Campaign Notebook: City will switch to paper ballots for June 7 runoff

Web Posted: 05/12/2005       San Antonio Express-News

City officials have decided to use paper ballots in the June 7 runoff, City Clerk Leticia Vacek said Wednesday. Bexar County Elections Administrator Cliff Borofsky said the cost difference between machine and paper ballots is about $200,000.

Vacek's announcement of the possibility of the switch to paper ballots set off a firestorm at Bexar County Commissioners Court on Tuesday.

Also, early vote times for the runoff have changed, Vacek said. The location of one polling site also changed.

Early voting will be from 8 a.m. to 8 p.m. May 31 through June 3 at the same voting locations used in the main election. Election day balloting will be from 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. June 7 at the same locations as the main election, with one exception.

Precinct 2090, which is in District 7, will be at Timberhill Villa Retirement Center, 5050 Timberhill.

Requests for mail-in ballots must arrive at the Bexar County Elections Department by May 31.

Loser seeks investigation
Cynthia Test, who was beaten out of a City Council District 7 runoff by 33 votes in Saturday's election, is asking for an investigation into Bexar County's electronic voting system, citing potential computer glitches.

In a crowded field of eight candidates, Test came in third with 2,624 votes, trailing second-place finisher Noel Suniga who had 2,657 votes. Elena Guajardo led with 3,163 votes.

The runoff is June 7.

Test's attorney, Rolando Rios, is preparing the legal papers for an election contest to be filed against the city, Test said.

In one case, Test claims, a voting machine recorded an "over-vote" ? a vote for both Test and another candidate ? in the race, something that is supposed to be impossible with the new technology.

But Bexar County said such an occurrence is impossible and that the over-vote would have come from a mail-in ballot.

The county began using electronic touch-screen voting machines for all elections in September 2003. The $8.1 million system has been criticized for not having an attached printer that can provide a paper "receipt" for the voter to verify.

The lack of a receipt prevents a meaningful recount of the electronically recorded votes; the machine merely reprints the results recorded on election day.