By Tony Kukulich
With the start of early voting only weeks away, the first of two public tests of the hardware used to capture and tabulate votes was conducted by the county last week.
“What we want to do is show you what we do in preparation for the election with our voting equipment,” said Marie Smalls, director of the Board of Voter Registration and Elections of Beaufort County.
Smalls noted that public testing of voting equipment is required by law. The second test will be held Nov. 4.
The test focused on two pieces of equipment that voters will see when they go to vote. The ballot marking device displays the elections in which the voter is eligible to vote; records the vote and prints a ballot that reflects the voter’s choices.
The county maintains 593 ballot marking devices and each device has to be prepared individually as each machine is independent from every other machine. They are not connected by any sort of network. Preparation includes the clearing of previous election ballots and the using a thumb drive to load the current election onto the machine.
“They are all standalone units,” said Jean Felix, chair of the Board of Voter Registration and Elections of Beaufort County. “That’s why the testing process prior to an election is so extensive. We have to do each one individually.”
The calibration of the touch screens on the ballot marking devices are also tested to ensure that votes are recorded properly.
“These new machines are very good at being point,” Smalls said. “I’m not saying that there’s not ever a calibration issue. If there is, that can be brought to the attention of the clerk immediately so that that can be rectified. We may need to pull that machine out of the line of voting.”
The tabulation scanner scans the ballot and compiles results that will be used to determine election outcomes. Once a ballot is scanned it drops into a bin housed in the bottom of the scanner. There is no personally identifiable information on that ballot. It only reflects the voter’s choices and cannot be tied back to a specific voter.
“It’s all anonymous,” said Vernon Kemp, election systems manager for Beaufort County. “We have to protect the privacy of the voter.”
Each of the county’s 105 scanners is checked to confirm there is no data stored and tested to ensure that the ballots are recorded properly.
Kemp said the question he’s most often asked is whether voting devices are connected to the internet.
“No, they are not connected to the internet,” he said. “They are completely offline.”
There are 50 elections in Beaufort County this year and 173 ballot styles, which is a unique combination of voting contests dependent upon the voter’s address. As there are 95 voting precincts in the county, some precincts will have more than one ballot style.
The order in which candidates appear in each race is determined by the candidates’ party affiliation, and the order changes every two years, Kemp said. There are six parties approved for the upcoming election. The party order in which candidates will appear this year is: United Citizens, Green, Republican, Alliance, Libertarian and Democratic.
Early voting in Beaufort County starts Oct. 24 and continues through Nov. 5. The county’s four locations for early voting are open from 8:30 a.m. through 6 p.m. Polls are closed on Sundays and holidays. The four locations for early voting are:
Beaufort – 15 John Galt Rd, Beaufort, S.C. 29906
Bluffton – 61B Ulmer Rd, Bluffton, S.C. 29910
Hilton Head Government Complex – 539 William Hilton Pkwy, Hilton Head Island, S.C. 29928
St. Helena Branch Library – 6355 Jonathan Francis Senior Rd., St. Helena Island, S.C. 29920
The second and final public test by the Board of Voter Registration and Elections of Beaufort County is scheduled for 10 a.m., Friday, Nov. 4 at the board’s office located at 15 John Galt Road in Beaufort.
“The public has an opportunity to come and see how the process works,” Felix said. “The general public typically doesn’t know.”
Tony Kukulich is a recent transplant to the Lowcountry. A native of Wilmington, Del., he comes to The Island News from the San Francisco Bay Area where he spent seven years as a reporter and photographer for several publications. He can be reached at tony.theislandnews@gmail.com.
