Caroline County General Registrar Rebecca Ryan and members of the county’s electoral board discovered late last year that there was a need for new voting machines that were compliant with the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA).
The Caroline Board of Supervisors, however, was not made aware of the need for the machines until a request for funding was added to the agenda last week for this past Tuesday’s meeting.
The timing of the request led to a contentious back-and-forth involving Supervisors Floyd Thomas (Mattaponi District) and Reginald Underwood (Reedy Church) and Ryan and Electoral Board Vice Chair Sandra Pelter before the board voted 4-2 to approve the purchase.
“I don’t believe in this new software because I don’t trust it, and I think that’s what the citizens in the county will be saying when we switch the software a month before the election,” Thomas said.
Ryan and Pelter argued that they’ve known about the need since last December, at which point they began researching vendors. Deputy County Administrator Alan Partin, who finalizes the agenda for the meetings, said he did not know this was occurring until last Thursday.
Ryan provided a letter dated Aug. 7 to the board stating that “the equipment we are currently using for voter accessibility has deteriorated and no longer functions as required by Virginia code. The tabulation equipment we are using is also obsolete.”
In response, Thomas said it doesn’t matter how long Ryan and the electoral board researched options because they didn’t inform anyone else in the county.
“Whether you’ve gone through 100 different companies and they came to your house and gave you a Tupperware party, you did not tell us this was coming,” Thomas said.
Underwood and Thomas also questioned how the Democratic Primary in June occurred with no issues. Ryan said 20 to 30 voters required assistance for the primary. Thomas asked if the new ADA-compliant machines could be installed only for voters who require them at the county’s 13 precincts, but Ryan and Pelter said that singling out anyone with a disability is against the law. The machines, they said, would need to be for everyone.
“It’s an ADA requirement whether one person uses it or everybody in the county uses it,” Pelter said.
The electoral board settled on Electronic Systems & Software to provide the new machines at a cost of $161,380. The budget for the purchase is only $107,000, so the board had to approve the remaining $54,380 Tuesday night. Ryan and Pelter said the new machines will have audio capabilities to assist the visually-impaired, among other helpful features for voters with sight issues.
While Supervisors Nancy Long of the Port Royal District and Jeff Black of the Western Caroline District expressed concern with the timing of the request, they voted to support it in the end. Jeff Sili of the Bowling Green District and Madison District Supervisor Clay Forehand expressed no reservations.
Thomas said the optics of purchasing new equipment and training staff so close to the start of early voting make some voters in his district “suspicious.”
Caroline doesn’t have any local races on the ballot this election cycle. County residents will vote on the next governor, lieutenant governor, attorney general and House of Delegates representatives in the 66th and 67th districts.
“I’m not going to apologize for my passion when it comes to voting because that’s a fundamental right that some of us haven’t always had the chance to experience,” Thomas said. “The reality is that on the national level, we’ve had people questioning elections. On the local level, we don’t really want that and theoretically have never had that before.
“All I’m saying is if we have to do this to be in compliance, we’ll go ahead and do this but only the ADA people have to use it, so we can eliminate some of the fear of people saying we changed the machines the month before the election.”
In other business, the board voted 5-1 to increase fees and levies for public utilities. On Sept. 1, the base fees for water and sewer, water and sewer usage rates, the administration fee and the capital asset fee will increase by 5%. The returned check fee will go up from $50 to $100. Also, fees for the Dawn Wastewater System will increase 5%.
On July 1 each of the next four years, the base fees for water and sewer, water and sewer usage rates, the administrative fee and capital asset fee, septage and equivalent residential connection fee will increase by 5%. Thomas cast the lone vote against the increases.
The board also voted 5-0 to deny a 20-home subdivision on two-acre lots off Ladysmith Road, 1.4 miles west of the Lake Land’Or entrance. Underwood abstained from the vote.
The applicants, Florence and Kerry Vornadore, were requesting a rezoning from Rural Preservation to Rural Residential on 43.8 of the 221.5 acres.
