Faced with aging ballot machines and critical legal vulnerabilities out of compliance with the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA), St. Francois County is overhauling its voting system.
The amount of polling locations have been dialed back from 21, all the way down to just six. Four of the six will be new and the other two are precincts that are in use from prior years. Polling stations will be at the First State Community Center, Mineral Area College’s Industry and Technology Center, North County High School, St. Francois County Elections Central, Bismarck VFW, and the Leadwood Fire Department.
Kevin Engler, a Farmington community leader, is the county clerk of St. Francois County and has been for over seven years. Before, he served as a member for the Missouri House Of Representatives, going on to become the majority leader in Jan. 2009. Now, as the county clerk, he’s the driving force behind the new changes.
As the county clerk, one of Engler’s biggest priorities is the ability for everyone, including disabled people and workers with tight schedules, to vote. With this comes geographical considerations and compliance with the Americans with Disabilities Act.
The ADA is an important U.S. civil rights law passed in 1990 ensuring that discrimination against individuals with disabilities in all areas of public life is prohibited under US law. This includes utilities like elevators, restrooms, easy access parking, signage, accessible routes, and other forms of access for people with disabilities.
“We had 21 polling sites and 8 or 9, depending upon how you looked at it weren’t ADA compliant,“ said Engler. “We wanted to make sure that people that were disabled had the ability, you know, if they were in a basement of a church or some place or something they couldn’t get to, to vote.”
“We have a unique county. Over 80% of the voting population is within two miles north of Bonne Terre, two miles south of Farmington, two miles east of 67, and two miles west of 67. In that corridor right there. And we centered in those areas. Also 19 of the 20 largest employers are in that area.”
With the consolidation of precincts into voting centers also comes consolidation of election costs and resource consumption.
“We believe the savings will be somewhere between 25 and 30,000 elections. So in years like this year where we have three elections, or in years where we have a presidential primary and three other elections, it will save about $100,000.”
In previous years, during federal elections, voting precincts had to print out ten percent more ballots than the amount of people who had voted in the prior federal election. As a result, funds were used on the printing and shredding of extra ballots that were never used. Now, with the advent of new print on demand ballot machines, taxpayer dollars won’t be wasted on printing and shredding ballots that never get used.
“Well, it will be very similar,” Englar said Engler. “Instead of them turning around, going back, and picking up a ballot out of the box and saying, ‘okay, you’re a ballot type 18, we’re going to pick you up a ballot,’ it will, once you press that button, print out a ballot 18.”
“The machines cost about $225,000,” Engler said. “We haven’t gotten new machines for 16 years now. You guys are more accustomed to computers than most. Is a 16 year old computer efficient? No. And we cannot get it upgraded. We used to be able to get them upgraded and they would give us, you know, a package to upgrade them but we can’t anymore. So it’s time to buy new machines.”
On April 7th, the St. Francois County General Municipal Election day is being held. Early voting is currently underway. Community members can register to vote by March 11.
