Thursday, January 7, 2010

Voting in Florida

Election officials in Broward County, Florida want more time to change out voting machines used by deaf voters. A state law requires replacement of current electronic voting machines by 2012 but they want to wait until 2016. Right now, a touch-screen machine is used in each of the county's precincts for deaf voters but the new system allows them to print a ballot showing their choices. Because each machine costs more than $5,000 and Broward has 786 precincts, meeting the requirement would cost the county upwards of $5 million and officials say they don't have the funds to make the change.