WAUKESHA, Wis. — Election officials in Waukesha conducted public testing of each of their voting machines to help ensure an accurate ballot count for Election Day.
City workers fed hundreds of ballots into the city’s 23 DS-200 ballot scanning machines to try and catch problems before they come up for voters. Waukesha Interim City Clerk Linda Gourdoux says they try to test for everything. “We do a series of test ballots,” Gourdoux said, “We do one where it over votes, one where it undervotes and then we make sure that the machine tells us.”
She said each of the machines are tested the same way so any problems that do come up can be dealt with right away or so the machine can be pulled before Election night.
Gourdoux added, “Once we get going it’s kind of like a production line. Because we have to test each machine and zero each machine out.”
These tests are open to the public, and anyone is welcome to look in in on the testing process. Annette Kuglitsch is a poll observer from Waukesha and showed up to learn more about how the machines are tested and prepared ahead of Election Day. Kuglitsch said she has volunteered as an observer at elections for more than a decade, but said she didn’t know much about this part of the process. She encourages other voters to learn as much as they can.
“These are our elections, you know,” Kuglitsch said, “We’re the citizens, we’re the taxpayers, we’re the electors. We should be engaged in our elections.”
Kuglitsch said she is skeptical about voting machines, but appreciated the chance to see how the machines were tested and asked questions. She added, “If you feel confident in the way your elections are run, then you can trust your elections. I mean I think that’s the question that a lot of people have. Do they feel confident?”
Friday, November 1 at 5 p.m. is the last day of early voting in Waukesha until polls re-open at 7 a.m. on Election Day.
