ATLANTA — The way Georgians cast their ballots could be changing very soon. On Tuesday, the state house passed a bill which would add new machines to polling places that have an auditable paper trail. For the last 17 years, the system has been all electronic.
On Tuesday, 13WMAZ's Chelsea Beimfohr spoke with Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger in his Atlanta office, to get his take on the proposed voting system. Raffensperger is a supporter of the bill and calls the current voting system outdated. He says machines described in House Bill 316 would give Georgians the “most confidence” that their ballot was accurately counted.
Q: Before you were Secretary of State what did you do professionally?
A: “I was in the General Assembly, the House of Representatives, for 4 years. I’m also a business owner and registered structural engineer, a licensed contractor, and I have a specialty contracting business.”
Q: House Bill 316 passed the House yesterday. Can you just explain what the bill says, what the goals are?
A: “Its really threefold... number 1 -- our voting machines are 17 years old. We need to update those voting machines. So the House, in their bill, elected to go with a ballot marking device with touch screen technology. So in many respects, it will look like what you have right now. When you’ll get to the final button, instead of casting the ballot it will be to print the ballot. It will then print out a ballot that the voter takes over to the optical scanner, puts it on the plaque, presses the button, and it shoots through. When it is then read, an optical scan of that ballot will occur and it drops into the ballot box. What that means is that we will have a paper ballot to do physical recounts. Then, you’ll be able to say this person really won, this person really lost.”
Q: How many are we going to need for the state?
A: “Right now, there are 27,000 machines out there, so we are looking at 27 to 30 that we need.”
Q: “The cost for the machines or all of them?”
A: “ Well, the governor put in the original budget, $150 million for the implementation of these new machines.”
Q: “Are counties responsible for the cost of the paper?”
A: “We will need a lot less paper because we have the electronic part of it, but it will have to print out the paper ballot and that would be a cost the county would have. But it’s a lot less paper than if you go with (an all) paper system. Over the next 10 years if you went with a paper ballot system, you’d be over $200 million in that system. We’re starting at 150 and there will be other costs, but they’re very comparable.”
Raffensperger says House Bill 316 goes before the Senate on Thursday. If Governor Kemp signs the bill, Raffensperger hopes to have the new machines in place by 2020.