The race to replace the lever
Residents help pick out new voting machines

By Chad Umble   Lancaster Intelligencer Journal

Published: Oct 19, 2005 9:25 AM EST
LANCASTER COUNTY, PA - A steady stream of residents cast their votes Tuesday for the electronic system they would like to see used next year in Lancaster County elections.

Four companies are competing for a contract to replace the county's roughly 440 lever-action voting machines. On Tuesday, company representatives demonstrated their products to the public at the former Armstrong Building, 150 N. Queen St.

"I'm amazed at the turnout," said Mary Stehman, chief clerk of the county board of elections.

Three of the demonstration models were touch-screen systems, and a fourth utilized a full ballot on top of an electronic display.

The federal Help America Vote Act requires the county to replace its lever voting machines with electronic ones by the May 2006 primary, a deadline Stehman said would be met easily.

"A decision doesn't have to be made until the end of the year," Stehman said.

The county is eligible for roughly $1.8 million in federal money to buy new voting machines, Stehman said.

The units demonstrated Tuesday ranged in price from $3,000 to $5,000 each.

Residents ranked their three favorite units on a survey from the county board of elections. The county commissioners will use the survey results to help them decide which system to buy.

"If I was going to use one today, just from ease of use, I would go with UniLect," said George Platt, a resident who works at an East Earl Township polling place.

UniLect, a California-based company, showcased a touch-screen model that features a color screen and flashing boxes for races that haven't been voted on.

Platt, however, said he didn't see the need to replace the lever machines.

"I'd rather use the old machines. They are easier to use," Platt said.

The county's current lever machines use a 1930s-era technology. Each one weighs roughly 700 pounds.

The new and considerably lighter electronic systems represented a welcome change for some.

"These systems will be far and away much better than we have now," said Nelson Dagen, a poll worker from Upper Leacock Township.

Yet Dagen worried that the touch-screen systems could scare away some voters.

"The over-70 crowd isn't going to take too kindly to the outright computer look," Dagen said.

Several other people expressed nostalgia, if not outright preference, for the lever machines, which have been used in Lancaster County since the 1970s.

"There is a bit of nostalgia cranking the lever, hearing the bell ring," said David Helms, a Conestoga Valley High School government teacher.

Helms said he prefers the touch-screen system from Elections Systems & Software, a Nebraska-based company.

"It seemed the most user-friendly from both the voter's standpoint and also from an election worker's standpoint," Helms said.

ES&S originally was scheduled to present an optical-scan system.

In an optical-scan system, a voter fills out a paper ballot that is scanned and tabulated.

Jean Menard, who has worked as a poll worker in Columbia for two decades, preferred the touch-screen systems over ones that use paper ballots.

"If we're going to spend all this money, I'd rather go with the new technology," she said.