Last October, the EVOTE
2014 International Conference was held in Austria, gathering together some
of the most influential figures in the vertical of voting paradigms,
administration and technology. This has since been followed by the 9th
Annual International Electoral Affairs Symposium in December 2014, hosted
in South Africa. One of the presenters at the event was Bruce Clark, the
Kankakee County Clerk from the United States, and he spoke about the experience
of the 2014 midterm elections in Illinois.
In addition to discussing poll worker
training, outreach efforts, and ballot preparation, a key subject addressed was
the deployment and use of optical scan machines for the election. One of the
major trends observed by Clark was the shift in the type
of voting equipment used in United States elections over the last 10 to 15
years.
The types of voting equipment in 2000 were
incredibly varied and fragmented across the different counties in the United
States. There was no systematic approach, resulting in counties using punch
cards, DataVote, levers, paper, optical scan, electronic and mixed systems in a
rather scattered fashion. By contrast, the vast majority of counties and
townships in 2012 used either optical scan (62.8% of counties) or electronic
voting machines (32.8%), resulting in less than 5% of counties using different
equipment.
Given this, the Kankakee County Clerk took
a closer look to compare optical scan (OS) machines with touch screen (TS)
electronic voting machines. In the case of an optical scan machine, people
still cast their vote on a paper ballot, but it is then inserted into the
optical scan machine for tabulation. The advantages here include the fact that
people like to see their vote and, in case of a discovery, there is a
physical ballot to examine. However, ballot costs can
be significant and there are physical limitations to the size of the ballot
box.
By comparison, there are many positives
associated with the use of a touchscreen direct-recording electronic voting
machine (TS DRE). The accuracy level is incredibly high and the touchscreen machines
facilitate far better accessibility for voters with disabilities, as they are
able to cast a ballot completely unassisted. An audit trail can be produced,
just like the optical scan machine, providing great accountability and
transparency to further bolster the legitimacy and integrity of election
results.
Naturally,
considerations need to be made before implementing touchscreen voting machines.
There may be issues related to calibration and, in addition to the upfont cost
to purchase each machine, counties and election officials must consider the
costs of equipment repair or replacement. Even so, the pros clearly far
outweigh the cons and this is why touchscreen machines are understandably
growing in popularity.
