County hits pause button a second time on vote tabulators

The purchase of new vote tabulators for Flathead County elections has been tabled a second time by the county commissioners to enable further evaluation of the proposed equipment.

Following a recommendation from Flathead County Clerk and Recorder Debbie Pierson, the commissioners on Tuesday unanimously voted to continue their Aug. 26 decision to table the purchase of DS200 tabulators that would replace vote tabulators that are 16 years old.

Largely the same group of about 15 people who spoke in opposition to the purchase of new tabulators on Aug. 26 again reiterated their concerns about the integrity of the proposed tabulators and the potential for vote manipulation.

Pierson, addressing the concerns, said "it's important that everyone understands it's our job to ensure election integrity.

"We invite people into our processes all the time. We test our equipment publicly," she said, adding that the public is invited to witness the testing process but rarely does anyone attend those reviews.

PIERSON ONCE again stressed that the election processes are set by law and the Montana Secretary of State's Office.

"We're only allowed by law to purchase tabulation equipment certified by the secretary of state," she said. "We can't open up a catalog; we can only choose equipment certified at the state level.

"There's risk with every process we do in life," Pierson added. "Our job is to mitigate that risk as much as possible" in the election process.

The old tabulators, the M100s, were not used in the 2020 election cycle, Pierson said. Only the large tabulators that can count large volumes of votes, such as absentee ballots, were used in the last general election.

This year's general election on Nov. 2 includes only municipal elections for Flathead County's three incorporated cities.

Commissioner Randy Brodehl said the commissioners' decision "to push the pause button is important" and thanked both Pierson and the public commenters for their input.

Commissioner Pam Holmquist said she favored taking more time to evaluate the proposed equipment.

"I think it's wise to step back from the machines until we're comfortable," she said. "I'm glad we're going in this direction."

Commissioner Brad Abell said he wanted to "reiterate that no matter what we do there will still be a paper ballot and we hand-count a selection of those to check the machines." He was referring to the post-election audits that require the hand-counting of votes from selected precincts to make sure they match up with what the machines tabulate.

THE COMMISSIONERS on Tuesday did unanimously approve the purchase of a hardened laptop that is used by election officials exclusively for internal election communication. Election results are loaded to the hardened system, through the software program, then are transferred again to another computer that can upload results to the Secretary of State's Office.

Pierson said she'll bring a request for election software to the commissioners for approval next week, and will come back with a request for election equipment within the next several months.

News editor Lynnette Hintze may be reached at 406-758-4421 or lhintze@dailyinterlake.com.