Montgomery County considers purchasing 1,900 new voting machines

Harvey added the number of elections that are scheduled for 2022 would make implementing a new system difficult, and mixing the old system with a new system is not compatible.

According to Harvey, the new systems are paper based, so there is a required manual count for audit purposes once an election is over.

Montgomery County Judge Mark Keough sought clarification on whether the current machines are just old or if there are integrity issues.

“We have not had any issues with accuracy, and we test them extensively before, during and after an election,” Harvey said. “That is required by law.”

The county used around 1,500 voting machines in the November election. Harvey said the extra 400 would make up for the elections office being spread thin.

“We had several locations that had as few as six machines,” she said. “If they had significant issues or breakdowns on election day, we would not have anything to replace them with.”

No decision was made during the meeting, as the item was deferred to give the commissioners more time to go over the information presented.