By Leah Justice

leah.justice@tryondailybulletin.com

The Polk County Board of Commissioners will soon be facing a big, and expensive decision on which new voting systems to purchase for elections that will produce a paper ballot.

The state has approved an election law change requiring all counties vote by paper ballot beginning with the 2018 election.

The Polk County Board of Elections invited the public to demonstrations from two companies on Tuesday, April 14 to view and give comments regarding possible new systems using paper ballots.

The first demonstration was from Election Systems and Software (ES&S), which at this point is the only state approved machine. The machine demonstrated was a tabulator, and if the county goes with the ES&S system, voters will fill out paper ballots then drop them into the tabulator, which will count the votes.

ES&S demonstrated the DS200 tabulator to Polk residents and the board of elections. Voters would have to fill in circles to indicate votes for candidates on a predesigned ballot for each individual election.

The DS200 tabulator includes a touch screen. Voters can insert the ballot in the machine to analyze the ballot. Voters can place the ballot in the machine the wrong way, upside down or backwards and the ballot will still be accepted. A screen tells the voter if too many or too little selections were made for a race. If something is wrong with the ballot, the voter will be given the options to either correct mistakes or to cast ballot with mistakes. If the ballot is filled out properly it will be automatically accepted and the screen will indicate to the voter that their ballot has been cast successfully.

The estimated cost for 11 machines from ES&S is $124,000, according to the election office. By going strictly paper ballots, the county would have to purchase the 11 machines as well as a ballot for each of its approximate 15,500 registered voters plus a required 10 percent more for each election. Polk County Board of Election Director Karen Lawrence said the cost per each ballot is 27 cents.

Currently Polk County uses voting machines, a total of 56 for all its precincts, which are touch screens and print out a receipt. No paper ballots are currently used.

The next demonstration was from Democracy Live, which, along with all other companies, is not yet certified from the state of North Carolina.

Democracy Live uses software that can be used on any Microsoft touchscreen computer or tablet. Voters would cast their votes by touchscreen, like voters do on Polk’s current machines, then print out the ballot on a printer, which uses regular paper. George Munroe with Democracy Live presented the system. The software for Democracy Live includes ways for persons with disabilities, including the blind, to vote on the same machines as all others.

Munro said a major cost savings to counties with Democracy Live’s software is being able to print off regular paper instead of ballots and only print out for voters who cast votes.

“We’re printing off on blank paper instead of printing off ballots,” Munro said. “You have to be ready for 100 percent of your voters to show up (with paper ballot options) and they never all show up.”

Board of election chair David Moore asked if the state has looked at Democracy Live’s system yet, with Munro saying they have a board certification meeting on May 8. Democracy Live’s tabulators are still in development.

It is expected the state will certify a few companies with counties having the option which company they want to purchase from.

The last state change for voting machines occurred several years ago and the state only certified one company. Then, however, there was federal funding available to help pay for the machines, where this time counties will pay the full costs of the new systems.

Upfront costs to go with Democracy Live would be an estimated $84,000 for tablets and printers plus another $10,500 for tabulators. There is an annual cost for software as well. Polk County could also shop for cheaper tablets and printers on its own rather than purchase screens and printers from Democracy Live to save money.

Munro said the cost to Polk County for Democracy Live’s tablets and printers is $1,500 x 56 (the number of machines Polk currently has), plus $1,500 per tabulator. Polk could only need one tabulator for each of its seven precincts.

Democracy Live also charges $300 per unit used per year for software, which would be $18,000 per year for a county election if the county used 56 machines, but less on election years where less machines were used, such as for a municipal election.

Lawrence said the county currently pays $18,000 per year for the current machines whether all the machines are used or not.

“If we just used 10 (machines) that election, we would just pay $3,000 (to Democracy Live) that year,” Lawrence said.

Polk County could begin discussing the costs of new machines for next year’s budget. The new budget year begins July 1, with commissioners holding budget work sessions beginning in May.