Hall County voters have the chance this week to have a hands-on test run of the state’s new voting machines.
The county’s election staff, along with officials from the Georgia Secretary of State’s office, will be at the Hall County Government Center on Tuesday at 11 a.m. and at 1 p.m. to demonstrate the machines, which will first be used in the March 24 presidential preference primary and E-SPLOST election.
"It's important for voters to have the option of seeing this new technology in advance of this year's elections," Lori Wurtz, director of election for Hall County said. said.
The demonstrations will be held in the Human Resources Training Room on the second floor of the government center, which is located at 2875 Browns Bridge Road in Gainesville. The public is invited.
The new system uses touchscreens, printed-out paper ballots and ballot scanners. Portions of the new system will be familiar to voters. They will continue to use a touchscreen to make their selections in an election.
But other parts will be very different.
“I think they will be a little of learning curve,” county spokeswoman Katie Crumley said. “And I would hope for the average person, it won’t be too big of a difference. But there may be some, especially those who are frequent voter and used to doing it one way, who may experience a more major change.”
Voters will no longer fill out the paper slips when they first arrive at their precincts. Instead, they will check in with an iPad that scans their driver’s license or another form of photo ID. Then voters will use their fingers to sign in right on the screen on the screen.
Voters will then move to the voting booth, where a 21.5-inch touchscreen will display candidates and referendums. Voters will make their choices on the touchscreen, which includes accessibility options such as enlarged text and headphones.
Voters will then print their ballot to a printer in the booth with them. The ballot includes a text listing of voters’ choices along with a bar code that can be read by an optical scanning machine. If a mistake is found, voters can request a new ballot.
Voters will then insert the ballot into a scanner, which will accept the ballot whether it’s face-up or face-down, forward or backward. The scanner is positioned on top of a black ballot box that can later be unlocked for recounts or audits.
“These are new machines and they are going to be different,” Crumley said. “So we just want to do our due diligence with the public to make sure they have access to seeing these machines in action and the opportunity to see what it’s going to be like to vote on them.”
Additional demonstrations can be scheduled with Hall County Elections staff during normal business hours by calling 770-531-6945.
http://accesswdun.com/article/2020/1/866490/hall-county-to-let-public-test-new-voting-system