Election officials seek cause of voting machine breakdowns

CANTON — St. Lawrence County election officials can’t determine what went wrong Tuesday with voting machines in eight districts until a court impoundment order is lifted.

Election results won’t be available until then from those districts or from the town of Fowler, where results of that town’s two districts were inadvertently combined.

Problems with machines were reported early from Rossie, Edwards and Clare.

“The machines were frozen,” Democratic Election Commissioner Jennie H. Morrill said. “Ballots were put in emergency lock boxes.”

Inspectors didn’t report problems in Colton, Lawrence, and Massena until inspectors tried closing the polls with an electronic key and the machines froze rather than print results.

“It’s nothing the inspectors did wrong,” Ms. Morrill said.

See Thursday’s Times for complete story.