PHILADELPHIA (KYW Newsradio) — In Tuesday's Municipal Election, poll workers at 168 of Delaware County's 428 precincts will be using e-poll books.
Delaware County Director of Elections Jim Allen says the switch from paper to electronic poll books will allow for a faster and more efficient voter check-in process and cut down voting wait times.
It also helps avoid voter disenfranchisement by alerting poll workers of voter name misspellings, if the voter recently got married and changed their name, if they need to present a specific form of identification, or if they qualify for assistance. Poll workers can also manage check-ins for two to six precincts at a time.
Allen says they piloted this program during the May primary at poll places in Brookhaven, Middletown, and Upper Darby, and "it worked extremely well."
And this go-around, Allen says they're putting these electronic poll books out to the largest locations where multiple precincts vote in the same building.
"We think that's where they can do the most good, because sometimes people are simply in the wrong room, at the school, or the wrong end of the gymnasium, and this will allow voters to get direction to where they need to vote …"
The precincts in this round of the roll-out will have paper poll books to use as emergency backups.
