Joint Performance Review (JPR)

Before we do let's do this if you're not mind which have everybody stand we'll have a work prayer dance counts but she are meaning and I asked for representative line fight as her bulletin please. I mean thank you maybe see th. Stated before gavel the same that he had no comments but would like to ask you and he may not be comfortable sign up but just keep them in your progress if you would his mother passed way in their services will be saturday so please keep him in your prayers if you would today while we conduct this meeting and also for the uh dates that are hit for the family the you have the agenda and front of you obviously we're not going to have all the folks at the end of the table at one time because there's not room in fact members I may need you to kind of shift this way if you will because we're not in the big mac building their redoing the sound system in the big mac building and because of that we came over here to term so if you don't mind maybe make this way grab your name placard if uh you see somebody's not here just take their seat if you wouldn't put name up there so we can identify you if you have questions in the future so what the purpose of the meeting today is in a medium of information uh will not be swearing anybody in under old because it's just to test money as you know that it's been in the news search you can be conducted a paper ballot uh election recently we wanted to have an opportunity for them to come give test money about their experience of members opportunity to ask questions but also there is a report that was put out on the election by the state board election commission unfortunately chris who is the director which supposed to be here his playing got delay common out of florida last night he sitting in the dallas airport somewhere but it's on the screen force he is going to be available to participate in the questions today via zoom but he has a staff here that will have committee into the table and they will present the report and let creates have an opportunity and be available for questions and then we're going to bring sling county to the table if you wonder what why saline county uh they were forth as far as voda turn out uh in we wanted to do a comparison based on source which had a uh smaller turno. Out in a higher country of a higher turnout so that we could do a comparison as to how it would look if a county of larger proportion was to conduct a paper ballot uh process and so that kind of sets the town for me like for being here early on to get in early so we could get out early and with that being said what i'd like to do is ask the individuals that are from seriously county to count to the end table that would be honourable tony horton jiff cotton uh the county court for sort of security lawren gross the chair of the source of county board of election commissions and if you would please count to the end of the table down there and when you find your way to your seat if you would just push that but in afraid you may only be able to have one button lit up at a time the sits from all the louds I think for two or three march to be hard at one time so you may have to punch that off and if you would please we can get your name and turn off for the record please. Good morning my name is chief cotton or jeffrey cotton I am the county clerk in the circuit clerk for searching county I also want to uh tell you that the judge tony horton will not be able to be here this morning okay thank you. The. I'm lorry gross chair of the county commission in sercie county all right good morning let's just start off by asking you could you educate us as far as the process for the paper balled election up to your and maybe just talk about you from you know the the beginning to the end and just give us a perspective from your positions of authority that you hold in how you participated in the election process up there and if you mind maybe just sort of the beginning in walkers through it if you would please and i'll at either want to do take turns or just you know work together it's a team to share what you like us to know. Uhm as a county. The corn court decided to go with paper ballots and that was the end of last year and so we started the process of uhm converting from the electronic machines that we've been using to to a paper ballot which each individual who voted would be able to. Use that paper ballot market and then we would. Count those paper ballots in naturally using the yes two hundred we scanned all the paper ballots and reintapes uh just as if they had voted with the electronic voting machine we just scanned the paper ballots themselves. Uh then the next day the paper ballots were hand counted uh to verify the actual uhm number of votes for each candidate and so we had two to uh things that we had to ensure that we knew the actual count we had a electronic count and we had a paper count. A thing you'd like to add may have. Well that was a fairly involved process and so I won't where you down with all the things that we went through learning how to uh put on a paper ballot election uhm the work that we did to make sure that there was a appropriate chain of custody for the ballots all through the process that there was transparency all through the process we had to uh organize a group of people who want it to help count to do the hand count and then develop the procedures and the paperwork to follow through to document the hand count and to do it appropriately we were it was a learning curve because we'd never done it before and we didn't have any direction about how to do it but our goal was to have a transparent secure quality election to the best of our ability under the circumstances would you mind just maybe going here in giving some of the specific details because I think one thing that would help understand is the amount of uh labor preplanning and maybe take a little deeper as far as what you know what what all was entailed that you're you're total vote count was fifteen hundred and something or do you mean what you're told about count was II don't keep numbers at my head and I didn't know what paperwork to bring so I apologize I don't but it was all over fifteen hundred okay so so that's not that's a small election even that's for for us it's a small election even um we we had to determine how to how to move the ballots from one place to another and make sure that they were secure so our team our team is the three election commissioners and we had to coordinators because we didn't have anyone. Who could devote full time as a coordinator so we had two coordinators who were part time and uh we spent a lot of time up for developing what I would call tracking paperwork that helped us to keep track of the ballots and then on election day to um to keep track of everything as it was coming in from the polls. We had several trainings with people who just wanted to be counters there were separate from our power workers all that we have power workers who want it to be counters. And so on our we we rain everything through the ds two hundred on election day all of the ballots and we had that preliminary count and reported it that night according to the law and then all of our ballots were secured and the valt at the clark's office in security containers until the next morning when we brought them to the court room where our counters were set up and we counted we had a I don't know how you want me to go so i'm glad to give you as much information as you need to just keep beyond and give its many details that you'd like okay we had a five tables with six people at each table and we took when a pole at a time the our ballots were collected according we have uh we have early voting and then we have nine polls polling places in our county and so we had the ballots according they were separated according to precincts with the end those polling places and each table had one of those sets of ballots and are we had scanners at the table so that we counted the ballots and batches so each better ballots which would be approximately twenty five ballots in a batch had a batch cover she that identified the batch and it was the ballots within scanned as they were taken out of the secure box that they had been in that night and they the batch was scanned with the batch cover sheet so we would have an electronic copy of the ballots and the batch cover sheet so we could always go back and we could look at that data electronically to see that that are to see any ballot within that badge and then we had teams up to we had two we have a caller. With a color by their side so they were both looking at the ballots we had a camera over each table so the ballots were always on camera um being recorded as a called the votes and then we had to what we call talliers so we had tally sheets where they each mark the votes and checked one another all throughout the process and then when that batch was counted then the talliers would check there each of their uh categories are votes and make sure that they had the same numbers so in that way we were trying to assure that we we catch anything that was missed along the way and then the batches those that back a say twenty five ballots because some of the batches were twenty three somewhere sometimes when they had a left and would be a batch of whatever was left we put them in what we we got those transparent document bags out enough you all have ever seen them and so we put those in that bag and then we put them back where they were in the box so they were security again and when people gives me when all of the when all of those votes were tallied for that particular polling place then we took those uh tally sheets and from those telling sheets we added all the uh the votes to another tally sheet that was a different color so we could keep them separate and that gave us the totals for e. Uh members having questions at this time center love thank you mister chair now and following the process that you have so first of all what is the difference between the paper balance system in the electronic vote the electronic voting there I guess we will do in place account did you have a system like that prior to this. Electronic voting other electronic rolling machines asking use paper ballots on election day right. You are I guess we have the package that we submit in the machine I mean I you had the you have to educate because I don't know which which references so yes we have uhm no we use the voter machine so we just an election day and plaski county I do but now in early voting early do you sure what you would have with your with your express boat machine which is where you vote on the screen yes you would take the long narrow paper and put it in the machine and then you would choose your you make your selections and then the machine would prenate correct right on that paper spit it out and then you would take place so this is it's the same is is this which hussein process that you're going to ask the pro- well we have a paper balance that you fill out by hand which in on the election day in plastic account you would have the same thing you would have paper ballots that the voter wouldn't use the machine to fill out the ballet you would be we like fill in the bubble so to speak on the paper ballot itself. All right maybe I don't know because II don't know early so collection commission. I don't know. There's two different ways I in our state of a voting legally speaking that account I can cast boats and one would be what you're familiar with this year is an early voting which would be using the express but machine and then another would be having ballots that are literally printed on the paper so that when the voter comes in the voter would take a pin market and market exactly so you still do and it's still so the let me ask you which I guess would I have two different systems misgrowth for answer that question we do in favor one would you pull up microphone a little closure with heads members has turn off your microphone because it does make a difference because we have to two microphones on and then set better yet that that's good enough miss gross I saw you conversion with german active there's somebody else from service you can you guys want to bring up to the table that are that is in an elected capacity i'm okay with that if you want to but your name entitled in are you my exists. So you are on the election commission okay there to which should now push my nearest yourself with your name please. And uh but then we're gonna let misgrowth answer which you in push button hold it now granted everybody has their uh now go in my name is cigarettes for search candy left to make sure and the democrat representative okay all right if you will hang on miss gross group and answer the question from center love please remind me the question are so i'm trying to figure out paper balance system you said we use in plastic I mean yes cause I just have more early are an easy thing yes so are. I guess we're talking about the security of the system because we've we've been discussing security for all this time you know that the security of the the election to the art it's never there so would you say one is less so more secure than the other well I think there are a lot of opinions on that uhm I know that when our **** did some research and determine that they wanted to go with paper ballots hand counted paper ballots in our county i'm sure they must have had some good reasons i'm not a jp i'm just a commissioner what you do with the **** tell us to do okay but I mean i'm not trying to pay you down i'm assuming that they felt that there would be more secure. Okay how this work can I speak now what the things we had some discussions in the county reference to this uh going with the paper ballots we it was passed by both of the police. The democrat is worth republican then we heard a for our referred to the town hall meeting then after that we weren't spoke to the court court which we do have one of our court court members back here mister richard then the corn court upon it a committee to steady this in what the things that we did at the commission was to listen to the people the people of search secondly wanted this from multiple reasons may I actually there okay other reasons our we're poor county what the poorest in the state we really appreciate it that the voting machines that were given to us believe me we did there to get an old part of one more heaven some some problems with they won't work we're having to take these out to the rule areas of the county and it's it's hard force to get them out there we're having we're using some churches some community buildings. And it's the expensive amount there plus they're going down like I say it we're having problems with them and what the reasons that we went with almost it's faster to to be able to vote with our own paper it's also easier to get the machines there and one of my biggest fears is that for those machines start going down we're gonna poll closing some polling places it to me that's unacceptable because when you start doing that you're disenfranchising a certain group of people you're disfranchising. Our veterans a lot of live in rural areas you disinfranchising the poor people and another reason that we're the we decided to go with paper ballots you have a certain group that's intimidated by other machines they're not as computer literate and so in my view it was very important and the views of the people which also were with the jps. That we go with the practical ballots to get more people the opportunity to vote in what they the people who we represent. Believe in no is the more secure way of voting are voting. It's it's we just feel like that that's one of the many reasons that we weren't with favorite ballot. They're missing serious via for public smaller members of normal information miss gross to come in if you if you agree with what he said I may ask this last I said there are a lot of different opinions on this topic I think it's a quite a controversial topic and I think that uhm I cannot speak for the jps who were the ones who made the determination to go with paper ballots but from some of the things that the commissioner watchford has said I agree with much of what he said I don't think i'm concerned about closing some polling places as he is I think you know that's just a strong personal thing with him but I think it's a bad idea to close posting to close them back for me. Paper ballots. Makes sense. Personally they make sense because with a paper ballot you know exactly the intent of the voter you don't have a machine between the voter and the printed ballot if you think about a a express vote machine for example you the voter you come in and you touch the screen and you tell and it's got a lot of neat bells and whistles right because it tells you if you missed one it asks you if we want to review all those kinds of things as a neat machine and then it prints out your your vote on a piece of paper right on the ballot so basically it's a it's an electronic pin if you will and it's a four thousand dollars electronic pin and the new machines are almost double that cost. Okay so if I take my pin which costs ninety nine cents and put my votes on the piece of paper two things that happened i've saved a whole lot of money because this is some four thousand dollars and i've also made sure that I don't have a machine some of which have computers in them between my choices in what's written on the paper. I know that when I put my mark on that paper it's the market that I wanted to put there so then my follow up the one more than we'll move on my follow it will be about the security of the against the process paper ballots I think you're in them in you know I mean it's it's important security it's important both with the machines and with paper ballots elections need to be secure and so the measures that I would say that any county takes to secure their balance a measure the security ball security measures are very important as we spend a lot of time working through that and making sure that we were confident that we were securing those ballots and everywhere possible okay let me interrupt you because I got some other members one of those questions and we can circle back around uh represent a ba. Thank you mister chairman couple of questions why were your paper ballots pre number. Yes sir uh secondly you said that you discussed the people's choice did did you have optional did you have optional ballots where they could vote by paper or utilize the electronic machine to see truly what the wishes are the the the voters who are yes sir we did all right and do you have that information kind of what that percentage was that used machine versus paper I can tell you that we had fewer than ten people used the machines there was a machine according to the aday requirements there was a machine that every polling place and we gave every vote of the option abusing the machine or the paper ballot and II if I had known some of the questions that we would have I would have brought heart numbers and I can get those members to you if you would like me to do it okay I just that that's cut caution and then I guess my last question is how are you provided your voter information did you get your voter list by paper or was that an electronic process from a computer that someone said. For answer question representative would you not turn your michael for two year two there thank you go ahead now the voter registration are roles are on electronic on machine from there we actually printed out for the election itself we printed out paper pole books and so when the individual voter came that day they were verified using those paper pole books which you know had been used in the past we so we did not use the uh electronic machines to verify the voter uh themselves we used to pay proposed and and you just have polling sight you don't have a distribute the blank owner we do not have voting senators now we have individual polling places around the county nine is a lower said we have nine of those on the day of election and then course we only have one location for a voting thank you I saw thank you mister chair just so you know where you are in the line of representative spring representative car representative long and in center dots and represent spring good morning thank you mister chair and thank you all for being here thank you miss schools for your testimony I just want to get clarification on your test earlier testimony that process the to explain that takes place on the evening of the election are you saying that you all come back the next day and do what you just describe that's what i'm trying to figure out yes we hand counted we had a preliminary count from the ds two hundred from the tabulators that night the election night. Which we then we reported uhm through to the sector states office and then we had a hand count the next day and we looked at both of those before we certified our election followed mister chair. As okay so going okay so those met the and what to did the night before and what you did the next day that they call they met the numbers we had some we had several ballots that the d s two hundred did not accept if if things aren't build out just perfectly the ds two hundred will spit it back out and so those were in addition to and we had absentee ballots that the d s two hundred didn't read as well yeah thank you thank you replied core thank you mister chair may just said one question out of curiosity and with paper ballots there's a potential remark more than one candidate on a particular race did you guys have any issues with overvotes we we did but when it happened there was there were two ballots where the the voter did not distinguish but the other there were a couple of other ballots. Not three I think there were two where they evidently voted the wrong line and then they marked it out and they voted that when it said this is the one I want you know and that definitely the ds two hundred does not accept that so we had to count those by hand local thank you sir you want it on to the excuse me if I may add on to their. Another thing that we have really really implemented in which we always have but I really want to stress here any time that there was a paper ballot. We need those ballots that were remarked for we thought was not perfectly correct like she was saying if someone voted for mister smith and I would put no idea I meant to vote for mister jones anything like that we went back is the commission we are selves. The three of us the three commercials we went back and we looked at those we didn't have other people to look at those. So that insured another step of security. Alright uh represent long thank you mister chairman not a fair remember but I come up in to watch the proceedings whole election day and cost of the followup the next stage is to serve because of senator hammer had passed to bill in the previous searching basically trying to add security measures uh to paper ballot voting because previously he was okay for a county to choose to vote of our paper ballots but presumably nothing about security and what the things that we were really have pushing for in the last session was uhm secure the security of the boat so we've been back in and in added things it would without be uh helpful uh to protect the vote in a ballot of part around type of situation in that's part of why I wanted to come up there just to make sure you see if what we done had worked in in thirteenth and if we need to change in house very possibly surprised at how well through the vote we had uhm they weren't about and beyond the call during its horse having the video of the counting taking place in the uhm scanning the extra vote the vote seemed before the counter room those who require balance actually they went above and beyond the car duty for there but I want to have miss gross question if it's the settlement down in a duration by our kind of making up the process we what what did you learn to go into this process in going through your audit that would help you to do a better job the next election well we learn to lie I feel like we. A head of time we tried to determine every area where security would need to be increased or watched but because we had never been through this process before there were there were some things that we missed and we learned from those things and the audit that uh because we had an audit uh time runs together sometime in the last two weeks the guys came down and audited us and or came up in auditors and we found a couple of places where um in the tally sheets of votes weren't carried over in the hand count and um we were we were very disturbed by that because we won every vote to count and so we realized that the paperwork we hit developed needed to be more thorough there were just things numbers that we needed to keep track of through the process that we didn't even know we needed to keep track because there there's no training our preparation for this we were really operating in a vacuum and so II consider that the changes were already making in our process will make it what what have a very begin pact on the way that we count in the way that we keep track of the numbers in the general election coming up. Okay go and center dots thank you mister chair uhm so i've got a few different questions some of them are are processed that you've you've talked about here the last statement that you made that some of the tallisheets were not carried over. But you didn't catch that until you were audited or somebody else cut that after resulted in. How was the accuracy on the original bs two hundred I forget what the name of the machine has the death two hundred how was the accuracy of that in your hand count was there any discrepancies between them to to kind of catch that and say hey this is what it was counted as and here's what our tallet sheets and the totals don't match I mean that's one of the that's one of the things that we learned that we had not done as well as we wanted to do because. The what what we needed to have done on our counting she as we were going through was to compare at a precinct level like every vote we were comparing by polling place level well we were comparing by precincts but not by individual election if that makes sense we would have caught those votes that weren't carried over if we had done that and like I say we just didn't even know that that needed to be done we're very green when we went in this process the whole present as a whole but not the end of not individuals and because we had a number of ballots that weren't run through the ds two hundred we saw that there was a discrepancy but we thought it was because the difference in the votes that went through I can guarantee you in the general we will be able to tell you every single number for every single race in every single precinct and compare them to how how big you said that there is around fifteen hundred total votes cast in this election how many what what was the discrepancy as far as the the percentage of the dural between the original ds two hundred count and there were account there were eleven boats that were not count at eleven again. Uhm and then. Back to the process of if more than one thing is checked I heard that the commissioners decide on that uhm how how is how are those ran through though when those go through the machine and there's two things marked does it just kick that out and so fix it back out so there's an obvious. Over over vote that in that case and then the commissioner decided yes this was a vote for. Mister smith or is for mister jones or not a vote at all because it wasn't properly marked as that you make that determination and then that part of that eleven vote discrepancy then now now that's in addition to that okay in the um. And then just overall it sounds to me as if there is a lot of labor involved additionally there is not normally there what is the overall cost additional cost of me that took. Six to six people three tables eighteen extra people what well we're working on a reimbursement sheets now and once we have all of our numbers together we've been we've had trouble getting data from essentials but we finally did get our data from essential so now we can put all our numbers together so that we can compare really lime by line where the extra cost were there with paper ballots there is an extra half in per- there's an extra personnel cost if you pay your if you pay we had about half of our counters the people who wanted to count they volunteered their time they signed it now the day for saying they didn't want to be paid for that day so you have one day where you have an increased payroll that that's the day following the election and so but the rough if you had to pay everybody cause you can't really count on how many volunteers you're going to have on each individual election cycle we had we had a thirty voter thirty counters uhm I don't know what payroll is for a few hours a peace or is it came out about a hundred and twenty dollars and so we're talking. Three thousand dollars through that okay that's that's the high end all right thank you. Uh representative thank you mister chair a couple things on the follow up on what uh serious dots and was saying the estate earlier poor county and you know and then we just discussed the additional cost of a hand car you said you're you're currently feeling out to reimbursement form so do you have an estimated own on what this paper ballot election cost compared to uh electronic. Yeah. And and see which one caused more in in you have those numbers I will have those numbers and I will be glad to forward them to you if you want those members when I get them compared the big savings and paper ballots is not in the election we're having today it's and the fact that we will not have to replace most of the machines which is a huge cost factor for a small county. And so the savings as our peace determined it is a long term longer term savings rather than a momentary savings in at our understands that so really it is the the future savings on that equipment were you given reimbursement when you when the county were you given that equipment that you applied for the ground and and get the money that that reimbursed the county for that equipment it's the county itself uh along with about ten other counties in our consultant we're unable to we didn't have the budget available to purchase the machines and so yes the uh state did purchase and give us the uh voting machine since so we did not have any initial cost with machines now moving forward those costs and our or a since out of replaced machines that care for have gone down it would be up to the country to pay there but the initial cost zero for the country will hear we were given all the equipment and and then just want follow up on that on that side could you could you also provide the amount of money that you've had to expand on repairs and and keeping the equipment here in good work in condition uh that the county's head experience the the the life of that equipment cause I was also election chairman when when we rolled out with the new equipment in in ash for county unfortunately I didn't get the growing up we had a disparate county money to get there so could you provide any promotion to us who are currently uh as far as and now we have not actually spend any money because the uhm we have we have the machines in a secure location and so as one goes down we just. Set it aside so the initial group of machines that we received we currently have uh probably about eight uh machines that are not working and so we would have to only put will one machine at each polling place or the bigger poll in places maybe two but as currently we have not spent any money to replace machines uh so. Ha. As far as I know and bending more less power and estimate we have an estimate of what it would cost to to get those are the rate machines back up to operational capacity no sir I do not alright thank you sir. Yes sir that's what I was referring to a few minutes ago is these machines go down if they continue to go there how we're going to replace them the only way we if we can't replace them we're going to have to go with faith for ballots or we're going to have start closing precedents to reiterate we start closing presents we start disinfractions in semi roads vulnerable people do not being able to get to vote and it's forced the counting goes you'll always passed that state that we could use paper ballots by people spoken use more to use paper ballots but it's there's no precedent that's been say at the end of the last generation for counting vote. You know we were really given a guidance by the state and likely audit we had we welcome constructive criticism on getting something like this and it's like you all we know that you're down here we're all here for a fair election to be able to get everyone to vote to be able to get to vote in the votes to be counted in a timely manner so anything in the laws that you could pass any signations or that open for them saying that thank you that's that's part of what we're having the speaking about so we can now that we've had one we can hear it out and and do some comparison in a more recognized representative I think here for at least four to to mysteriously when you say the early you stay there is about three thousand little over three thousand dollars on the not you but that the other gentleman three thousand dollars for the for the counters on that additional day of the election and you know when II guess the reason I was asking about the cost on repair of that equipment is is to see is that less than three thousand dollars or not and then how many elections you have. A year and multiplied times three thousand dollars a water of their cost is for counters it could it could come up to a much larger price tag for a poor county and and that would be something that would also be a consideration and that sits the bank or me coming out if I may attribute for my accident from business standpoint what we're looking at. Is how long these machines will last is we stated and then we're looking at the potential of replacing them and is used a banker i'm sure you're fully understand. That in a much home which can't understand in any way shape former fashion we look at the depreciation we say we have to spend up ten thousand dollars old no machines coming out we've got captain layout capital expansion and then we have the depreciation i'm trying to look out for the long term the long term of the states money he start the states by the people's money administrated by the state in the people's money administrated by the county and it's gotta be balanced at at is don't see I was i'm a former j p also so I know and have been all exclusive for several years i'm trying to look at it from all aspects of it and i'm looking at the depreciation as much it's you know how are we going you know we don't know these machines you're aging as we all know we don't is as I say we is the county do not know the expected laugh of a machine with it's now they're going down and going down quick and there's a times that we'll put you know they'll be fan will pull my storage we can't get them fixed without more money so that's cat of what myself that's how i'm looking at it. If that answered any questions sir. And yeah II guess you know again not be confrontation because I don't I don't really have a dog in five in in your county II believe it left the people in new local control make that decision but what I would say is when the state purchase those machines and and send them to the county and I think more of the conditions of those things were maintaining and and campaign are working fashion so as machines go down at again as a business in this decision to keep them in good working condition and keep and work in in the the county it's not going evaluate so there's a counties that are in the same situation union where their replacing equipment in in having to uh spend counting moneysome though so better utilization of that equipment would be to find find some of the county that you could donate that equipment to your account I can I can see exactly what you're saying and I agree in part with it but what will work for a county for the salary county palestine county washington can you some of the counties it might look at all piper when you count the practical application that was small county poor people black will your word is trying to get by with what we've got to do the best we can to once again to try to repeat myself fire election we can all be proud of it this is how ace that we can do it without burdening the people in its it's one thing to say we'll repair for someone exposed to we as an election commissioner is election commission we have such a small budget we can't say okay let us go out and replace them that has to come to the administrative report by the corn court I can't answer for what they will give us in what they won't give us because I don't know it's this term exactly where we stand I know that there's a lot of projects in the candidate that we find it in I don't know. For we stand for we could get the money unless like you said it was applied at as you said. That the state that the county would provide the maintenance for these is a comment I don't recall that i'm not going to say it did not happen i've just stating I don't recall it but maybe you all help us out a little for we can have these elections for the people and by other people but giving us some money to maintain those possible minutes for it but also no. That there's a lot of things that you all would like to do is the isolaters but that money is not there this is a small state we have such a small budget now realize there's a lot of things every day that you all have request for that you would like to do but to do the you'll have to say okay we're gonna have to get this place where i've kit that police that's the same way with the chaot sir the main europe she could we are growing list of legislators and. We did not put secretary state on the agenda but did ask him to be in the room for technical assistance or to be at the call of the cheer to answer in where modes on the list represent fight center dismains center dots and then i'm on our sector state come forward because I got a question to our one ask as as resolved some of the questions comments that were made represent fight. Thanks for miss chairman we appreciate your being here today to answer questions I have three questions really how many uh humidity ballots were counted uh how long did that take the next day. And how many ballots did you have left over after the election. That's our own numbers i'll have to I did not bring specific data with makers again I did not really what we were going to be discussing our what kind of number she were going to want but I can get you those numbers okay if you would be glad to I have one of the questions how many ballot styles did you have different styles we had fifty five to five ballot staff thank you in a two or two members it feels submit the questions you want uh answered and I i've heard several to kolby we all stand it up to you you can respond back to kobe user staff person uh misgross and then we'll push that back out all the committee members okay and so before you all get out of room today come on up mikobia will get all that worked out right uh all right and i've got to sing or display dots and senate king senators make an apologize and I don't wanna rehash anything if we've already been through some of it I walk in just a little bit late but just to make sure I understand the conversation so far. Uh you're concerned it's more on the financial side then there was any issue with the integrity of the elections prior to paper balance is that great it's financial we have we are not aware of any problems with the integrity of elections in the past in so but so that in fact you're into the decision I think it did in the county I mean I think it did the concern the the future integrity of elections I think it I think it did factor in definitely okay and then so what has the county passed as far as rules I mean it we're not the only governoring body that would would be able to dictate who what when and where in how is far as the elections go for the county and so ha- has the county passed anything or had anything in place because I i'm i'll just say that the biggest rate flagged me was we have volunteers counting ballots I don't know if they were professionally trained in volunteers that are working for free I mean to me actually. Probably creates a greater risk in someone that's being paid in professionally trained account ballots and so i'm just well half of those volunteers that volunteered were poll workers they were all trained but what they said why they retrained to camp there were all trained in our county we had three different extensive counting practices if you will training and practice sessions and the reason that they volunteered was because they had heard the concern about the increasing cost for going paper ballots and so even though they got paid for working the polls the day before they signed the at the day of it saying they would volunteer their time on that day for counting but they were all election officials duly trained so that was some type of certification or something that happened as far as how to come back out I wouldn't personally know there is there's a form that even a poll worker any election official there's a form that they can sign so if I wait my right to get paid to know i'm asking about the training that did occur who lived that how how was that done I let it okay and in you created a curriculum then I guess for it i'll get in in a behind assuming you didn't bring that but if you don't mind I think that would be one thing if we could just get a cop it was easy to grab I can make carpets of that yet i'm just speak curious of of what that actually looked like I should begin because my major concern. At the voted with a paper ballot I remember voting one time in a place that it was very difficult for me to even get a republican ballot to vote on because I was living in place he can at the time and it was a one of the hanging shared balance in and I was always very curious even how that turned out even how if I had it you know pushed in the right place and are the many other things that go along with it so i'm i'm very concerned personally just a personal experiences about paper ballots their validity the fact that counters can make mistakes how that's reverified and very fat all over again triple they are fad because I think at the end in the day everyone wants the vote to be counted I understand that's what you're trying to do too so I would be just curious to make sure what you're are understand what your processes were in as far as the transportation of the paper ballots to and from you know we have had some issues with that pretty recently in regards to apps and tea ballots in their transportation and alterations that happened with that do you have the list of procedures that were in place for how those were moved from police at the polling side I have I didn't bring all that with me by cassette grad a couple of things one of the most just accounting procedures but I can get that to you as well it's all on paper in all of our gail and all of our chain of custody documents on paper and when we did our poll worker training one part of that training that we added to what we get from the state is how to handle their paper ballots properly okay can you want me through a little bit of what that look like on how we got it from the polling side to the counting side and absolutely because we can with the okay paper ballots up until election day i'm just going to go for early voting i'll just tell you election day or case more or involved in that II think the early voting in where those stay and where they're harvard to get for a two week period is probably the the greatest chance to for there to be an issue okay. Up until we open election on early voting the ballots are locked in the vote at the clark's office and uh the morning of early voting uh the commissioners take the ballots to the early voting site there is a rim that is right adjacent to its in our recent there's a room that we have a pad lock on so that the only people that can get in that room are one of the three election or one of the election officials either the commissioner so the coordinators are they able to go in by themselves there's always going to be at least two by two in in is it in in its monitor I guess with video or there is no video there okay so how do you ensure so who has a key just the commissioners in the coordinator but each one of them has a key so there's nothing that prevents one going in one at a time of the committee then honor personal honor well we've got where we are right we're talking about honor even in the machines and so I think we've got acknowledge that there's some issues somewhere and it could be even on the on the county level so okay so there but everybody has a key there's no video in of the the space in the game I think these are useful things to know about you know if we're going to have to put something place I would hope the counties would but but okay. If I may follow up on there once again as i've stated it's by partisan but democrat in republic we decide as a party we also wish to have the padlor we the county didn't by the parallel we do because we don't want anybody who said the people are supposed to to have a key to there that that's what the thanks. Yeah. That I wanted to stay you know any time that those ballots are moved it. It is this one person one party does not go in and get those there there has to be but they have the ability to go in it's one party one person to go and get them and there's no oversight of if that were to have kird and not to occur that's that's correct okay and you brought up you brought up something we need to address as a camera down there a camera on it will be a good idea and that's something that we need to put in place in sincerely thank you for some more constructive criticism which we definitely thank you I charge mister we understand what doesn't come across as criticism I mean I think what you're doing I don't know much of an issue with honest on such a small level I think fifty eight balances a lot of ballot which you all should you looking at yourself you get too close to a problem to see and you all are saying things that we have so which we do actually want to apple map in the general election and fit thank you for bringing up any point like that uhm sinner dots and then send it a king. Thank you mister chair so in this might be a question possibly for the secretary state's office of if they're I don't know if you're going to call them up at some point here go ahead and come on let's see you're whoever should come and name entitled for the record please. Leslie bell me i'm the elections for arkansas secretarias fate you question for her at things should probably be able to answer. So my concern is more toward the the election equipment the and the maintenance there of as I understand it in the wonderful thing about live streaming as you get text from people all over the place and hey did you know this uhm does the state maintain a contract to fix this election equipment so that counties don't have to bear that burden or cost yes we actually in two thousand and twenty three source county uh along with our seventy five other counties had the essentials there to do maintenance I don't know if you guys were president that time or the county clark did it but that's the proper time to tell him if you have equipment day on and we pay for it you don't pay anything so if you have equipment it's day on right now i'll get with you on how to take care of it or aren't can earn your coordinator but you guys don't pay anything for the maintenance so you shouldn't have any equipment ever that's not operating correctly okay and then secondarily how has the secretary of state's office informed counties that there is a contract because clearly they didn't know and i'm sure we've got at least a portion of our other countries that don't know the same thing some counties like my county has five hundred express machines approximately and they're all working they're all in there have been since twenty eighteen when the gotten and so because the state maintenance we don't pay a penny in maintenance contracts because the state pays for that maintenance contract in representatives and that's that's one of the things as we try to stay on top of the coins and goings of you know the commissioner's new clerks appointed clarks we have four election coordinators in the secretary of state's office and then also like when it's context the county to go on side and do this they you know will work with the county to fix that stuff in that something that uh I was just talking to our coordinators and they are a message to make sure that everybody knows it because. It's some of the ones that you know do you know it have made went on to endeavours canning election commissions you know volunteer basically and they do change a lot it's a lot of work for no money so we'll make sure that every county knows what II don't know state board ever says that in their trainings but I know that you know I can see we get twenty three that they were on side insertion county in twenty five there will be back on side and it's to answer any questions about the you know the wellbeing of the machines have used federal money to go ahead and pay for new batteries for every piece of equipment in arkansas we get those help american vote fines from the election assistance commission so no counting will have to pay for new batteries or anything we're going to take care of form in that mean it's all be done in twenty twenty five they do the maintenance in office instead of the own election year sir if I might make a suggestion the secretary of state's office just may be put it into a guidance ninety days before an election general and primary just so that those are the biggest elections in you you'll have the people actually working on that leading up to that election so they can be sure and make sure we've got up to date maintenance on all the machines before the primary heart of the general yeah there was one thing I heard in the conversation that if we have you know newer commissioners that might not know that maybe sent and we put out in our reminders we do daily weekly reminders for elections for all counties and and maybe we'll include that hard were maintenance agreement but uh we'll take that consideration thank you sir senator king. Twenty seven years ago I was on the election commission you know we were very talking about the costs and understand exactly what you're talking about rule counties in having money issues but in two thousand four I think out of response from the two thousand election uh you know the federal government came up with money in harvard so we had the decision on the west commission that time we could either go with the uh paper ballots machines for combination of both and we went with a combination of both but I think that's the biggest thing that we need to do is get with our federal delegation and look at the costs and do a future cause because what you're going to have is if we don't continue to have money rolling in you're going to see go back the days of with all this technology in paper ballots you're going to see you know some counties with the cruise ship and in some of them you know floating down the the river in your enter to so I think that's probably as much as our criticized federal government that was one of the best things they ever deared was come up with money to make it uniform across the nation for a voting machine so that's a number of one thing that I see that's going to help the state with the cost and it's somebody that's been on a election commission can't ballots the other party is there when you guys went through there because that been on the last commission long time ago and still know people down there they call me the cinema down there was the machines can be fraud there there is that soon down the iraq I think there is that sentiment and a lot of places and you know recently there had been problems with machines and pennsylvania in other places where they were casting wrong votes I mean it has had it is happening now I don't know that it's happened in the past there is a lot of suspicion about the machines whenever you have a computer between the person who's voting and the printing of that vote on paper I think there's their shipping concern because computers are easily hacked well that's true but I remember the day's back dean of voter fraud and there is a lot elections still in your dark saw community two thousand six I went to account in carol county and recount of the count. And in a recount of the recount and so there was we had huts and how long he reside for cause of voter fraud but I think most of the time when you see the voter fraud stuff it is not election on its very rarely turn up anything on voter fraud I mean it when the fraud has happened that's cook before it even gets to that point but let me ask you one question on the ballots now this has been a long time been on their son at that time essentially it's printed the ballots in there was for that there was counties that printed their own ballots I mean there's a lot of things with an item understand that electronic stuff and I can think it be frauded I mean i'm sceptical but i've also been through elections where there were voter fraud with paper ballots to we've been there and laid at night throw in ballots through they don't come in I mean there were situations in some of the counties I know of. Ballots came up there and laid in it takes thirty five minutes to drive from the poland side and it took them two hours to get there and and so there's it's just this thing have gone on the piper ballots and not i'm not saying electronic can't happen but the paper ballot stuff trust me there's a lot of stories and stuff that we've heard but heard about so where did you get your ballots printed out yesterday did you get your ballots obvious and answered we had the printed absolute printers now so I mean there was things back long time ago whenever they were print and ballots back then in nobody watching believe me the state or election commissioners a lot of times they'd life in your face trust me I know I was on the phone with them I mean our qualhurts and how long said that's just the vote of fraud we got me that's just the way we did it and we all knew it over there so and I would tell you on republican side it happens in there and proper county in two thousand twelve I win on election night and I get a call the next day and their counter ballots down there without till anybody which is illegal you have to have a public notice and it was my opponent's brother on the legs commission and in our so now mine that went about thirty five votes instead of more votes so I would say with what's went on and cropper county there should be a lot of suspicion going on there too and it was public so we can be both sides I think it's clear that fraud will happen in elections among certain people if possible I mean we know that it's we know that there are some people I believe that very small percentage of people who will cheat effect can whatever they're using and so one and recognizing that and the problems have happened in the past with paper ballots it's one of the reasons that we work so hard to developed very clear guidelines with redundancies and upon redundancies to keep that from happening and when I provide that the paperwork and the um that we developed for that in the plan that we develop for that hopefully you'll see the effort that we got we went. To to make sure that those things couldn't happen because there are ways to check and make sure there were an extra ballots cast there weren't ballots lost that sort of thing so you I mean to agree that we need to work on our federal delegation to help statewide with the cost. Would be a uniform thing that I think everybody would agree with whatever costs we go to because ultimately I do think that that's who should pay for the election equipment because like we said in in the small real counties and even in more and other counties it's more populated the money part to do that in with its new technology you know you get the new machines where the inevitably it's like everything else to software runs out you have to spend money on that too so if you want to work on trying to rod our philip federal delegation to cover the cost of election believing that they spend enough money there they ought to be paying for these machines I think uhm members that may give you a snapshot where we are going represent ladyman on the list and my goal is somewhere around them thirty years out of here and what we're going to do is have election commission come up and give their report of their audit of the paper ballot election up there that is going to create opportunity for some questions and then want to get sling county to the table to talk person if it was to happen in a county's side slain so just give me a snapshot when it comes to your questions should keep that mind if you would let us they want to ask you one question do you know how much money is in the find right now that's available for the repairs in the maintenance on the machines near the bounces in the the balances right now i'm probably basically nothing cause we've already paid for the the next year it's over a million dollars a time we have set fun for their secretary of states office theater uh created there of ucc following years ago a great fine in the end one of the reasons to that uh we try to keep fed up is the federal money for new equipment will not allow us to pay for the maintenance but we also have around we did have room three to four million lived out of old harvard money that's what i'm gonna pay for the batteries for any other car maintenance or anything like that that the county's need so the only maintenance it would not be paid for. There had been counting abuse you know to it in some way like it was broken at a polling place they'd have to pay for that but county is also can reach out to me and i'll help some money those half a phones replace their equipment they don't have to replace any equipment if they want to go above and beyond what the stay in the federal money did provide then yes they would have to pay for that out accounting firms but if you have machines that you need replace completely contact erin and will get you new machines as a stays right now for county needs help you've got money to help them run the absolutely sir are representative ladyman thank you mister chairman for secretary of states I was I have a question so what is the expected life of these machines the what we're looking at probably ten to fifteen years more before they have to have updates one thing that the new equipment has that abertronics that were previously then and they come under the state in around two thousand and five those were not great well they were like a ballot marker with you on audit log in the machine itself so the the voter never got to see their ballot so when these come out the border seizer ballot their upgradable uh in fact that's one of the things that are being done in this next twenty twenty five session they're like the windows version of some of the software for the election where in the equipment itself will be updated so we're probably looking at outside the state or need to buy equipment in maybe another ten to fifteen years. Okay so the count the image in the million dollars that you get every is that every two years we get it about over two years now it's you know at the ac in the federal government to discretion uh like I said i'm about really to pull down another million from the facts in that what about those batteries we are but it's been steady especially since covered that we yet you know anywhere from three million to a million that we pull down and in there it's a state may act but that's kept us running pretty gear on elections and it helped by a lot of equipment for the countries so we have a lot of machines in the state uh most remarked at the same time so the uh grades or replacement machine all machines break now eventually so I mean even the metal parts are going to crack or something's going to happen so my concern at state level is do we have adequate funding savings or count to replace these machines and you know my main that you've got that covered but eventually you're going to have major costs may be replacing these machines and we're talking about replacing five hundred machines at once where do we get their money that we have an account set up that we're putting money in a you call it rainy day replacement whatever are we covered there if we're telling the counties that we're going to take care of the machines we're going to replace someone when they break do we have adequate savings the depreciation was brought up that's a real paying these things eventually they are going to die so do we have adequate funding to to reply so the machines when those things are going to happen I have adequate funding for to protect this system I would say that moving forward that we probably do not have adequate fund and we're looking at your looking probably thirty to fifteen million dollars to replace a system if we go with a system roberts like the us it's something that uh I was gonna talk. Start talking to the chair about i'll put him on the spirit but we've talked about the that's obviously a great question representative lighting in the yes we will have to replace it stuff eventually in the the state needs to start looking at some way to you know pay at the end so that channels because you know counting should not have the morning account from a county at income from really small county but our came from accounting where we didn't have a lot of money in I know that county like service county they they won't be able to ball the snakes generation of stuff swing county wouldn't be able to probably even do it. That's why I said it's like right now I have enough to get as through this equipment many will continue to get federal help from what the election assistance commission tells us. But you know a lot of states did not by they did not pay for the county equipment counties had the head by and pay in some counties head by if they had the money on this system but we would like to continue to take care of our counties in that fashion so i'm. Very interested in any funding sources or ideas that the legislators have as well and be happied or with the future for that thank you thank you miss chairman could I have one more maybe a statement more in the question sure you all I think I got the numbers right here you said you get fifteen hundred ballots and you have thirty counters that correct okay so I calculate that that's one counter for every fifty ballots but man think that's right my engineers coming out of here but I think that's right and so if i'm looking at a county like cricket where i'm had and we've got thirty thousand ballots we're looking at six hundred counters if the scale is the same and it may not be and and i'm not this is not a negative torture and i'm just trying to figure the numbers out here because I believe this may be a size county size requirement or option because if you go to craig or palaski as an example I don't think you can violence of people to count those ballots and it's going to be very expensive so I think the small and I like the option of what in the currently decided I think that's a great thing but I think there is a point in population or number of voters that it becomes unrealistic what you all think about. I think first of all the we did not have to have that many people at each table I think we can go from six to four and have the same results and basically the same speed we didn't really know what to expect so for us it was a bit of overkill but I also know that the longer they counted the faster they got as they became comfortable with the system the counting protocol and so I think that a county with more ballots and we have could easily handle it through good training and practice and and and learning the skills that we had the sort of event along the way and you know in the past march counties managed to count their their paper ballots one way or another. And I think II believe that paper balance are good option we've been talking about I think I heard fifty million thirty fifty min while ago paper ballots don't cost a light they do cost more if you'd have to have the electronics system running alongside the paper ballots system in your paying for both systems then paper ballots will increase your cost at least by the payroll but if a county has an option to scale down with the cost of the electronic system and use the paper ballots they will save a significant amount of money because the machines are expensive they have to have expensive batteries they have to have expense and maintenance it's not just county money state money is the people's money federal money as people's money. It's still all text dollars coming in it's expensive elections have become incredibly expensive. And I don't think they have to be that expensive all the time here's where we are. Blessly did you want to respond to something I just wanted to make one point in agree that elections and I started on a punch card system in nineteen ninety six or seven until my age a little bit. But they don't work fine uh we counted those by machine back they will be in hand count those and we didn't hand camp our precinction the implementation of haying account by president came in that changes the game for the big counties as far as the time limit for here you have to count but one thing I want to point out is that the the the requirement for the machines starts of federal requirement not a state requirement we do have it in our state legislative statutes as well but there federal requirement is to me ada requirements so unfortunately you will pay for both until in less the fans were to change their paying I don't see them do that you need time soon and that's worth part of the experience comes through so you'll never be able to go to a completely hand county paper ball because the law requires that a person want disability to be able to vote just like an assisted like everyone else and that's why I said scale down the eliminated yet because you're always going to have some portion of that electronic you have to have a list exactly okay members here should we are in the thing draw on could they need to get the I need to get the election commission to the table so they can give the update and I think that's going to create some questions and then II want sleen and really that in order to launch so let's go uh center love a more recognize you but you've had a lot of questions you've taken my rep a lot of questions but you can go past because i'm on weight okay thanks represent baby ma- my questions for director bell me the require any reports on on the status of equipment from the county's back where the report is they've got a machines i've got several machines so that uh in in your department you know which machines are are which counties have the machines that are down that may need maintenance in the so that that we were certain our equipment say good condition in all counties escalates gives us a report back after they have the year the back yearly uh. And then we have counties that you know will call uh sintella i've got you know six machines that aren't work and we held form to get on fiat I don't require that from counties one reason is that most of the time the election commissioners volume ones that have access to that their part time you know basically not accounting employee not paid to do their so it's kind of hard for me to maintain those top of requirements on that why are so vendor to keep us up today with what's wrong with the equipment when they find it well follow up now be brief I would just think you know this can only not be in aware that that monies were available for that equipment probably could have put some mind to these maybe even the the core court and ease about the cost of maintenance and that keep on that equipment so it might just make me a good suggestion to. To coordinate with those counties in in and make it mandatory they report on the condition instead of relying on a vendor that's paid by a contract and we will impartially independent II haven't want to say my defeats but I am not aware of most counties that they don't know in in doubt and I don't know if you guys are near and that's why you didn't know so I think that may be the portion but I think that we will have to periodically just send their out to county it's for concern times we don't know when replacements are putting in and that's one thing will change it my office and you'll take care of it appreciate your sir represent long did you have questions. Well it's actually information for representative I went back and reviewed video at taken of the election accounting day it was when you take out for their time of heating to call about six hours to do the vote counting thank you represent senator urban thank you just have a quick question and I know that sometimes printing the ballots can be complicated because of the different you know districts and we have all have little pieces so one election that I was one of my elections I had somebody go to vote for me and roseberg when I had portions of white county in my district in the wrong ballots for there. So um and I know that we contact so what do you all have a process of like the secretary of states offers have they couldn't vote for me because my name was on the ballots because they had the wrong ballots at the present so there uh there are process of checking those printed ballots to make sure that they're printed correctly with the right uhm candidates for the elections uhm at the different pretext because of you know our districts are peacemeal so we have peace sometimes of different counties and it gets very complicated that's actually under the perview of the election commissioners and their required to do the ballot projecting and the logic inaccuracy testing before each election so that's done at the local level in its not easy and I remember that election factor election was the first one after i'd lived in come to the state and I was although mister election at yeah we we don't check the secretary of state's level but the county can explain to you how they do it uh in it requires a lot of proofing and it's more grieving II can imagine I mean it was great because we caught it early enough in the day you know that I don't think it affected me too much but I really appreciated the office and and white county for like jumping in quickly and getting the right ballots out there as soon as possible in one of the only things that secretaries state probably does do in that situation as we step in with their coordinator myself and try to get the vendor. To use quickly as they can to to get that back you know where they can function in with the right ballot okay and if you run out of paper ballots do you have the ability to print more no counties most counties do not have their own printer so that's one of my concerns if you were to run out that's where this cost the extra cost for the elections there's actually uh uh a code section then make some order more than what you know the voters they have in case because you have to cover for provisional belows and so that that's always been done if you were a paper below county so that's not the new but yes if I were to run out you'd have to you know get with the vendor in four year prainer local printer and get more printed so that's what we would train or monies just make sure you order more than enough okay thank you can I address that just gives me a briefly uhm essential slaves out our ballots so our paper ballots are the same balance it would be in the machine we are coordinate or work with them to develop though ballot faces in everything based on the breakdowns of the prethinks and so whatever printed ballots we have would be the same as if you went to the machine and voted and because every we ordered extra ballots and so we had we had extra ballots and but if for some reason we had a problem with the paper ballot not being available there is a machine because of a a requirement every polling place anybody can vote on the machine and the right so nobody would be decent french highest are unable to vote yet all right we're going to move and I do have one question legislative for a year away one of the clarification which what's the current of the machines that are out there based on when they purchase what did you say you anticipate the life expectancy of the ones we have out there to be seven year would you say ten to fifteen since these are great of all that we. Uh you know in some counties who had on since fifteen in some countries have heard on since nineteen so you're looking at a variation there but most of what will go wrong with the machines would be the battery in our more place in that this year for all counties for our machines so are you guys doing a projection could you mention thirty to fifty million a while ago are you putting together so sector safe putting together a proposal for how we're going to transition that smoothly instead of it just be a we get you know we get up to a cliff and have to jump off kind of moment yes sir I have some ideas of how in working with through the national association of state election directors are survived other states on what the idea and as well as uh some ideas for some counties that if they can uh have their reimbursements from the primaries moved in to a portion of it at least even five percent back for uh voting system as well sustainable putting money back first of all system okay then less saying when you said fine in thirty fifty million you were a talk to chair you were talking to chair budget when you reference chair right that sarah talking about years let's get the lessly if you would excuse yourself but don't go far in service you can if you would stay where you are let's get let's get the election i'm sorry let's get the state board or election commission. Now you let me get rid here. Okay uh let's get the state board of election commissioners to the table there and chris has joining us for those you walked in lay chris was going to be here but it's flag got held over down at uh florida where he was at a conference and so we've allowed him to join basement and. What your should have a copy of the report in for any use at being distributed to the membership we've got a copy of the state for election commissioners audit of the election up there which charlie are you going to or you can be the one to present. Uh yes sir okay increases available for questions away and so let's do this each one of you all the introduced yourself name and tow for the record and then charlie among up give me a few minutes membership copy this report and then political show hanging out second while we get that handed out. We're let make the report if their questions are generated from it will let members ask questions there might be some dialog back and forth between the source security officials in state board of elections and then we'll get down that way to get selling counting up to the table. And to. To stay if we have some afterwardless make sure we make them available anyway from the public ones coming. Alright charlotte name in tower for the record for all you'll push back but we are tomato will have to make mikes answer when you announce yourself just turn it off their. I'm sure more some election message supervisor for state board have been with a secret for about two and half years but previously I was the working commission our election coordinator for in pitts county for. Since nineteen eighty three so have been around for a while so so we we went to before you go on let me get limited everybody else interdoors himself name it for the record please john davidson state board election commissioner educational supervisor with the agency for ten years previous to that I was with the secretary states offers for twenty years eighteen years of those or in the elections division is what in cooperation the uh legal council for the state more of alex commissioners have been with the commission since mark krish gives her thank you all for live at me at ten via zone my flight orlando was three hours like my flight now there was not a car to be rented so that I could drive from downstairs little rock so that's why i'm a figuring via zoom i'm the director of the state board I was a lawyer beforehand I mean chris matters and and i've been with the board since february of twenty nineteen i've been the director since december of twenty twenty three so appreciate my staff stepped up to come help i'm looking forward to the good conversation here are increased you okay we charley present the report. Absolutely but i'm here to answer questions needed I can hear you guys really well and I hope you could hear me yes sir we can't charlie go here in move through your poor police okay thank you so what you have for a view is a basically still common with an area report but this is we were in certain county couple weeks ago uh we appreciate the uh the corporation in the hospitality that they presented to us galax or you say we were he didn't know what which because you know this is a new process you know we we got uh no seventy five counties that were responsible for for training and make it certain election pro- uh processes are done in in a ra- legal honest way and so we know that so when i've started you know in elections what so I started with the handmark big paper ballots we had one of the probably first uh senators tavioters that we used in and so i've kind of been around for for for a while and so so we took a crew up there it was six servers uh we even recruited one who are awares who's the partner county election coordinator and and in our more of our state commissioners uh jamie comma whose in in the room as well with us today uh to to assist us and and we we can may practice this time around to use uh. Uh experience coordinators to help us with the as prosecutors mainly you know we may learn from them but they may learn from swell as they do their own house out so so that was a reason for that so so basically they sort of the source of county certified uh sixteen hundred and ninety eight ballots so and so. You know course the goal is always to you know the audit you know that we'll hand count sixteen hundred ninety eight bowed uh we got close and uh there was an early vote was more now as pretty much responsible for uh in county and john can help me at the tally and actually get through to the uh presinct are the point sites that he was working on. Uh so on the on the second page first paragraph can explains what we what we found there they third five five hundred and twenty bow it's for canada was bradford which was a district judge uh contested and. And that try not to bring can make this anyway any longer than needs to but I hand counted five hundred and seventeen uh ballots we were five hundred actually county five hundred fifteen ballots which matched to the d s two hundred electronic results type. Then we found too ballots that were were non partisan that could not be run through the day as to uh the two hundred and so that brought there to fast seventeen so so I come up with three three votes okay so when we have a discrepancy we tried to dig down and try to figure out no okay where are those votes so we went back in with the help with the uh margo who is more in the election coordinators uh we went back and we went through and we we found two mistakes on on their tail sheets there uh actually was last in the five twenty and so that brought down the what the certified torous on that particular should be in uh five eighteen so so I still had the five seventeen versus the far they tained in the a lot of different things we looked at the west voters the step chaots uhm I think loria actually contacted uh quirk cartoon and to say if there was something he remembered you know from that so you know so there's explanation of more and extraval but no no ballot for mister bradford so that. We we don't know in our vice view even so so that was more and discrepancy that we found uh john I which you tell you talk about the what you found on their in one of the precincts that I hand counted rather small pricing to think it had forty nine total ballots that we counted the number of ballots that I counted uh as lori said they would break the ballots from the pole into different precincts and I would put those priestings into envelope are into sleeves I guess you would say so as I took those out of the sleeves counted both of them I got the number that had been scanned through for on the ds two hundred the correct number that was there however there were two extra ballots that were just laying in the outside of the envelopes and they were just kind of there in the bands uh they had a sticky no one on scanned and so it looks like those were not skanned and then looking at their hand count numbers and the numbers that I had hand counted it didn't appear that those ballots were ever counted either by hand or battery later it didn't appear that they were counted at all and so we kind of talked with the commission with the coordinators to try to see maybe what the issue was there and never really could rectify exactly what the problem was as to why those two ballots were not skinned and or not hand counts. If you would push your button there please thank you i'm sorry then why when you want to talk about fear situation. Ah counted I had counted two different uh polling locations uh on one polling location. The voter registration indicated that it was a hundred and ninety nine voters voted. Uh mary and account came up with a hundred and ninety six votes. Uh which which match the uh the hand count of the election commission and the the tally machine or the uh ds two hundred type indicated a hundred ninety one both. We were in goes we don't know exactly what happened to those three member ballots it's partially that perhaps thr. And left left the premises with their balance but those ballots were never accounted for uhm in another on the other box that I counted the uhm the process that that uh that lawyer would describing the the counter would would make a tally sheet and then those taller sheets were then transferred on to another uh tally she and then and there was those those votes. Those totals were then transferred on to separate sheet. And in one instance in this worn by. Was being audited the part of the told or for the talicy was not transferred over to the final she however. The numbers matched and i'm not sure how that that happened but the the tallies were not counted. But the numbers on the on the sheet that was reported in it being correct so it was it was the same number. We had some other thoughts. Chris did you want to wait and he were you able to hear them okay appreciate it although I will say the live stream is about thirty seconds behind so i'm watching the lot of talking camera here first i'd like to say that I agree. At doing a good job that they were very much article and how they were trying to do the hand count and and I give a lot of problems for they they did a really good job it what they were trying to do however was believed pointed out that looking at this some of the results that concerns that we ran into for unfortunately some of the concerns I thought we might run into whatever you have that much paperwork being handed around back and forth there's opportunities for. There's a lot a lot of opportunities to learn from this experience with them and you know when we go to or audit we want to dig in the end until we find you know whatever explanation are for any of the discrepancies would come across and as charlie was pointing out in the early though in fact the certified results of five twenty there was a man there that showed it should have been five eighteen and then we were only able to like hands on five hundred seventeen balance so okay it's it's three balance the from her different there and that's not a hundred percent and we we could explain the five twenty to the five eighteen as a math but we can explain the five eighteen to five seventeen and we we don't like that but it's part of unfortunately the process of handling it and one of the things I wanted to address to. Earlier was talking about there are counties that do hand mark ballots of election day like palaski county but they also use their d s two hundred to tell you their results and what are the things I would invite you to consider is that in the end mark hand count process like seriously counting it your handling the ballots themselves a lot you're handling them from the balling location to the central occasion and then you're breaking up in the batches of the meaning of the table handling and then you're putting the back together and then which you need to review you have to touch them again with our felt marking devices and tabulators they go in the tabulator that's where they stay there going to box they come out and you're not having to handle that you're dealing with the data from so it provides some protection versus having battles get it all around and i'm sure charlie or any experience make sure you can talk to you about how chaotic target and balance and papers all over the place incidents they were burning methodical and they recognize that process in work real hard keeping it straight but each touch is an opportunity for one thing to get in the wrong stack and speaking to which that was something else I only touched on one pack I was there to observe it and try to stay out away and then joining but once you're made it come to part of it i've been charlie to charge in this the one stack I was looking through the bank was supposed to be appreciated but there was another precinct ballot mixed in there at the end the results were correct for that but you have two precincts that were combined together um so you're present reporting would be awful little bit like that all in all I think that it was evident that they work hard at it and I one of the thing I want to talk about and we've hit on this earlier but I made a note of it is I understand the costs could concerns related to using programming and the marking do I however federal law and statement require eighty eight accessibility which means you're getting her the program in college for the devices if you don't use the devices you're just in car you're just getting the program in cost. If you use the devices you're spreading their costs out amongst all your your voters and it's one of those things that it's a hard cost to just cost x the program your balance whether your county of fifteen hundred and sixteen hundred and ninety eight ballots or county of a hundred and thirty five thousand balance that costs the same and so that's just the cost it's going to happen in its federal law and as many you know I am a profound. Yeah. You're going to have to have a program now I understand the issues are talking about with the marking devices but I prefer to think the idea is is giving the sight denet of warning of not having over about the score that marking to vice makes you make a selection and the fact that it warns you skipper race you know i'm i'm not voting for constable this time that's not I want to get it's okay I have the opportunity to review my ballot and able to determine how it marks my ballot before I put in the table later which is the same for being out I have a heart hammer balance I get to review it for fun it's got the marks I want and whenever you have handmark ballots you have more opportunity for the voter committed error marking dot scratching out initially which we have to go to voter intent to determine we were doing that with the marking devices opportunities working devices so all in all it's ultimately a policy decision for the state and I give certain county lots of props they work very indulgent about their team was very dedicated to it I will say I like the use of the cameras and the use of the the overhead cameras for their transparency although I think they will admit that they do not have a death down a storage for to record all of the counting and also you know during the runoff I don't think they institute that same video system either and those are additional costs to equipment in time and energy technical skill that i'm not sure is you know what the cost today is that's one of the things we could figure out that goes the policy how want to verify the transparency and with that i'll stop talking and answering questions or steps about answer questions as best we can all right so we'll go to members that have questions i've got center display in center love representative wouldn't represent long and represent long future turn off your mind when I get to your you can light it up then so we're up with center dismay first thank you and notice the paragraph on intern and it looks like at one point the counters were kind of gauging in ten and then piping it back over to I think the pri. For individuals counting just in general though I mean how many ballots for subject to you know in tient or anything determination just roughly man is it. For subject to interior okay and then for I think they were in certain of how many work if I was begin late to make was stated having people actually ended up voting on the machines where you are able to see that out of the seventeen hundred just shy there were fewer than ten fewer than ten but each and everyone was told that she had the option of paper baller you walk over you to this other and then on the terrible hand writing. I can't read my hand so there we go it was obviously a wonderful question thank you we'll go to internet okay center love thank you mister actually going to go back to something that senator dismank raised and i'm on as chris so chris sooner to dismay raise an issue in regards to person's being actually qualified to count right and so I want to go through process because I guess don't stone county this is social counties are so social county had a process would process do you are following regards to counting their innocent and i'm really catching the question in regards to if you are have a process that she use action in auditing encounting the would it be fair to give that process to the county so that everybody can be on the same page the heart of what i'm asking thank you for question so i'm not sure audit process is directly applicable to the counting process although it could be used it's I understood the process to service you can eat is they would like the ballot on there with their caller is there you describe and they would go all the way down the balance so you get the first rates the second rates are right and I do that and made a scores scorers as I understand doing hash marks to count so back home for candidate candidates see the candidate they they were hash marking and I would work through a batch of those and then they would end those up and write the number down on to kind of a combination sheet my only concern with going through the whole ballot one time a single page battle it that's probably affected. I think if you get into a multi paid for a lot like we will have in the general election we start having constitutional issues which will be into thirty or ninety four page on ballot. Then you're having to flip the page over and he track of it I think it's opportunities for losing your place I think one of the ways to consider doing it is this team counts this rights and that's the only race they count and then another team counts at another race and that's the only right stay count I think also having defined and I think they were trying to do this batches so that no time there's more than twenty ballots on the title so that you you're working in in a batch so that if there's a discrepancy between machel and john's count we can get we get we don't have to go through the act of a balance to find the miscount and if we're doing that one race those are all procedural things to consider you know just a lot more logistically one step at a time I understand doing the whole balance at one time I just see there's more opportunities for missing a half mark or when you go to add up to hash marks or when you go to add up your telesheets not put the line in and so or working through that and I really appreciate you know certainly counties village efforts in this and you know why we can come up but they want to continue doing this and and this is a white continue doing it you know we'll keep working through ways to avoid because you know that the model I tell our staff and this thing I have is when it comes to counting ballots a hundred percent is almost good enough and what that means is we've got it that that's the market always going to get so that that's been proceed we bring to it well I would just our just think that you know if you are have a process I think that process could actually be following or at least you know because what our her with sercie county really did this is something new for you all in so if if you all had a process in the end I think to give it to our the county so that taking the pattern of process then everybody would be uniform that's that's kind of my thoughts to how we can make actually make the process more uniform around state. I agree with the center but currently the process is using the marketing devices in the tabulators and then they does a bunch of the handling incorporates this is going to know in definitely involves a lot more personal top thank you can I speak to that uhm we were we really welcome the article process we were concerned about our accuracy uh in once we got into the election we realized how many different numbers you have to keep track we learned alive a lot didn't we try we learned a lot and we were already changing our paperwork as a result my teammates are probably gonna run me out of the county when I get home but I hope you guys ordered us after the general because I believe you'll have we'll have a very different result but I will say this as having gone through the process i'm a very strong proponent of running the ballots all the ballots through the ds two hundred and you think that count and maybe if you know the county wants to spot check and like you guys did look at one vote. You know in counting rather than having to count every single ballot on the day after it's a good program for people who want paper ballots to not hand count every ballot but to choose like one precinct or one race you know afterward to just check to make sure that you're uh tabulaters are working properly because that's where a lot of the suspicion or confusion or whatever is if I was the **** I would recommend that rather than hand counting every single ballot personally so I think that's a good idea that two with that way can I speak to their amount okay i'm sorry you know ever since we've done you know started using this current equipment uhm you know that you are a one hundred percent of a hundred ten percent advocate for our our process here in arkansas and that's reason we do the saudis you know we've been doing I guess the nationwide was after the twenty twenty that was a power program for five counties and in the nerve the in the wall was pay as to do the fifteen counties at each general so in twenty three or pass that we do not their fifteen after the primary as well which I think is great II love going doing these things but either hot cars uh my expectations is that every count is going to be a hundred percent you know I i've been around is equipment you know for a long for a long time and uh not thank you. You know I have faith in the intabulators totals in that's reason we do these are it so that we make certain that these they are this machinery is is counting correctly I think overall since twenty twenty we've counted probably in the neighborhood of seventy five thousand ballots across the state in I think we pay at two discrepancies and and we thank that was basically human air and how the ballot was paid in into the emergency band and it actually there's a good and all the gistics of that but acts annoy went down into the uh the drop box at the bottom without being actually counted so we were you are doing these audit uh uhm I think the you know we've gotten now probably eight or ten counties that are doing their own like say they're their own audit after the election preparing certified audit to make certain their current ball you know before they actually certified the election so but so don't get to great idea that's a little move on to the members representative thank you mister chairman first in his. How many how many posted you actually have have heard in here is seventeen hundred somebody said fifteen ninety eight and then we views fifteen hundred how many commonly vote tour chairs do you know okay they're certified total was sixteen ninety eight I might see fifteen by mistake sixteen nine to ninety eight basically hand counted uh seventeen hundred so that's to vote the efforts so uh like say our we're we're not completely finished with. The audit with them say I i've been i've done three other counties between since it's a band sourcey county and we'll probably continue to ask questions that they am to see if we can find out some points so okay and I have a question on third paragraph from the bottom of the second page that they are creek goods women hold by other way but. How many is that the only world place that you fail there was should be included in one bad has a ballot from another present I guess there was a the only one you fail that that's the only one that we actually called that wasn't something we was actually looking for we're looking at you know the votes create the one that he was working at he does his eyes called day at uh when we were uh finishing uh so if there was more canada through that you know you know you know that for sure yeah we know that one for for certain but that would be easy enough for for the commission to go back and go go back and in can you know at that so that without more those things that you are checked for so you should you worked with the machines and been involved with them since the inception I guess pretty much is this is all put choose when I answer it but can those machines. You mention human air can those machines be uh follownessly so you want to involve to canada ten more can be to the could not be can be around I have a hundred percent confidence that you cannot change the vote occur that change. And i'll say in my thirty years like I said twenty years what the election commission before these machines were ever drinked I was part of the selection committee on the. Ten years that i've been with the sector state or what the more election commissioners a hundred percent uh faith that these machines cannot be packed there's no way to have them there's no modem connected to them there's no way you can get into the software to have them and we prove and that of the seventy thousand ballots that we've hand counted over the past two elections that were seventy thousand correct ballots and so if there was any acting that had been done we would have probably caught that in those seventy thousand hand counter ballots that we've done over the thirty year how many counties that we've counted. The biggest concern is i've heard from market. One is that the machines can be humanly program to for fraud. And in the second woman is the delay and getting the results where they're published it's well allowed here but now miss goes this is your question on the day after the count have to the election day is there the recalled or is that in total otherwise it's a another twenty four hours goes by after the election before you recount for you certified the power we count all the balance the night of the election they all go through the ds two hundreds and we have a preliminary count through the ds two hundred the night of the election and then the hand count happens the next day so we already have reported a preliminary count the night of the election I believe that that's law that we have to do that and we want to do it anyway even if it wasn't law. So mr cooper this is one more question for you and then is you said there were one hundred and votes cast which you only found the hundred and thirty seven is that correct. The as the was a honored from the list of voters from them there were a hundred ninety nine k physically counted a hundred ninety six and that matched the the election commissioners count of a hundred ninety six where those three other vote of those three other ballots went we just doubt that. So even with the best for the election board and search the care they may still somewhere through vote or out there that perhaps people follows call can I can I respond to that because the ballots were all accounted for we just had names that did not have ballots for those names so we assumed that perhaps they signed in and then didn't vote because all the ballots were counted for so we were not missing ballots. That's correct the number of ballots and the steps were correct so it wouldn't the ballot this place or something summaries and that vote was not a candidate or didn't go with the ballot didn't make it for some reason those people did not collect a ballot and use it because all of the balance that we're counted for were were recognized in voted we counted for all the ballots we were trying on all of our on all of our balances we want to account for every name on the voter list and we want that to mash the number ballots that we have and the ballot stubs match the ballots and we were counting all those on the day that we did all our counting and we saw right away that we had three names on the voter list and we did not have ballots for those three names but we weren't missing any ballots all the ballots were counted for and were voted so we don't know II ask I talked to the poll workers at that pole to ask them if they knew what it happened at someone come in and signed and left. You know it's just a big open civic center where they vote in that place it was in saint joe and they said they they weren't aware of anyone who didn't vote they wanted to vote but somehow we even went through all the names to see if someone had written down the same name twice and there were no repeats on the name so we it's a mystery. Okay uh representative wouldn't I got a couple of membership and move on be okay thank you mister thank you part i've got to representative long representative and i've got a few chairs I want to get sling county up to the table then represent long thank you mister chairman mister uhm we have elections so the people who can express their will and judging from the numbers that we've been told I think he said less than ten people voted home machines out of sixteen hundred and ninety eight votes so that's less than one percent chose to use of the machine count or the machine ballots whether it's because they don't cross computers where they think it's cost savings for whatever reason and an overwhelming majority of the people in service and county chose to vote compare relatively given the option of not doing it so I think that without being the case we need to do all we can to help sort of security in any other country that wants to do this to do an accurate and secure uhm election and have this morning in the future you're going to offer he guarantees or maybe training for sorts of counting renewal the count institutes to go to paper ballots. Are crew should create says for you I know you're our thirty second deliver but go ahead first off i'm not exactly sure how to check in process was and how it was offered to vote with the divides or not and III can't speak to that our monitor born in the polls when that was going on our monitors were at the central locations I understand it but you're correct I mean it if people want the choice of marking them the handmark ballots I mean we have counties that do have mark ballots you run into potentially with that comes to the counting time and I agree with the the chair that using the tabulators to run the hand mark ballots through as a great idea and I also agree that they should compare their results to the tabulator results I think the rules probably need to be clarified on how to do the voter intent to make sure that those are getting separate because those are problems balanced so I think there's a third case the rurals on that and as far as the procedures and rules I mean looking at doing. This is one of the options of voting then we'll work on buttons and procedures together so the counties can have some baseline performance standards on how to do it and i'm really appreciate service accounting you know the efforts will definitely work with them on and making this if this is the process that they want to do in certainly counting it as the policy decision to legislature to allow this is one of the ways of doing it then absolutely we'll support it and make sure that the rules are in place so that it's done the same across the state is the big at the end of the day what we don't want his county's doing things their own different ways we want standardization this is one of the processes we'll have you know the standards perhaps time much like we have standards were using the marketing devices in the debit card like. Representative ladyman in uh representative wouldn't would you mind turning off your dear please thank you sir. Thank you mister chairman i'll try to be brief here I don't know but uh the question was asked about hacking the machines and and and I agree with you I don't think those machines can be active are not connected in any way so the esnapes machines can't be but the question I get occasionally is that the two hundred can they be hacked with that reader is and also how do you trinite for that day that to the secretary of states offers in can that process be h. So the d s two hundred encrypted drive and and less like you talk to a whole lot more than I can but you've got the ballots themselves so that the one of the right things have used in the ds two hundred is the voter is casting it into the device to be counted i'm not relying on someone else reading accounting my ballot later the device is doing it and then we can audit that in fact I strongly encourage commissions to do they post election precipitation audit when I was like what we do randomly select some polling locations you randomly select a race and you go when you check before I signed a certification of election I would do that if I recognize because I want to make sure that the device has counted the balance if I discover an error discrepancy will need to work through it figure out what's going on with it so that the the tabulators are solid piece of equipment it's part of the process that can be checked later about humans which is a great step and then we still have the piece of paper at the end with the english characters on their of the vote that was handled by the voter and we're not having to have we don't have as much issue when you're using parking device as a handmark balance then we can do hand mark ballots if it runs it and he gets kicked out because of an overvote or there's marks on there that aren't in this spot their areas where you can read it then those need to be set out aside in the commission can make an independent determination on those and do it in a public meeting and that way everybody knows that this ballot was decided for joe and those are some procedures and processed is that II think it happened as part of this process and you know it's we want to not only check you make sure it's done right before hand check make sure it's done right in the time i'm checked make sure it's done right afterwards but double check all those things along the ways and you get a lot more we're done and see with the use of. Yeah. Thank you more with the increase were you going to answer that you in cricket county I think we still on for this but I don't want time we did when you go in they ask you that you want to pay our balance you want to the machine reason I remember that as I always do the machine and why would always do the paper about considering first the machine so I think we still do that do they do that in other counties the deal they do then number counties that suck an offer per se I know that there are counties like a plastic county for example they do hand mark ballots on election day but they have machines available since they don't have enough machines to handle the ballian voters they have an election day and there's some other counties that big but he used the devices but they have handmarked balance that does we get something I wanted to mention earlier and I forgot thank you for the question we were talking earlier about the pre printed balance with all of the questions and how many you have to order and there's a rule in a process for you order like a hundred and five percent and all this well what happens is at the end of election all of those balance that we're not used to have all the eat that we paid for they get stored for two years the benefit of the market device is you order the cart start the blank cart stock and it's once you put in the table and print it to make it a scan card so it goes in the marketing device then we use it but I have a stacks of unused court stock that can be used for the next election so it's a little bit efficiency in that portion of it which is one of the things I meant to mention earlier that religious do you know the difference between free printed paper ballots that are pen mark and we have to order enough to make sure we have enough for the voters in case they also up or order just enough blank part stock that we can then use. Okay let's see that it's a table but everybody keep your seats on the end and sling folks you'd come around here to the uh to be my right hand side that are here they be honourable judge matt bromley and kurdish and uhm in the room else and uh I think doug wands you to come with them while you're coming to get your seats and i've got a couple of questions for service he county folks yet just sign up right there between representative long and commissioner jan from get three chairs. These are some things i've heard and I just want to get him clarified whether they're accurate or whether you're just inaccurate if you would you mention while go about the recording who did the recording and whose request were those people to come and do the recording in where did that record and go to. This was handled mostly by one of our coordinators so i'll give you general information on it but again I can give you specific um there's a a man who is developing equipment for counties that want to do that kind of recording and I met him and I cannot tell you assistance first time smart and uh he was in phoenix when I was in phoenix and he eh he said that if we wanted to uh record it we could we could least they recording equipment but he would come down to make sure it was all set up correctly forest to see how it would work because we wanted to have cameras on all of our tables we didn't have the cameras. And I can get you again the name of this company and the um these guys have you guys have the link to wear all of our uhm all the data is is uplinked to a website so there's a leak for that uh all those files are those video files are on uhm website okay and where you charge for that yes we were how much were you charged for the we paid a hundred dollars rental fee for the equipment and he came all away from air zone to do that yep okay the the same question is I think it came from texas he was in dallas at the time okay. Those things that the the recording recorded the process and everybody at the table and everything and then you should that was that that's out there somewhere for aim by the one to watch it is that correct yes okay where the ballots recorded and were the ballots scanned the ballots were scanned and they were put on the thumb drive and there also on that website who's holding that some drive and why were they stand we have the thumb drive the commission does are you the only one that has yes okay but then anyone because those ballots were recorded right. And they're out there for anybody to view those ballots would be accessible as far as viewing the in those work today and and help me out here commissioner or commissioner somebody and then typically those things are stored away and secured somewhere else that correct. Correct years who has access to after they've been stored once they've been stored only the commission where and actually once the elections over their stored and sealed and not gotten back into unless the court order or an order from the state more what asked to see those ballots otherwise they don't they're not viewable from anyone also the gentleman she mentioned was she didn't know the last name of mark is nice mark cook I actually made him the day they were doing the hand count market but under our current law those ballots once they're dealt with our stored and secured but now those bell have been scanned and those ballots have been put out there a website for about view of trainer i'm trying to understand we've got I mean a secured location but now we got home out there for a bit of sea and could they be altered and the fact that they're out there for air budget see where it's our current losses are locked up in secured and nobody can see him i'm trying to rationalize how that was allowed and and the opportunities that that would create now that they're out there for your by the end i'd like to hear from both sides into the table how that's allowed in how that's not a problem we had questions about that and what we were told was that the physical documents must be stored away but pictures of them don't fall under that protection. Cause we we were concerned about that as well and uh it may be something that is decided later that that's not acceptable we fell into a gray area where nobody could say this is absolutely not okay or absolutely okay so do you think that the voters are service and counting or okay that ultimately are our outcome actually they thought it was a great idea they love that transparency they said we can it's the uhm candidates like the idea they said we can go we can count for ourself but if we want to to make sure those counts were correct and so we met with a lot of a lot of people were excited about the idea. I'm just second the age of a eye and altering if somebody want to come back in question how how a day I would they avoid or how would you address the questions so they may alter those now that they've been electronically scanned in recorded while we have the originals that are secured so if there was a question about that we could always do a recount with originals and they could see the originals and they would know what the originals are they were not put on the web until after the election was certified. Okay a more recognized representative wouldn't and then we're getting in sling counting then we're going to put the plane on the ground represent thank you mister chairman the script and we'll be sure there's correctly the court center to him her head can skin the voter be at the no no sir the belts are not tied to the voter in any way in any way you don't have a number once you pull the stuff once you yeah once you police the number is removed in all the steps through in the box that there's no number on the ballots so there's yeah okay all right thank you mister chairman thank you one of the question the gentleman that was there doing the record it did he handle any of the ballots anybody outside of those thirty volunteers handle band sir no sir he fixed machines machines being in the the scanners and the and the cameras we had some scanners that you know that. The got stuck what efforts can do and he made sure that they were working correctly but but he handled the balance when you should put them through the standards he did not probably just gave us did he not put them we had judges to do that we we had we heard the judges to to handle the one was what's again republican one was a democrat but the individual he was there even stayed behind the land most of the time only town he was there was if of scanner gustar or something he had not warned but too of our people sworn people or each saturday him for he was a justing the scanner then once again under the camera and pounded the scrutiny of our people he left him behind another area so the anti question all hated which do some technical stuff under the scrutiny as our people. As well as the campus did he provide the scanner yeah yeah we really really the scar from him yes. In the night information was transmitted somewhere yes okay that's all hand up the other I was just going to say that he didn't handle ballots when they did have james in the uh in the scanners and he pretty much did stay behind who are all of the counting was going on through the day he was back with the counters throughout the day he also he also had exit and i'm not going to try to do the schematics of the rome but he had the exit for exited back and forth where they went to the restroom of whether he went he did not even go through entering your next thing through the counting area okay all right thank you slinkin here's what i'd like to hear in the reason brought in it's five member non number tried you guys are about fourth as far as turn out and I want to get a comparison that of service he county with around sixteen hundred and ninety eight votes versus of selling county and never votes that we have done there I would like to sopen it up for comparison of how it would play out on a larger size county versus of smaller size one than a more open it up to any view that want to come in on that you know even the cost or anything that you've heard so. In by the way uh names entitles for the record please i'm proud of the sling and it clark and I don't synergy I don't know if this is exactly what you're looking for but my my concern on this right here is is you've heard so many things through the past several years about disenfranchising voters thank paper ballots would be the appear to me of it because like in say county we would have to know away with with early both because we have the early voting sites we would have to argue boat centers i'm sorry both centers. Because those vote centers if you're using a vote center with type of ballots selling county normally two hundred and fifty three hundred different ballot styles at each boat center you would have to have ballots for every ballot starter was. It would made logistically impossible to do that so that way you're going to have your vote centers are gone you're going to have to increase your polling sought you know that's one day with vote centers that we learn from the we went to vote centers the demographic service more people vote around where they work then where they live because they used to get now for the run by and vote or they're go early vote so that rottery it it would virtually be impossible and to do that and then just your your early votes you would have to have a ballot on demand printers in there which is about ten thousand dollars a peace and we have some large early votes out of sling county and I know there's smaller accounts that does things different but whenever whenever things like this take place unlike four is the problem in arkansas. No one has told me anything in arkansas that there is a problem where I hear it all is from in another state in other states in other sides of limitations after i've been in the election business in solan county for twelve years and and prior to that is just a jp. If I knew of anything that someone was cheating our would go to the prosecutor at target's office so fast you would make your heads been cause of her so much about people cheating an elections and I have it seen it but if you the system that we've got employees the electronic boating that's where just like the bank uses the computer design you are credit cards if you cannot trust elections and you can show me where their sprout taking place how things are messing up i'll be standing shoulder to show with you but until the tandem I see something that's evident and not just rumors of things that have happened in things in other states that are happening are common to organize i've got power workers that hear about all this they're not coming back after this election they're scared to do what's going to go on polling sites because of all the things they've heard and when you tell them arkansas doesn't we don't have these problems if these other states have because we take it serious we put in laws and laws and laws and a lot of times be as a county clark I don't understand somebody has passed a pure by the legislature but when you get back and you start going through it you start seeing things why they did it and you're thankful for that but to come up here and do something just because another state is having problems and we want to have a retro day on elections we don't need a retro down election day these machines i've got one hundred percent confidence in them let me ask you question the the man power what I wouldn't think I want it now was the main power would take in a county like selene washington plasky which you know is even larger. Based on the numbers that have been shared today about service county what kind of numbers would you be looking at as far as either the paul workers or what would be required in the way of counting the ballots. I would guess at their but I know who wouldn't be available to count the next day and that's our power workers because when they go and they're in nice green thirteen hours a day and then you've got the average age i'm gonna say it's all other than me. So it's it's over sixty five i'm sure a lot more than that they come in they work the polls twelve fourteen hours they're there they don't want to come back to next day a start count and as far as the number of. I'm turned to allison and ask her the judge i've turned that the judge does I think he's done some numbers on that neighbor name entitled for the record please my name's matbrumly and on the store in county judge the question is how many people would it take how many people in eh go here and assign a car you've heard roughly although they're still getting the numbers in and and will get that but based on what you got so if if we went into a general election we would based on roughly fifty five thousand votes we would need around three hundred and fifty people just for the counting process that is in addition to the number of people which is around two hundred that we currently have. That does not include the security measure of survivals that does not include the amount of space that we will have to read out uhm and any other things that we'd have to go along with that. So you know I don't I don't know what we we pay currently eleven dollars an hour minimal agencies are console to people to do that I think there's probably some business owners and here that don't have people jumping with the opportunity to perform a task for eleven dollars an hour so that concerns me I heard from thirty county that they educated people at least three different sessions. Those we would have to be prepared to pay those people to be educated during those sessions so all those would be incurred costs that currently uh or not encourage however I do want to say this that information is gained by some of our history as far as vote numbers and also what other states have uhm experienced uh with white vote numbers in number of people we may prove to be more efficient. Then the time that it's going to take. To be able to do this is is mister madison uh said which I agree with that you count by by by race we had in our last primary twenty races which II think you reported that you had how many races. It was less than twenty uhm that that's going to take a significant amount of time I heard a concern about turning the vote out or last primary vote was turned out in about two hours one hour in fifty minutes for their preliminary numbers you're looking at days potentially for this to happen we have to factor in people getting tired people getting sick issues in which it's not just going to take in my opinion those three fifty if you're not having at least ten percent replacement for them another thirty five people that are ready to come in and take over breaks all these things that you're going to have so where I was going to go with that is. Concern which raised in selling county in in and we do it I came in office of january of last year. In really nothing happened the first two days after that there were some significant issues that were brought for attention in voter integrity election integrity was one of those by february or core court past resolution saying we white evidence i'm big on evidence based practices we want evidence and so our corn court went so far it's to budget money for an audit what I learned was that I would have to go to a certain town the castodian of all assets in the county however i've got no right to go to those secure ballots that have already been locked up without a circuit judge being able to say you can do it well on what means would they ever rule because there's no evidence that there was every ever anything that is gone wrong but what I did learn is that our election commissioners could call for a recount or an audit in so we. Budgeted money so that that could take place that resolution will sign on february twenty first of twenty twenty three. It no time was that opportunity exercise to use those dollars that were set aside. To audit a previous election I was policed greatly pleased when the state election board a commissioners came and said we're about to origin the only question I had is can you be here tomorrow. They did show up the first week of june. And they audited audited twenty nine point four percent of the eighteen thousand and seventy six votes that were cast in our last primary five thousand three hundred in twenty votes were hand counted and we had one hundred percent accuracy. So i'm will be real honest here I believe that I have spare a little time much time in finding out how much a police accurate less efficient more time consuming more expensive process will take to replace one that is proven to be one hundred percent accurate. Dollar wise of you establish what a budget would be. If we decided to go to paper ballot yet a more preferences with with broamly map it could be upwards of seven hundred and fifty thousand dollars more than it depends on the the race right I mean just absolutely depends on the race we could see things as high history quarters of a million dollars more is we work through discrepancies it all projection warriors all of all of these things here's what I can guarantee it would be much more expensive than much more time consuming in less accurate than what we have today. What i'd like his about eight questions members. What i'd like to ask is when the meetings over fuel would come up with kobe and I talked to coach here but when you get which you need and what is that you're waiting from essentially in order gear what in order to to know what your true budget was we get scott it this week so where can I putting the numbers together okay early next week we should have it because we've done most of our numbers okay because what i'd like to do to get a college comparison will probably expand the economy talk to coach here to figure out in in talk to the election to to determine a cost comparison based on on what verifiable data we can pull from and we'll get with the association county and try formulate the could I think that would be good to know what that pin down number is one of the thing did the gentleman tell you he came down for a hundred dollars to do that but he give you an estimate for what the cost would be moving forward she giving you that estimate yet I mean well no because we were going to talk to him about doing that we didn't have any interest in his coming back we wanted to see how those how technically speaking when it would take and we determine that it was too big for our county to do but we did determine we wanted to use the a. The one of those card that you put the scanners the scanners and uhm so we've been we're currently pricing scanners but we will not have the cameras like we did before because it's on our budget right now so he won't be coming back we didn't ask him to art i'm just thinking the focus has been out transparent scene everybody liked it but now when it comes to the cost that's going to be a prohibitor to you being able to provide that is what he said my misinterpreting which is the scanners are part of the transparency because they document all of the the document all of the ballots and we are going to work at finding a way to get the cameras where very prohibited we we can accept gifts we can accept donations for it so we have to find it in our budget we do have people who with gladly offered the cameras to us for that purpose but we can't accept those gifts in on the scanners when you scan that goes on to it some drive yes sir then who's the custodian of that thought the commission that german take a thumb drive with them no sir all right by any questions for members let me say thank you for being here uh somebody matt judge I know you didn't ask me this but I want to heard it mentioned preference I think is elected officials we need we we need to take in account in our equation of what's the best for our constituents what what are their preferences in what are the preferences based on until I heard you know you had an option I don't know how that that that worked as far as electronic paper ballot but there I can assure you he's been concerned in many preferences vocalized in our county. On what we need to do as far as elections we do the court is in his staff do an excellent job of witnessed it in l and a testing people are concerned about collections that for some reason attendance is very low to something that's open to the public. Yeah. This area I thought was a big deal and I don't know if we'd have enough chairs quite frankly. Yeah. In observed it in every other chair was open I don't think that the usage or not using of those chairs discount the concern that our community has on elections. And so to say that a lot of people participated. In one style versus another on a preference that you know they they they've heard things wherever they get their information. What are we shriving for. Hundred percent accuracy in the most efficient cost effective way that we can. So that there will be for those counties that are maybe blessed monetarily. But to use dollars strictly with preference leading maybe the costs I think it should have has come back in as far as transparency we put on facebook live. Our counts that hour in fifty minutes it took to get a hundred percent accuracy in a primary vote can be watched today. The ballots will be destroyed within two years and so if somebody. We're so cruel is to go back and manipulate some image that was now or carved forever we won't have anything to compare it against because those are destroyed every two years that's all ahead. All right no other comments