Voting machines won't be certified

North country voters will cast ballots on new machines this year, even though it's unlikely those devices will meet state certification standards by Election Day.

John Conklin, state Board of Elections spokesman, said his agency recently gave county commissioners the option of deploying their new, uncertified ballot scanning systems when it became apparent that SysTest Labs, which is certifying voting machines statewide, would not be finished with its testing by fall.

The offer, he said, also was an attempt to appease the federal Department of Justice, which sued New York three years ago because it did not comply with the federal Help America Vote Act of 2002. The bill required states to adopt voting systems that are accessible to disabled people and can create a permanent paper record. New York still has not complied, in part, because it is trying to meet a self-created standard that is more stringent than federal guidelines.

Sixteen county commissioners — including those in Franklin, Jefferson, Lewis, Oswego and St. Lawrence — accepted the board's offer and will send only HAVA-compliant digital machines to poll sites, instead of mixing new systems with traditional lever machines.

Commissioners had varied reasons for making the switch.

"We believe that this is the wave of the future and that we're not going back to the lever machines," said Jerry O. Eaton, Jefferson County Republican elections commissioner. "Jefferson County wants to be on the front end of progress, not one of the last counties to implement the system."

Lewis County commissioners didn't see the sense in waiting, especially since their neighbors also were making the changeover.

"We've been working with HAVA for seven years now," said Elaine M. McLear, Democratic elections commissioner. "We're ready. We're trained. Our staff is trained. Anddoing it as a region, we're going to have the support from our fellow commissioners and fellow counties. It will cut costs on advertising. Public awareness is going to be better if everything is uniform. And it's more cost effective to go with one system than two systems."

Julie L. Rolfe, St. Lawrence County's deputy Democratic elections commissioner, said making a complete switch also gave commissioners plenty of opportunity to "work out the kinks" before elections for statewide offices next year.

"We don't anticipate any problems," she said. "But we're being proactive. We believe the more we introduce these machines to the voters, the easier it will be for everyone involved."

Sean M. Hennessey, Jefferson County Democratic elections commissioner, said the five north country counties will be jointly purchasing media spots to provide a uniform education to voters about the new machines. The spots, he said, will be across all media platforms and be paid for with state and federal funds. All five counties have Sequoia voting machines, so the voting experience should be similar.

The experience of disabled voters at the polls won't change much from last year. They'll continue to use machines that include audio prompts and a hand-held controller to help them cast their vote.

The rest of the community will vote using paper ballots. A voter will take the ballot to one of several private booths that are provided, mark their choices, and deposit the ballot into an optical scanner which will record their vote. The paper ballots are saved.