Senior citizens in Logan County may practice on the state's almost-new touch-screen voting machine, to be used for the second time during the 2008 Primary and General elections, to be held May 13 and Nov. 4.
Therese Cox, senior outreach coordinator for Secretary of State Betty Ireland, will teach brush-up sessions on the iVotronic voting machine at the senior center in Logan at 10:30 a.m. March 19.
Thanks for a federal law, West Virginia, along with other states must meet certain guidelines during elections. One guideline requires counties to replace punch card and lever voting machines. All precincts in the slate will offer voters machines that are handicapped-accessible.
The touch-screen machine, used by several counties in the 2006 elections, provides access for voters, even if a voter has a visual or other physical impairment. It also produces documentation in paper form - a paper trail - so the voter can be assured his or her vote is recorded accurately.
Secretary Ireland has said the use of the machine not only speeds up the tabulation of votes cast, but also reduces or eliminates the occurrence of over-voting.
The touch-screen machine has a built-in capability that alerts a voter when there is an over-vote. It is as easy to use as a bank ATM, a self-service grocery check-out or a Sheetz restaurant order system.
Thirty-four West Virginia counties will use the touch-screen voting machines as the primary voting system this year. Sixteen counties will use optical scan paper ballots: three will use optical scan with an AutoMark voting machine; and two will use paper ballots. Each precinct in Logan County will have one or more touch-screen machines.
For more information, call Cox at 304-550-8538.
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