The idea of adding electronic voting for this year's municipal election was met with a lukewarm reception from Bonnyville Town Council.
In advance of the upcoming October election, during their March 14 meeting councillors were presented with the option of having electronic polling stations.
“We were approached by the City of Lloydminster to rent their voting machines. While we were thinking about it, the MD decided they were going to rent the voting machines. So administration did get a quote from an outside party. It would be at a cost of about $9,000 should we choose to go with electronic voting this year,” explained town director of finance Renee Stoyles.
With electronic voting, electors are still required to mark a paper ballot. The ballot is then put in a privacy envelope and fed into the machine, which tabulates the results once the polls are closed.
The benefit of going electronic is results can be out within half an hour of the polls being closed, as opposed to the two hours it usually takes to do by hand. As well, the machines keep a running count of how many people have voted throughout the night.
“That's the biggest question; is it worth $10,000 to have the results quicker that night or is everyone fine waiting?” CAO Mark Power said to council.
In the past, with the use of volunteers to man polling stations and count votes, the cost ran between $8,000 and $10,000. Should council opt to use the electronic voting system, it would be in place for both advanced polls and election day. This would make the cost almost double, estimated at $18,300.
“I'm a little bit reserved. I don't know if I want to spend double on something like this. I know there's been other communities that have had things go wrong,” said Mayor Gene Sobolewski.
In addition to the added expense, council expressed concern about what would happen should something with the technology go wrong.
All of the ballots are stored inside the machines, so if the data is lost they can be fed back through the electronic polling station. However, if for some reason the machines stop reading the ballots, which Power explained is the worst case scenario, the ballots will have to be counted by hand.
“It's a small community and I don't think we've ever had any trouble recruiting people to do the counting. It's kind of an exciting evening,” said Coun. Jim Cheverie. “I kind of like having humans count it compared to a machine, and it costs a lot less. Maybe I'm a little old fashioned, but there's some kind of pride having it done by the people of our community.”
The talk around electronic voting was part of an overall discussion on the town's election bylaw. The new bylaw addresses provisions for institutional voting, which takes place at BonnyLodge, Extendicare, and the hospital, and allows for incapacitated voters to cast their ballot from home.
Stoyles noted that during the last election in 2013, they did get one incapacitated voter, in which case two appointed people go to the voter's residence with the ballot box.
“Just to give everyone a chance if they can't get out to vote.”
The election bylaw also encompasses advanced voting and the requirement of a deposit for nominations. It includes the types of voter identification that will be accepted, which is either one piece of g overnment-issued identification (federal, provincial, or municipal) or one piece of identification that is authorized by the Chief Electoral Officer that includes the voter's name and current address.
Council voted unanimously to pass the first reading of the election bylaw. It will be back before town council for approval at their April 11 meeting, at which time a decision will be made on whether or not to move forward with electronic voting.
