Ohio Voters May See Long Lines at Polls

By JOSELYN KING    Wheeling News-Register   20 September 2005

BELLAIRE - Ohio voters should expect longer lines at the polls and more tax money to be spent for the Tuesday, Nov. 8, general election.
  Reading skills also will be necessary for voters, as they face five state issues on their ballots. All are lengthy, and some are estimated to be at least five times longer than most proposed amendments that go before voters.

  "We're going to have to inform our poll workers that the ballot is longer than usual," Belmont County Board of Elections Chairwoman Frankie Lee Carnes told members at a Monday meeting. "People are going to have to take longer to read the ballot and to vote. (Poll workers) shouldn't call us for assistance if there are three people waiting to vote."

  County boards of elections in Ohio also are required to publicize all proposed state issues in the print media prior to an election. Since the ballot is considerably longer this year, advertising cost will be a concern at the county level, Belmont County elections officials agreed. It is not known yet just what the price for publicity will be.

  Ballot books in the voting booths also are going to be an odd size for this election, County Elections Director William Shubat said. The Dayton Legal Blank Co. has informed him they will print the state issues on wider and longer pages than in the past.

  In Belmont County, all voters also will see two countywide issues in the general elections, and there are also 26 other issues to go before voters in specific communities throughout the county.

  Carnes questioned whether the entire ballot book would be printed the irregular size, or if it were just the state issues that would be on larger pages. 

"We'll have to put some warning label up in the booths reminding voters that there are state issues at the end of the book," she said. "If we don't, they will miss them."

  Shubat said he would speak with representatives of Dayton Legal Blank about printing Belmont County's ballot the same as the state ballot.

  Belmont County voters will cast their ballots on punchcards, but it will be the last time they will do so.

  Shubat informed members that the testing of all 230 new touchscreen voting machines in Belmont County has been completed, and that four of the machines were replaced by the Diebold Co. after they were found to have slight defects.

  Diebold representatives and officials from the Ohio Secretary of State's Office also agreed that the print-out capabilities of all the devices needed "some enhancements," Shubat added, and Diebold is to return Sunday, Oct. 2, to make the changes. Ohio law requires that all voting machines be equipped with a "voter verifiable paper audit trail."

  There is one less candidate for Richland Township trustee in the November election. Current Trustee Milton Porter has asked the elections board to withdraw his name from the ballot, as he does not wish to seek re-election due to health-related issues.