A motion from County Judge Chris Hill prompted the move to paper ballots, which was followed the County Commissioner Court’s unanimous vote to approve the change at a June 9 meeting.
Some background
Commissioners directed county elections staff to develop a plan to switch to hand-marked ballots in an August 2024 meeting. Currently, Collin County voters use ballot marking devices, or BMD's to mark paper ballots electronically. The BMD prints a ballot with a bar code, and a machine reads the barcode to tabulate votes. The new system, called Ballot on Demand, or BOD, will have voters mark their ballot with a pencil, and then feed their ballot into a machine that reads the markings on their ballot, according to a November presentation from County Administrator Yoon Kim. The current machines can be reconfigured to read the hand-marked ballots, according to an August memo from Kim.
County Judge Hill introduced the motion during discussion on renewing the county’s $556,000 contract with Elections Systems and Software to maintain the county's BMD's through June 2026. The county will be able to amend the contract to accommodate future changes in the county’s voting system, Collin County Elections Administrator Kaleb Breaux said.
Citizen concern over election security security prompted Hill's motion, according to Hill's newsletter. Hill previously motioned to implement hand-marked ballots twice in 2024, once in August and again in September, and both motions failed, according to a newsletter from the county judge.
By the numbers
The county elections department expects the transition to paper ballots to cost roughly $2.4 million, Breux said. The $2.4 million, which will cover equipment costs, is lower than the November estimates of $4 million and $3.2 million to implement hand-marked ballots, Breaux noted during the meeting.
The county would need to purchase an additional 1,500 privacy booths, with an estimated total cost of $525,000, according to the memo from Kim. The ballot stock, where voters mark their ballot, is estimated to cost the county about $144,000. Other costs include printers, backup batteries and carts to safely transport printers.
There were roughly 750,000 registered voters in the county in November 2024, according to the county elections department. The county covers over 30 cities including McKinney, Anna, and Melissa, and portions of Frisco, Plano, Richardson, Prosper and Celina.
Also of note
The county will still employ roughly 300 electronic ballot marking devices to comply with the Help America Vote Act, which requires ADA compliant voting machines at each polling place, Breaux said during the meeting.
“To meet HAVA and ADA compliance, we estimate we’ll need about 300 Express Votes in our inventory, ” Breux said during the meeting.
The county currently has roughly 1,800 BMDs, Breux said. After the switch, the county will can offload 1,500 BMDs, bringing the maintenance cost down from $556,000 to $210,000, according to estimates from the election office.
Looking ahead
Elections staff will present an implementation plan to the court at a future June 23 meeting. The county expects the new system will be ready by the November 4 state constitution amendment election, Breux said.
A 2023 study found the county will also require 51,000-square-feet of election storage space, roughly double the current election storage space to accommodate the county's growing population, according to Kim’s presentation. The new hand-marked voting system could occupy up to 5,000-square-feet, Kim said. Possible space solutions include building a new facility, leasing the space, purchasing and remodeling the current facility, or reusing the county’s healthcare building. All options range between roughly $11 million-$27 million, Kim's presentation states.
The county will make effort to retrain the voters and ensure county residents are aware of the voting system changes, Breux said.
Quote of note
"We have a great group of seasoned, veteran poll workers," Breux said in reference to training the elections department on the new system. "Let's make sure we're doing a great job, not only for our voters, but for our poll workers."
