DeLand, FL – 3 years of planning to change the way Volusia County votes comes to a head.
By unanimous vote during Thursday’s morning session, the Volusia County Council approved a $2.2 million dollar purchase for 163 voting machines made by Elections Systems & Software of Nebraska.
Those machines will replace the current voting machines – made by Dominion Voting Systems of Ohio and used in every county election since 1994 – at every one of the county’s 125 precincts starting with March’s presidential primary. The current ones will still be used for any other county-run elections until then.
The ES & S equipment is expected to be easier to use for handicapped people or those with special needs. It also comes with a wireless modem feature that should be far more reliable that the dial-up modem in place with the current voting machines.
The new machines will continue to use paper ballots in accordance with state law, but will offer a touch-screen computer option for those who can’t fill out paper ballots for whatever reason. That computer will print out a ballot that can then be given to precinct workers.
Supervisor of Elections Ann McFall told the council during Thursday’s meeting that they started noticing breakdowns with the current machines in 2013, but decided to wait until 2015 to purchase new machines because of the 2014 gubernatorial election.
“You can’t buy off-the-shelf equipment and use at voting,” McFall noted. “Florida has the most restrictive certification program in the nation.”
McFall also noted that ES & S and Dominion were the only 2 vendors to reply to the county’s request for bids for new machines and she went with ES & S because it would be easier for poll workers to use.
The contract with ES & S – which was $300,000 less than what McFall had budgeted for the new machines – also covers the costs of maintenance and support needed to keep them running.
Many of the new machines will be used as backups in the case of failures or issues on election days.
McFall’s office plans to hold special town hall meetings county-wide so that Volusia’s residents can actually see the machines for themselves before the next Election Day. No dates have been set for those meetings.
Copyright 2015 Southern Stone Communications.