Reply #13: UT: Orem Council votes for paper ballots [View All]

[EFerrari]

Orem Council votes for paper ballots

OREM — The Orem City Council agreed Tuesday night that using paper ballots read by an optical scanner would be a far more cost-effective way of voting than borrowing expensive touch-screen machines from the county.
City Recorder Donna Weaver presented pros and cons to the council about the different voting methods, recommending the paper ballot as the most logical choice.
Borrowing 143 touch-screen Diebold machines and the corresponding encoders and memory cards from Utah County would cost the city between $28,000 to $33,000 for a primary election. The cost would increase to $38,000 to $43,000 for a general election — far greater than the city's annual election budget of $56,000.
The paper ballots where voters fill in small ovals with a pencil are a significantly less expensive choice, Weaver said, yet still maintain the speed and accuracy of results because of the optical scanner.

http://deseretnews.com/dn/view/0,1249,650221750,00.html