Board of Elections selects voting machine

2/5/2008

The Schoharie County Board of Elections decided Monday to purchase the ImageCast Ballot Marker system for local elections.
The decision came quickly, following the New York State Board of Elections approval Thursday, of three voting systems for use by handicapped voters in New York.
The Board of Elections has examined a number of different machines over the past five years, so was ready to select a system as soon as the state finished testing them and decided which to approve, said Election Commissioners Lewis L. Wilson and Clifford C. Hay.
The county will buy 18 ImageCast machines this year.
Each polling place in the county will have one of the new handicapped-accessible machines for the primary election in September.
The purchase will cost about $250,000, which will be paid by the state from federal Help America Vote Act funds.
ImageCast, ES&S Automark and the Premier Automark machines all received state approval for use by handicapped voters this year.
State testing of machines is continuing.
The three machines, along with others, may also be approved for use by all voters in 2009.
If ImageCast is approved for all voters, the county may buy more.
Since ImageCast is now approved only for handicapped voters, the familiar lever type machines will also be in use in all Schoharie County polling places this year.
Commissioners Hay and Wilson said they chose ImageCast for these reasons:
* Quick delivery.
ImageCast was approved as now manufactured. The other two systems were approved pending a modification. Sequoia Voting systems said it can deliver the machines to Schoharie County for the September primary.
* The fact that these are made in New York. Sequoia Voting Systems of Jamestown, which made the machines now used in the county.
“The company has demonstrated its quality of workmanship and we have done business with it for years,” said Commissioner Wilson.
* Ease of use. “We feel the ImageCase is a littler easier to use, by both voters and election inspectors,” said Commissioner Hay.
“Sequoia makes an excellent machine,” said Board of Supervisors Chairman Earl Van Wormer III. “They have provided election services in New York State longer than any other major election service provider, and Sequoia implemented the nation’s first voter-verifiable paper audit trail voting system.”
Sequoia is providing election services in many states, including Florida, California, Illinois, and New Jersey.
Mr. Van Wormer inspected the ImageCast and other machines last week at the state Election Commissioners’ Association meeting in Saratoga.
Seward Supervisor Larry Phillips and the County Central Data Processing Director Stanley France also visited the convention.
Commissioner Hay and Deputy Commissioners Diane Becker and Anne Hendrix attended the convention, where the state Board of Elections met and approved the three voting systems.