Voting Machines Story Archives - West Virginia Public Broadcasting

Senate Passes Bills On Elections, Cost Of Insulin

The Senate passed five bills Thursday related to elections in the state, as well as issues around diabetes.

The West Virginia Senate passed three bills Thursday related to elections in the state.

All three bills originated from the Secretary of State’s office as technical cleanups.

Senate Bill 620 makes just four changes to state code that would increase the maximum number of registered voters per precinct, as well as the distance between polling places.

Sen. Charles Trump, R-Morgan, chair of the Senate Judiciary Committee and the bill’s lead sponsor, said the bill increases the maximum number of voters in an urban precinct from 1,500 to 2,500, and allows for greater consolidation of precincts.

“There’s also authority under this bill for counties, county governments, county commissions to consolidate precincts. But there are limitations on the geographical distance,” Trump said. “The consolidated precinct cannot contain more than 5,000 total – that’s up from 3,000 registered voters – and under existing law, there’s a one mile radius limit. This would expand that to five miles. It’s all permissive. It would be up to the county commissions to decide whether or not to do that when they exercise the statutory authority of drawing and configuring the voting precincts in their respective counties.”

During discussion of the bill in the Senate Judiciary Committee on Feb. 17, Sen. Mike Caputo, D-Marion, expressed concern that the consolidation of polling places the bill allows would create undue burdens on voters.

“I think it’s our job to make voting easier for our constituents, not to add what I think could be a cumbersome task,” he said. “I get that you’ll move the machines to one precinct, if you consolidate. I still think there could be bottlenecks at check-in. It would appear that we are doing things to make it more difficult for the voter.”

The bill ultimately passed on a vote of 27 to 7. All three Democratic senators were joined by Republican senators Jason Barrett of Berkeley, Laura Chapman of Ohio, Patrick Martin of Lewis and Ben Queen of Harrison in voting against the bill.

The Senate also passed Senate Bill 631, which would facilitate the state’s use of federal money from the Help America Vote Act in federal elections. Also known as HAVA, Trump said the bill was passed by Congress after the 2000 presidential election to help facilitate vote counting in states.

“As the technology of voting machines has become more advanced, they become more expensive. And so in West Virginia, the voting machines that are used by the 55 counties are purchased with combinations of county monies and federal monies,” he said. “This will allow the secretary of state to utilize federal monies that come into the secretary of state’s possession for that purpose.”

Senate Bill 631 also extends the deadline for when county clerks can accept voter registrations on the final day of registration by a few hours, from close of business to midnight.

Senate Bill 644, which aims to clarify the procedure for contested elections, also passed.

“In short, what this bill does is it moves to the courts the place where election contests occur,” Trump said. “If there’s an election contest from a municipal election, the current law is that it’s decided first by the mayor and council. Contests of elections involving the county and district contests, current law is that they’re decided in the county court. This moves all that to circuit court.”

All three bills now go to the House of Delegates for consideration.

Support For Diabetics

The Senate also took up two bills to address issues around diabetes in the state.

Senate Bill 195 would allow a licensed healthcare provider to prescribe ready to use glucagon rescue therapy in a school, or in a school district’s name, to treat severe hypoglycemic episodes.

The bill also sets forth procedures for administering glucagon, including the requirement that a school nurse approve its administration, and authorizes school personnel to receive training on assisting students in diabetes care and how to identify and react to a student experiencing a diabetes related emergency.

Senate Bill 577 would limit the cost sharing for a covered prescription of insulin to a total of $35 for a 30-day supply, and $100 for a 30-day supply for covered diabetic devices.

Senate Health and Human Resources Chair Sen. Mike Maroney, R-Marshall, said the bill would apply to West Virginians that currently have private health insurance.

“Our bill applies to private insurance, the 20 percent of West Virginians that have commercial insurance, roughly. That’s what this bill applies to,” Maroney said. “Medicare already has it. PEIA has similar ranges. I can’t answer Medicaid.”

The Inflation Reduction Act capped the cost of insulin at $35 per month for Medicare beneficiaries starting in 2023.

Maroney said a similar bill passed the Senate last year but failed to complete legislative action.

Both bills passed and now head to the House of Delegates for consideration.

Election Officials Approve Grants for Voting Upgrades

West Virginia election officials have approved more than $6.5 million in federal grants to make upgrades to voting equipment and security across the state.

Donald Kersey is the election division director for the Secretary of State’s Office. He told the Charleston Gazette-Mail that the funds will be used in 41 counties to upgrade or replace voting systems, to upgrade cybersecurity and to improve physical security where voting machines are stored.

He said 26 counties will use at least part of the funding to upgrade voting systems, 24 counties plan to upgrade cybersecurity systems and 17 counties plan to improve physical security.

West Virginia County to Get New Voting Machines

A West Virginia county is getting new voting machines that officials say will speed up the voting process and provide better security.

The Herald-Dispatch reports the Cabell County Commission approved the new machines Thursday. The machines and their installation will cost around $1.4 million. The approved proposal says the county plans to pay around $285,000 annually for the next five years to pay off the purchase.

Commissioners expressed concern, however, over where they’ll get the funds. They say grant money will hopefully covers at least half the costs, but won’t know how much funding they’ll receive until August. County Clerk Phyllis Smith says the purchase was necessary as many of the roughly 16-year-old machines don’t work properly.

The new machines are expected to arrive in August.

Sec. Of State Office: No Evidence of Tampering With Voting Machines

Officials in some states are trying to figure out whether local election offices were targeted in an apparent effort by Russian military intelligence to hack into election software last fall.

The efforts were detailed in a recently leaked report attributed to the U.S. National Security Agency.

North Carolina is checking on whether any local systems were breached, while the revelation prompted an election security review in Virginia. Both are considered presidential battleground states.

In Illinois, officials are trying to determine which election offices used software from the contractor that the report said was compromised.

The three are among eight states where election offices had contracts with VR Systems, a Florida-based company that provided software to manage voter registrations. The others are Florida, California, Indiana, New York and West Virginia.

The report, dated last month, asserts that hackers obtained information from company employees and used that to send phishing emails to 122 local election officials just before the election last November in an attempt to break into their systems.

So far, there is no indication that voting or ballot counting in any states were affected. Officials in at least five counties in Florida — a key political swing state — received the emails, the Miami Herald reported. It’s not clear where else the emails may have been sent.

But the revelation, published by the online news outlet The Intercept, set off questions in the states where VR provides software.

North Carolina state elections board director Kim Westbrook Strach said her office had not been contacted by any federal officials about whether any of the 21 county election offices that use VR software were targeted. Still, her office was contacting county boards about potential breaches.

The news of a reported Russian hacking attempt surprised Bill Brian, elections board chairman in Durham County, which experienced problems with VR Systems’ electronic poll books on Election Day. The issue forced officials to abandon the system, issue paper ballots and extend voting hours, but officials there said that trouble did not appear to have been caused by hacking.

“We have not had any big, ‘Uh oh, we’ve got a problem with computers,'” said Brian, a Republican.

In Virginia, state Elections Commissioner Edgardo Cortes, said he could not comment on whether any local officials were targeted by the phishing emails, but he said he was not aware of any breaches. Still, the disclosure of the NSA document has prompted a review of election security, he said.

There also is no indication to date of the reported Russian attempt “resulting in any contact with local election officials in West Virginia,” said Steven Adams, spokesman for the secretary of state.

In some states, VR software was used in only a handful of voting jurisdictions.

New York election officials said just four counties used the software last year and that federal authorities had not contacted the state about any of them being targeted.

California officials said only Humboldt County, in the far northern part of the state, used VR software during last year’s election. Sam Mahood, a spokesman for Secretary of State Alex Padilla, declined to say if the office was investigating whether the county was targeted.

So far, Humboldt County has found no evidence that anyone in the elections office received the phishing emails, County Clerk Kelly Sanders said. The county used the software to sign in voters.

Illinois officials have asked local elections offices whether they used VR’s software in 2016. By midday Wednesday, only one county said it had.

Last September, the Department of Homeland Security told the AP that hackers believed to be Russian agents had targeted voter registration systems in more than 20 states. No evidence of tampering emerged in the worst-hit state, Illinois. Hackers who penetrated its network with a method called SQL injection spent three weeks rooting around before they were discovered in July. Officials said nothing was added, changed or deleted.

The general counsel for the Illinois state elections board, Ken Menzel, said the state cooperated with the FBI and other federal authorities in the investigation but was not told who might have been responsible. He said the intrusion had been traced to some servers in the Netherlands and he heard speculation of Russian involvement.

“The feds did not see fit to enlighten us to the extent that the feds know more than that,” he said. “That wasn’t part of our need-to-know.”

Kay Stimson, a spokeswoman for the National Association of Secretaries of State, whose members oversee elections in several states, said the group wants to know why federal officials did not warn potential victims at the time the attacks were allegedly happening.

Stimson said that with more specific information that breaches were possible, states could have offered help to local election officials and created firewalls to make sure any local problems would not have caused problems at the state level.

The Department of Homeland Security did not respond to a request for comment.