Manassas ditches touch-screen voting machines, buying scanners

MANASSAS, Va. — The way Manassas residents cast their votes in elections is about to change.

The City Council tonight is expected to approve $101,000 in funding for the purchase of 11 new optical scanning voting machines. The city is the last jurisdiction in Northern Virginia to make the switch from the old touch-screen voting machines in use since 2000 that were banned by state officials following the 2012 Presidential Election.

The council’s action will increase the amount of cash set aside for the new voting machines by $10,000, allowing city Voter Registrar Susan Reed to purchase an additional device and accessories for a newly created sixth voting precinct. Plans to purchase the new machines have been in the works for over the past year.

“When you make a change from touch screen to optical scanners, there is a different way of conducting the election,” said Reed.

Voters used to the old touch-screen machines instead will be handed a paper ballot, and then be shown to an area where they can sit behind a screen to fill out their ballot. Afterward, the voter walks his or her ballot over to an optical scanner machine where the voter inserts the ballot into the machine, and the vote is recorded.

The ballots are then stored under lock and key and later taken to the voter registrar’s office where ballots are counted.

“With the new way you get a lot of ballots, and we treat them like they’re like $100 bills,” said Reed.

The eleven scanners purchased from Hellertown, Pa.-based Election Services Online will be used at all polling places. One will be used as a spare. Reed expects to have the scanners in-house 90 days after the order is placed, and up and running in time for a June 13 Primary Election for statewide offices if one is scheduled. Otherwise, the machines will be used on Election Day November 7, 2017.

Laptop poll books, signage, and privacy screens, and other supplies that accompany the new voting machines will also be purchased using the funding.