The Johnson County Clerk’s Office is looking into switching e-pollbook vendors before the May primary, but the clock is ticking. Electronic pollbooks, which poll workers use to check in voters at vote centers and make sure they have the right ballot, failed on Election Day, and the county last week asked its long-time vendor, Election Systems and Software, to cover the costs of purchasing new e-pollbooks from a different vendor while continuing to use ES & S’s voting machines. “We have asked (ES & S) to pay for it, but as of right now, they have not committed to that,” County Clerk Trena McLaughlin said on Thursday. “We’re going to have to do something.” McLaughlin and her staff are now weighing the other options because the county needs new e-pollbooks, she said. Election Systems and Software promised it would make things right with the county after it failed more than 52,000 Johnson County voters in November, but so far has not delivered on that promise.
Two other vendors, including one that nearly half of Indiana counties use, have demonstrated their systems to staff at the county clerk’s office, McLaughlin said.
“I like them both. They’re both pretty comparable,” McLaughlin said.
The county is looking at KNOWiNK, a St. Louis-based election vendor, and VR Systems, Inc., a Florida-based election vendor, to replace its current e-pollbooks that they bought from Election Systems and Software, but that failed to work properly in the last election due to a lack of cloud storage and connectivity issues.
Full Article: County looks to switch e-poll book vendors, but company won’t pay.