Several of Bartholomew County’s electronic voting machines will start using a new verification system that leaves a paper record of each electronic ballot cast.
At least four of the county’s 137 electronic voting machines at the Donner Center will be equipped with a voter-verifiable paper audit trail, or VVPAT, for early voting in October as part of a statewide effort to implement new security measures on electronic voting machines, said Bartholomew County Clerk Jay Phelps.
County election officials expect two additional voting machines at the Bartholomew County Courthouse to use VVPATs for early voting this fall.
A VVPAT is an independent verification system added to electronic voting machines that prints and stores paper copies of electronic voting records to safeguard against possible election fraud and voting machine malfunctions, including making sure that voters use the voting machines correctly and allow election officials to audit votes cast electronically.
“The main difference is for recount purposes,” Phelps said. “Right now, as far as our voting machines go, you can’t do a recount on them because there’s no paper trail.”
For more on this story, see Thursday’s Republic.
