Election Day
Erie County voters to use scanning machines
No more curtains to close. No more levers to pull.
For the past 40 or 50 years, voters cast ballots for their candidates in curtained metal booths.
No more. For the first time in a general election, Erie County voters — except those in Buffalo — will use an electronic scanning system to cast their votes.
Buffalo will get the machines next year.
Some voters already used the new scanners in September’s primary elections, but a much larger turnout is expected on Tuesday, so more poll workers will be on hand to help voters with the new system.
“We’ll have poll workers for 930 election districts,” said Robin Sion, assistant to Erie County Republican Elections Commissioner Ralph M. Mohr.
This is how the new voting process works.
Instead of enclosing themselves behind curtains, voters are given paper ballots by poll workers, who rip them from a party ballot book.
The workers then send each voter to a “privacy booth,” where the choices are made by filling in circles with a black pen, similar to taking a standardized test. Then the voters take the ballots to the machine and feed them through the scanner.
For now, the privacy booths are tables with cardboard partitions. Voters will be directed to chairs at the individual “booths” where they can sit to fill out their paper ballot.
The cardboard partitions—which include instructions on how to complete the ballots — are temporary. A permanent design will be determined in the future.
“Different companies produce different booths. Erie County has not decided what we’re going to go with,” Sion said.
What happens if a voter changes his mind or marks the wrong candidate and wants to change the ballot?
Voters can get up to three ballots if the machine rejects it because of an extraneous mark or as a result of a mistake or changed mind, Erie County Democratic Elections Commissioner Dennis E. Ward said.
“You have to hand it to an inspector and they keep it,” he said of the discarded ballot. “Then you can give it another try.”
What is different from Primary Day is the addition of manila envelopes for voters to place their ballots in once they make their choices. The envelopes address privacy concerns some voters had in September, Sion said. Once the ballot is slipped inside, no one else can see who the individual voted for as he or she walks over to the scanner.
In addition, if an individual feels that someone is looking over their shoulder at the privacy booth, he or she should inform poll workers.
“They are there to help ensure privacy,” Sion said.
Another way the voter’s privacy is protected with the paper ballot system is that the ballot serves as a fail-safe mechanism. After each one is removed from the manila envelope and scanned, it goes into a secured drop box and can be hand-counted if necessary.
For the most part, the ballots have not changed under the new system, but there is one difference in the way the propositions are presented. Previously, they were listed at the top of the ballot. Now they are located on the reverse side of the paper ballot, as clearly specified on the front.
“The ballot is the same. Just the method of voting has changed,” Sion said. “Instead of [pulling] a lever, you fill in circles.”
The new procedure is a result of the General Election Commission’s Help America Vote Act of 2000, which requires states to upgrade their voting systems. The process is simple, quick, reliable and accurate, local election officials said.
It has taken New York State since 2000 to implement the mandate. But the slow pace benefited voters because it gave other states a chance to work out the kinks, officials said.
The equipment is the same finally settled upon by Florida following voting problems there during the 2000 presidential election.
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