The Porter County Elections and Registration Office has found another silver lining in the exhausting renovation they endured last year following a flood in February: faster operating times from the new tabulation machines that had to be purchased.
The Board of Elections and Registration met in the basement holding room Monday morning for the routine public test in advance of the primary.
“They’re faster as far as running the reports and moving screen to screen,” said Porter County Clerk Jessica Bailey.
“The screens are clearer too,” added Sundae Schoon, director of the Elections and Registration Office, of the new machines. State law requires 10% of the machines to be tested at the public test. Bailey said the remainder undergoes logic and accuracy testing before the election.
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Board President Paul Rausch was assisting new board member James Colter, who replaces former member Ethan Lowe, in running his first test of a machine when an alarm went off. “We failed the test right off the bat,” Rausch said to Colter.
“If it’s missing initials, it will call the judge,” Schoon said, but in this case, “it was jammed. If you don’t let go right away.”
After locking up the test ballots, the board recessed for the few minutes it took to head upstairs to test the new high-speed vote tabulator before it’s sent to its permanent home in a locked location at the Porter County Expo Center.
“We were already having conversations about updating it,” Assistant Director of Elections and Registration Tara Graff said of the old tabulator.
“It’s a little bit larger,” she said of the new one, which cost $135,000. “It’s a little bit different of a feeder shape, but essentially the purpose and function is the same.”
“So hopefully nothing will go wrong, but if it breaks . . .,” said Jennifer Klug, serving as proxy for board member Jeff Chidester.
“No, we have two,” Schoon reassured her. “We still have the old one. You can be optimistic. I’ll be realistic.”
Bailey informed the group that the only hiccup facing the looming election so far is the loss of the Emmanuel Lutheran Church vote center location for the primary due to construction on the parish’s campus. They expect it to be back in the vote center offerings by the general election.
“We still have 39,” Bailey said of the county’s remaining vote centers. It’s required to offer only 13.
Early voting opens Tuesday and will be from 8:30 a.m. to 3:30 p.m. Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays; from 11 a.m. to 7 p.m. Tuesdays and Thursdays; and from 8:30 a.m. to 3:30 p.m. Saturday, April 25 and May 2 at the following locations: Chesterton Town Hall, 790 Broadway; Hebron Community Center, 611 N. Main St.; North County Complex, 3560 Willowcreek Road in Portage; Porter County Administration Building, 155 Indiana Ave. in Valparaiso; Union Township Fire Station #2, 267 N 600 W in Valparaiso; and Valparaiso Fire Training Center, 355 Evans Ave.
The Porter County Vote Mobile will be at the following locations: from 4 to 7 p.m. on April 7, 14 and 21 at Luke Gas Station, 6259 Melton Rd. in Portage; from 4 to 7 p.m. April 9, 16, and 23 at Kouts Library, 101 E. Daumer Road; from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. on April 25 at South Haven Library, 403 W 700 N; from 4 to 7 p.m. April 28 at the Ogden Dunes Volunteer Fire Department, 111 Hillcrest Road; from 4 to 7 p.m. on April 30 at Jamestown Apartments, 2810 Winchester Drive in Valparaiso; and from 8 a.m. to 2 p.m. on May 2 at Chesterton’s European Market, 220 Broadway.
Early voting ends at noon on May 4.
Shelley Jones is a freelance reporter for the Post-Tribune.