"It is so easy to use this equipment," she said. "It's user-friendly for voters, workers and ourselves."
She expects workers in her office will be able to tally the votes earlier on election night, rather than finishing at 1:15 a.m. the next day, as in past years.
Allen walked through the voting process earlier this week.
Voters already will be familiar with the first steps.
She said a poll worker will scan the barcode on the back of a driver's license or other form of identification, or enter it manually on a poll pad, which is essentially a computer tablet.
Voters will sign on the screen of the poll pad, rather than in the paper poll book.
The poll pad prints a receipt with a number on it. The number doesn't identify the voter but indicates which of the 74 ballot styles the voter will need for this election. For example, people voting at Cambria Township will need one of five different ballot styles, depending on their school district; there are multiple school districts represented in the township, Allen said.
Every district will have a school board election and Central Kansas Extension District 3 election. With the receipt, there won't be any confusion about which ballot to use.
GIVES A PAPER TRAIL
Allen feeds a blank ballot into the ExpressVote, one of the new machines, and scans the check-in receipt, which pulls up the proper ballot on the screen.Allen makes her selections on a touch screen. She can write in a name, if she wishes. If she leaves out a race or if she votes for too many candidates, the ExpressVote displays a warning on the screen.
Every ExpressVote machine is ADA compliant, she said, which was not the case with the previous machines.
When she's done, the ExpressVote prints out the ballot, showing her choices.
She takes the ballot over to the DS200, another new piece of equipment, and feeds her ballot into the machine. If, on the way, she sees a mistake, she can "spoil" that ballot and start again.
The DS200 thanks her for voting and counts the votes. The ballots are stored in the machine until the polls close.
"Everybody has a paper trail," she said.
SIMPLE RECOUNTS
If there are any issues or questions, the paper ballots can be run through the DS200 again to be recounted.The new machines not only will make elections easier for the voter, they should pay for themselves eventually, Allen said.
The new machines cost $514,000, and purchasing 65 more poll pads cost another $62,000.
The blank ballots cost 7 cents apiece; the old preprinted ones cost 26 cents. Since the new ballots are blank, if all of the ballots aren't used in this election, they can be used in the next one.
In addition, the county has taken on programming the machines. In previous years, the vendor did the programming.
Allen anticipates the new machines also will make advance voting faster and easier. In the general election last November, she said, 500 people voted in fours hours the day before the election.
Advance voting will begin Tuesday at the clerk's office. Hours are 8 a.m. to 5 p.m., and voting will be available until noon Nov. 6.
The election will be Nov. 7.
©2017 The Salina Journal (Salina, Kan.) Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.
