fill in circles to choose who they want to vote for, and then the papers are fed into machines at the polling locations and the machines tell the voters if they voted properly, Gwinn said.