E-Vote: County Secures Voter ID Cards Through Imaging

A simple request to mend an old filing cabinet turned into a project that has saved Douglas County, Ga., taxpayers thousands of dollars and protected their voter registration cards. The Voter Registration Office has now scanned in approximately 70,000 records of registered voters, including voter signatures. Information Services Director Mike Amato knew when he saw an old filing cabinet overflowing with cards -- and no space for another one -- that there had to be an alternative. He, along with Records Administrator Becky Hebert and Voter Registration Director Laurie Fulton teamed up to tackle the project.

Information Services Director Mike Amato

"Rather than add more file cabinets, this was the perfect project to deploy electronic document imaging," said Amato. "We were successfully able to accomplish our conversion from paper to scanned images in less than two months and at a fraction of a cost compared to other counties."

Prior to developing the digital records, all signatures were verified manually according to Fulton. This involved finding the card in a physical file, removing it, making the visual comparison, and re-filing the card. The new digital imaging allows the staff of the Voter Registration Office to pull up the original signature on the computer and make the comparison much quicker.

"The cost of this project was $5,000 which was very little compared to other counties who've spent $40,000 or more and taken years to complete" said Hebert.

The low cost is attributed to making the project manageable and using the existing imaging system. The major cost -- as with any project -- Hebert said, involved labor. However, the county was able to use the in-house resources of its Information Services Department in setting up the imaging station. The resources of both the Records Department and Voter Registration worked together to process, image and index the active voter registration cards.

"Voter Registration will save hundreds of hours verifying signatures and responding to the needs of the citizens of Douglas County," Amato said. "Project success was due to interdepartmental cooperation and the support of Chairman Tom Worthan and County Administrator Eric Linton. Douglas County is once again a leader in the metro area with the cost-effective deployment of technology that makes business sense."