An apparent glitch in the software used at Summit County polling places to match signatures on ballots with their registration forms left some Ward 1 residents unable to vote shortly after polls opened on Tuesday morning.
The issue impacted at least five polling locations in Summit County: the Highland Square Library and St. Paul’s Episcopal Church, both in Ward 1, as well as locations in Peninsula, Twinsburg Township and Cuyahoga Falls.
Bill Rich, a member of the Summit County Board of Elections, said the issue was quickly addressed by poll workers who reviewed paper records before a software update from the electronic poll book company was pushed through.
But that fix was not established soon enough for some voters who showed up early at their polling location.
“We couldn’t vote,” said longtime Ward 1 resident Mark Bailey, who showed up to St. Paul’s Episcopal Church at around 7 a.m. with his wife. It was the only convenient window for her to vote ahead of what she anticipated to be a long day at work. “We both signed the electronic tablet, and when they turned it around, our signatures weren’t on file,” he said.
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Bailey said the same thing happened to another voter next to them, but another nearby voter was able to submit his ballot afterwhen his signature was found in the electronic poll book. Bailey said he’s voted in nearly every election in the 25 years he’s lived in the area and had never had an issue like this.
Poll workers, he said, told them they could “wait for some forms to come from downtown or just to come back later. … No one really knew what was going on. I realize we were probably one of the first ones there, and they said there was some kind of glitch.”
His wife had to leave and go to work without casting a ballot with hopes of making it back in time after a work meeting this evening.
Ward 1 resident Jessica Goldbourn also arrived early at St. Paul’s Episcopal Church to vote before going to work. She said that when a poll worker scanned her driver’s license and the driver’s license of the person ahead of her, there was nothing on file for them.
They were then directed to the end of the table and provided with a paper form to sign so their signatures could be matched with their driver’s license. She and the voter in front of her were then able to cast normal ballots.
Goldbourn said she was given the last signature-matching form available and the voters who came in behind her, who were also not found in the electronic system — she said she saw roughly 10 while she was there — were turned away and told to come back later.
“Obviously people were frustrated,” she said, as a poll worker was on the phone with the Board of Elections trying to figure out what to do.
Rich said no one should have been significantly delayed or turned away because of the glitch, that anybody whose signature was not found in the electronic database should have been able to cast a provisional ballot. After the glitch was discovered in the five locations, poll workers were able to use the backup paper records.
That workaround was in effect when Bailey returned to vote at about 8:35 a.m.. Bailey said he was directed to a poll worker who was able to comb through stacks of paper to match his signature with the voter registration log and he was able to cast his ballot. He said when he finished voting, he overheard someone indicate that the software glitch had been resolved.
“The eventual solution was we finally got our electronic poll book provider to push out an update file to all the electronic poll books to supply the missing signatures,” Rich said. “So that problem, in the locations where it occurred, and we’re aware of five, that problem has been resolved and it’s no longer necessary to check the paper poll book signatures.”
Rich said in a phone call shortly before 10 a.m. on Tuesday that he was not aware of any other significant issues with voting in Summit County.
