Greene Election Board ready for November
WAYNESBURG – The Greene County Election Board began preparing for the upcoming November election Wednesday, announcing they will use the same scanners and paper ballots they utilized in primary elections this spring. And Greene County Election Director Frances Pratt told the commissioners that the state came through with the funding promised to cover the extra costs associated with the last-minute voting method change, approving the $49,294 requested by the county to cover the added expenses.
The county commissioners will vote to approve the settlement with the state for the primary election costs today.
In April, just a month before the primaries, the state barred three counties, including Greene, from continuing to use a touch-screen voting system, UniLect Patriot Direct Recording Electronic Voting System, after examinations of election results revealed an above-average undercount in last November’s presidential election.
After the de-certification, the county election board worked in conjunction with the county commissioners and the state to quickly implement a paper ballot voting system for the primary, with two scanners used to count the penciled ballots.
Workers had to carry the sealed ballot boxes to a makeshift counting room where about a dozen county officials sorted through the papers, sending them as quickly as possible through the two scanners.
While Pratt and the commissioners were glad to receive the reimbursement from the state, they are still trying to find a permanent solution to the de-certification of the simple touch-screen method that had been implemented countywide.
“We find ourselves in the exact same position that we were in the primary,” Pratt said. “Since we have no timetable with UniLect, we need to contract with Opti-scan.”
While the results were a little slower than past elections, the May primary was conducted without major incident.
In other matters, the commissioners will accept a grant today for $2,650 to help making polling stations more handicapped accessible.
And the election board announced that the Clarksville polling place is permanently being moved from the Pleasant valley Presbyterian Church to the Senior Center in Clarksville.
The Franklin Township polling place will remain temporarily moved to the Greene County Fairgrounds 4-H Building, until the construction of the new municipal building is completed.
The last day to register for the Nov. 11 election is Oct. 11.