ELECTION QUESTIONS — Officials with the board of elections asked Jefferson County commissioners for new electronic poll books Wednesday. Commissioners asked them to see if there’s any way they can shift adjust their storage to help make space for a bank that would like to move into a first floor space in the Towers building. -- Linda Harris

STEUBENVILLE — The Jefferson County commissioners could have to shell out as much as $140,000 to bring the county’s voting machines up to snuff.

Officials with the board of elections were at this week’s meeting, which was moved to Wednesday because two commissioners had another official commitment, to report the poll books they’ve been using for the past six years had reached the end of their lives.

“They are out of warranty, have become costly to fix (and) are becoming unusable without costly repairs,” Director Bob Gale wrote. “I had brought this to your attention in the early part of 2021. We have been able to get four more elections out of them since I brought up the need to replace (them), and we will do our best to get through one more.”

But Gale, election board Chairman Brian Scarpone and board member Tom Gentile said they can’t risk going into the 2024 presidential election cycle with failing equipment.

Gale said they’ve had “major issues” with the current poll books, pointing out in the 2021 balloting as well as the small primary in May they’d used just 18 of them and 16 had failed.

“I spoke with the vendor. We had some trouble with the software, — it was just dying and the batteries won’t hold a charge – it costs around $200 to replace batteries,” he said. “We had at least 10 more units we had sent out in the field for testing, and when they get out in the field after testing, for some reason, they would break. “

“They just need replaced,” Gale added. “We don’t want to go into 2024 with them. There’s no way we can use them. We can get through 2022 – we’ll probably spend $15,000 fixing them just to get through to the November election, but going into 2024 it’s going to be a different story.”

Gale told commissioners he figures they’ll need about 85 electronic books, printers, charging carts and carrying cases, plus they’ll have to pay licensing fees. He said they’ll need to replace the existing system after the 2022 general election on Nov. 8 but before the 2023 primary so “we’ll have ample time to test them out.”

Commissioner Tony Morelli pointed out the Jefferson County Board of Elections is “highly regarded” throughout the state for its election performance.

“According to the president of the board of elections, we had 100 percent election integrity the last time. That’s got to be one of the best in the state,” Commissioner Tom Graham added. “Our elections are safe, secure and we’re confident they’re done correctly, and we’ll continue to make sure of that by getting them updated machines.”

Morelli said the average life span of election machines is about six years.

“Things get to end-of-life,” he said.

“They’re doing the right thing by coming up well in advance,” Commissioner Dave Maple added. “I think they’re going to get it, we’re just trying to figure out if it’s coming out of this year’s money or next year’s, and if we have to bid it out or if it’s already been bid out” because the state has a list of approved vendors and both companies are on it.

The trio seemed less than enthusiastic when commissioners took advantage of the presence of the election board’s delegation at the meeting to ask them to consider whether there was any way to reconfigure their storage spaces or an alternate space that would suit their needs. Much of the first floor in the Towers is currently used for board of elections storage, but the building is rapidly filling with tenants and a bank has expressed interest in renting space on the first floor.

Commissioners purchased the building in 2013 and moved the elections offices in a year or two later. Maple and Graham were commissioners then, along with Gentile.

“We had discussions that if the opportunity ever arose to put somebody else in, would you be open to discussing it?” Maple recalled. “There was no commitment on their end, no commitment on our end. But now that there’s such a high occupancy rate and that first floor is such a lucrative spot, a lot of that first floor is just storage. (We just want to see) if they can take a look at another way to store their (records and equipment.) In their defense, storing it on other floors becomes a nightmare on election day, trying to wait on elevators to go up and down. They’ve got some good arguments why moving would not be an easy task.”

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