Few Problems with New Voting Machines

Though the new electronic voting machines have caused some ire for election workers throughout Nassau County, voting locales in the 4th Congressional District have experienced few problems with the new machines, election officials said.

One problem cropped at Hewitt Elementary School in Rockville Centre, but a chairperson for the voting district, Kathi Collins, said a technician from the Board of Elections showed up within a half hour of the reported problem, and fixed it shortly thereafter. She added that another official from the Board of Elections videotaped the technician fixing the machine to ensure that there wasn't any tampering.

"It didn't stop anyone from voting," Collins said about the voting machine problem.

At the firehouse on the corner of Maple and Morris avenues, an elections inspector who asked not to be identified, said one of the voting machines was out of order and he was forced to switch to paper ballots. "Within 30 minutes, a technician showed up," he said, "but we've since moved to paper ballots."

Democratic elections commissioner William Biamonte said that there were some issues with the machines' scanners, but problem equipment had since been replaced. There were four reported instances of a ballot not being returned to voters who had made mistakes and requested a new ballot. In that scenario, Biamonte explained, the voter loses his/her vote.

"There are multiple problems happening," said Biamonte, "but very few of them are machines that are broken."

Biamonte said he expected there to be related problems throughout the day, possibly delaying the release of unofficial results later tonight.