S.D. reaches deal for touch-screen voting

Machines to be used in every polling place

TERRY WOSTER  published: 04/23/05  Sioux Falls Argus Leader

PIERRE - Secretary of State Chris Nelson said Friday he has reached a $4.6 million deal with an Omaha company to supply touch-screen voting machines for every South Dakota county.

Touch-screen voting machines are required by the federal Help America Vote Act, and 95 percent of the cost will be paid with federal funds, Nelson said. The contract is with Election Systems & Software, a company that provided optical-scan voting equipment to 50 of the state's 66 counties.

"Every polling place will have a touch-screen machine,'' Nelson said. "Every voter will be able to vote privately and independently, in many cases, for the first time in their lives.''The machine being purchased is an AutoMARK Voter Assist Terminal. Three companies demonstrated touch-screen systems, Nelson said.

The AutoMARK system doesn't count the votes. That makes it different from some electronic voting systems that are raising controversy in Florida and some other areas.The machine South Dakota will use is essentially a different form of pencil that allows voters to mark a hard-copy ballot despite a vision impairment or other physical limitation. The finished ballot bears blackened ovals next to the names of candidates the voter favors, just as current pencil systems do. The ballots from the touch screens are ped in a box with the other ballots and run through the optical-scan counter.

Some South Dakota counties have used ES&S equipment since the 1980s, Nelson said.

Minnehaha County has used the company's voting machines since 1994, Auditor Sue Roust said. The county will need 70 touch-screen machines, one for each of its polling places, and it may try to have a couple of back-up terminals, she said. Commissioners already have set aside $84,000 as the county match for requirements of new voting act, including purchase of touch-screen machines, Roust said."I'm very pleased the state chose a vendor we're familiar with in Minnehaha County,'' she said.

Lincoln County Auditor Paula Feucht said her county will need 14 touch-screen terminals, and has set aside about $17,000 as its share of the cost. She said her concern about the new machines had been whether separate counting systems would be needed."I wanted to make sure we could coordinate the touch screens with the regular ballots,'' Feucht said.

Counties are responsible for 5 percent of the cost of the machines.

South Dakota has about 800 voting precincts, but some are combined into a joint polling place. About 660 machines are needed to provide one in each polling place. For the 16 counties that now hand-count ballots, the state will pay for optical-ballot counting machines, Nelson saidThe new machines are scheduled to be in place for the 2006 primary election, but Nelson said he hopes that some will be used during local elections earlier that spring. That's a chance for poll workers and voters to practice, he said.

The upgrade in technology could be all but unnoticed by voters who have used pencils and optical-scan ballots in the past. "If you come in and you choose to do that again, the only thing different will be a new machine in the polling place,'' Roust said.However, that touch-screen machine will open a new world of participatory democracy to citizens with disabilities, the head of a Pierre-based advocacy agency said.

Robert Kean, executive director of South Dakota Advocacy services, said the touch-screen machines allow many people with disabilities to vote in privacy and without assistance, one goal of the Help America Vote law.

"The voting machine addresses issues for a broad range of persons,'' Kean said, including those with temporary issues such as a broken arm, and the elderly.He used a test model of the machine and watched several people with disabilities try the system during a voting-machine fair that Nelson hosted earlier this year.

"I think it generated, frankly, some real excitement,'' Kean said.Nelson said the touch-screen machine probably will be somewhat slower than traditional voting, but he added, "If you know who you're going to vote for, you can go through pretty quickly.''