“Software to examine filled-in paper ballots to evaluate voter intent for $35,000.”

Stark County's new touchscreen voting machines are rolling into the Board of Elections.

The past couple of weeks, warehouse managers have been accepting shipments of the Dominion Voting Systems ImageCast X machines – which have been a point of controversy in the county. Workers have been opening the boxes, inspecting the machines for damage and testing them.

Travis Secrest, an administrative assistant for the Board of Elections, said the equipment so far has passed all of the tests.

Many of the machines still had plastic film on their touchscreens as of last week. All 1,450 are expected to arrive by the end of August. They're scheduled to be used for the Nov. 2 general election and during the in-person early-voting period.

It's been a major ordeal for the county to buy the equipment – including a legal fight between the elections board and county commissioners. In May, the Ohio Supreme Court ruled commissioners were required to fund the purchase.

Dominion quoted a retail cost for the new voting equipment of $6.17 million upfront, plus $331,550 a year to cover the software license, the hardware warranty and some ballot printing. The state covered $3.27 million. Dominion extended a trade-in credit of $1.7 million, reducing Stark County's upfront cost to $1.48 million.

What is the county getting for its money?

The county will receive:

1,450 ImageCast X voting machines at $3,500 each.
1,450 voting machine leg stands at $350 each.
Four mail-in and paper ballot scanners at $25,000 each.
Tabulation server for $17,000.
Software to run the equipment for $170,000.
Software to examine filled-in paper ballots to evaluate voter intent for $35,000.

The rest of the cost covers smartcards, battery chargers, USB drives, a workstation for the Board of Elections to examine paper ballots, backup batteries, training, on-site technical support, seals for the machines, installation, and assistance in state-required logistics and accuracy testing.

Meanwhile, about 1,400 Premier Election Systems Accuvote TSX machines that have been used in Stark County elections since 2013 now sit in an offsite storage facility, said Secrest. The Board of Elections is still using about 30 TSX machines for the special Aug. 3 election in Lawrence Township. Two fire levies are on the ballot.

The main differences between the old TSX machines and the new ones are a larger touchscreen; voters insert the validation card at the bottom instead at the top of the machine; and the printer is much quieter and is supposedly less prone to paper jams.

“The functionality is very much the same," Secrest said. "You insert the voter card. Your ballot comes up. You touch the screen as you normally would. ... And then your ballot is printed in the printer. The functionality from the voter's experience is going to be very much the same."

With the larger screen, "it's easier to view. It's easier to see," he said.

Testing the new equipment

Secrest said voting machines are not connected to any sort of network.

They also will be locked and sealed. They can be opened only by a Republican and Democratic poll worker.

Secrest said each machine counts how many ballots were cast on the machine and that total can be checked against the number of paper receipts and a count of how many voters checked in at a polling location to vote.

"So there's a series of tests that take place ... to make sure that the machines are functioning correctly. That the ballots are being tabulated correctly. And that the entire system is secure," Secrest said.

Within three days after each batch of new machines arrive at the board, staff cast test votes and check the totals. Check that voters can't vote for more candidates than permitted in a particular contest. Make sure the screens and printers work. Test the battery. Confirm the features to serve people with disabilities are working. And check that the machines are running the most recent version of software.

Testing and staff training must be completed by Sept. 17, when absentee ballots go out to Ohio voters in the military or those abroad.

"There's a lot more work to do," Secrest said.

What was the controversy?

In December, the Board of Elections announced it had selected Dominion to provide its new voting equipment. The decision came as then-President Donald Trump was sharing on social media unsubstantiated allegations that Dominion machines had been hacked, denying him re-election.

In March, the Stark County commissioners said they would not approve the purchase. In a resolution, they said the Board of Elections had not done enough to vet the purchase and that communications with Dominion's competitor Election Systems and Software indicated ES&S would have provided a more competitive offer.

The Board of Elections filed suit against the commissioners in April, leading to the Ohio Supreme Court decision.

Meanwhile, Look Ahead America, a Washington, D.C., group founded by former Trump campaign staffers, and a Jackson Township resident filed a lawsuit against the Board of Elections. The group, which says it wants all voting machines' source code to be publicized, alleged the board had met in an illegal closed-door executive session when they deliberated over the purchase of the Dominion machines.

The case is still pending.

Look Ahead America attorney Curt Hartman said with the delays in the legal case that the machines could be used in the Nov. 2 election. But if the judge rules in favor of his client, it would be the county's responsibility to unwind its deal with Dominion.

"If the Board of Elections goes down a path that could cause chaos down the road, that’s not my fault," he said.

From cantonrep.com/story/news/2021/07/21/stark-workers-testing-new-dominion-voting-machines-now/7963070002/