Randolph county fails to grasp certification concerns

Unpopular vote
Randolph board grudgingly approves new polling machines
High Point Enterprise

Randolph County Commissioners reluctantly voted Monday to use federal grant money to replace the county’s voting machines.

Will Massie, assistant county manager, said that the state was trying to improve the election process by making sure every system produced an actual paper ballot.

Commissioner Darrell Frye said Randolph County’s existing voting machines work well and produced a manual ballot.

“This makes no sense,” Frye said.

“I know it’s federal money, but it’s still coming from the taxpayer’s pocket and we don’t need it.” According to a memo from Elections Director Patsy Foscoe, all existing voting machines in the state have been decertified and can’t be used.

Systems were decertified for a reason, Some because they fail to meet federal standards, some because the fail to meet the more stringent state standards. The point of these standards is to avoid loss of votes and possible cheating. I don't understand why he views this as a bad thing.

Randolph County will receive $576,285, which is enough to replace all of its existing voting machines.

Commissioner Robert Davis said the county had to use the federal money to buy the machines, or the state would use it somewhere else.

“You know they’re going to throw this money in a hole somewhere,” Davis said

The only other place the state could use the money would be on voting machines. There is no other "hole" they are permitted to thow it in.

Only one vendor, Elections Systems and Software, meets the state’s qualifications for providing the new machines.

“That one vendor is going to provide machines, software, training, for 100 counties?” said Commissioner Phil Kemp. “They must have had some powerful lobbyists down in Raleigh.” Chairman Harold Holmes said he supposed the county should be glad the state didn’t demand the changes without providing the money.

Again, the reason there is only one vendor is because Diebold refused to comply with state law and Sequoia had failed to comply with federal law. Why would you wish to do business with companies which cannot obey the law?