Wood County Commission tests election tabulation system
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PARKERSBURG -- Wood County conducted its public test of the tabulation system that will be used during the upcoming election on Nov. 8.
Wood County Clerk Mark Rhodes and Wood County IT Systems & Network Administrator Chris Whittaker conducted the public inspection and test Monday before the Wood County Commission.
Rhodes and Whittaker showed no votes were in the system, they ran a number of test results with one vote for each race on the ballot to show the counting system is working as it should. After they were done, they cleared out the system so it showed no votes and the computer's hard drive was put under lock and key.
Commission President Blair Couch said the tabulation machine and the voting machines are not connected to the internet, via cable, wi-fi or any other means.
During election night, results are tablulated and moved to a separate machine by thumbdrive before they are downloaded to send to the Secretary of State's office or put on the county's webpage.
The commission signed a certification confirming the test and its results were correct.
Another test will be run election night before votes are counted to show the system does not have any votes in the system.
Officials said the ballots for the general elections are smaller than the primaries due to the number of races and the number of candidates.
Rhodes said since early voting started last week, there have been 2,341 ballots cast as of Saturday. He said that was lighter than what the county saw in November 2018 during the last non-presidential election.
Rhodes said he won't have a breakdown of how many Republican and Democrat voters until after the votes are counted on election night. For the information, he currently has the largest age group of the early voters are in the 65-70-years-old category.
In other business:
* The commission put Stephen Nulter in nomination for reappointment to the Union Williams Public Service District.
* The commission put Edna Summers in nomination for reappointment to the Claywood Park Public Service District.
Brett Dunlap can be reached at bdunlap@newsandsentinel.com