COOPERSTOWN _ Polling stations throughout New York state will be equipped with new ballot-marking devices Nov. 4, but elections officials don't want you to use them unless you need to.
BMDs are meant to facilitate voting for disabled people. The state Board of Elections, which has been sued by the federal government for not installing new equipment fast enough, has required that each polling station have a BMD this year. Locally, they will be used in addition to the traditional lever machines.
With federal funds, Otsego County purchased 37 Sequoia ImageCast machines at $11,500 apiece to satisfy this state and federal mandate, according to Keith Featherstone, Republican voting machine technician and elections specialist.
At one end of the ImageCast is the BMD, the required part this year. At the other is a scanner that won't be used this year because it hasn't been certified as accurate by the state.
At the BMD end, the voter can look at a computer screen while listening to instructions from a headset and holding a small keyboard in his lap.
Friday morning, staff at the county Board of Elections Office in Middlefield tested one of its BMDs on a reporter for The Daily Star. Using a voided ballot from an earlier town of Cicero election, the reporter had to select candidates for state Supreme Court justice, county judge, district attorney, county legislator, supervisor, superintendent of highways and council member.
With Featherstone and his Democratic counterpart, Laura Curtis, assisting, the reporter was able to complete this test in about 15 minutes, but not without frustration. The audio instructions were delivered in Spanish because the ``voter'' made a mistake early in the program and had to backtrack, with assistance from staff.
``We won't be using Spanish in this county,'' Featherstone said.
On the modest-sized screen, the candidates' names were too small to be seen clearly when the entire ballot was displayed. And when the picture was enlarged, parts of the ballot disappeared off-screen, making selections difficult.
The BMDs are equipped to address many handicaps. The keyboard has a braille section for blind people. People with motor impairments can use a sip-and-puff device. But how well these aids will work in practice remains to be seen, according to Sheila Ross, Republican deputy elections commissioner.
Ross and Hank Nicols, Democratic elections commissioner, noted that while all voters are entitled to use the BMDs, voting with them will take much longer than with lever machines.
Christine Zachmeyer, executive director of the Catskill Center for Independence, said elections officials should be encouraging people to use the ballot-marking devices, not warning them of delays.
``If we're going to be replacing our lever machines, we should learn how to use the new ones,'' she said.
People with disabilities don't want separate machines, she said. ``That would be discrimination.''
To encourage voters to try the BMDs, the Catskill Center, together with Sequoia Voting Systems, will hold a BMD demonstration at the Holiday Inn in Oneonta from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. Thursday.
Nicols said he expects that most people with disabilities will continue to vote via absentee ballots from the comfort of their homes.
