Photo provided A sample voting pad of the voting machines being considered for purchase for Bartholomew County elections.
Bartholomew County election officials are planning to ask to buy new voting machines in advance of next year’s elections.
Bartholomew County Clerk Shari Lentz, flanked by the county’s bipartisan election board, told Bartholomew County Council members on Tuesday that they would like to purchase 125 voting machines at a cost of about $350,000 to replace aging ones that are nearing the end of their expected life-span.
Lentz will be working together with county Auditor Pia O’Connor to put a final proposal together, potentially as early as the county council’s next meeting in July, for consideration.
The current batch of voting machines were purchased 20 years ago, Lentz said. They were upgraded in 2015, and at that time their vendor, MicroVote, said they would last for about another 10 years. While the machines will still work, “they are getting some age on them,” Lentz said.
“I want to be proactive in taking a look at this and seeing if this is something that we feel like is a good time to purchase new machines,” the clerk told council members.
The goal is for the new machines to be ready before the primaries next spring in advance of the 2026 midterms, according to Lentz.
The clerk said “with the tariff situation being questionable,” MicroVote is able to lock in the price for the 125 machines, but the county will need to pay a down payment sooner rather than later. That’s because MicroVote has only a certain amount of machines ordered “that do not have any kind of tariff on them,” Lentz said, adding there would be no interest “for the next couple of years” if the county opted to pay in installments.
Lentz said there is some money in an election fund to cover the initial cost, “but for $350,000, we’re going to have to kind of extend that over a few years would be my desire.”
The county could pay for a down payment now and then appropriate additional money in 2026, 2027 and 2028, if that’s what the council ultimately decides, Lentz said.
The voting machine panels are “smaller than what we’re accustomed to,” Lentz said, have better lighting and buttons that line up more clearly with the ballot. A sample machine was brought to the meeting so council members could take a look.
“I personally think it’s a nicer, sleaker, just easier to read machine,” Lentz said.
