New system gets off to good start

Turnout seemed strong in the busy pre-work hour of 6 to 7 a.m.
By ROGER G. SMITH
CITY HALL REPORTER
YOUNGSTOWN -- There were some lines and tentative voters but no serious problems in the first 90 minutes today using Mahoning County's new electronic touch-screen system.
Lines formed and backed up a bit at some precincts as voters arrived early and tried their hand at the new $2.9 million system, said Thomas McCabe, deputy elections board director.
He said poll workers had a few questions, most of which had answers that could be found in their instruction packets.
"Minimal problems at this point," he said.
Otherwise, the usual problems cropped up to start the day, such as poll workers' being late and buildings' not being open on time, McCabe said.
Broadcast reports said that reviewing the choice for governor was confusing some voters but that elections officials assure the ballots were cast.
Elections officials hope to avoid problems with the four hours of training given to each poll worker.
Turnout seemed as strong as or stronger than usual in the busy pre-work hour of 6 to 7 a.m., McCabe said. Gauging turnout was difficult because of the time some voters needed in using the 850 new voting machines, he said.
Voting procedure
The process for voters is fairly simple.
Ballot cartridges are put into a voting machine before each person casts a ballot. Then, voters can follow the instructions on the computer screen.
Voters cast ballots by pressing down with a finger next to a candidate's name and then touching the lower right-hand corner and moving to the next page. Touching the lower left-hand corner of the screen returns the voter to previous pages.
One computer screen may have three or four races on it.
A screen comes up showing all their selections after a person is finished making picks. Then the large red "Vote" button at the top of the voting machine lights up.
After that button is pushed, voting is finished.
rgsmith@vindy.com