County Working to Improve Voting Process Following Problems

The Benton County Election Commission presented several ideas to help solve their voting process problems.

"They were going to be looking at perhaps going back to a paper ballot county, looking at the different machines that would count paper ballots," said Benton County Clerk Tena O'Brien.

The Quorum Court listened to several recommendations to improve the voting process, including the possibility of increasing the number of precincts. O'Brien also believes the size of polling places are a problem across the county.

"That is an area I feel needs to be looked at by the commissioners is the number of registered voters in those precincts and the accommodations that are available."

With additional precincts comes the need for more staffing, but O'Brien thinks emphasizing early voting will ease the influx on Election Day.

"It doesn't matter if you've changed your address, changed your name, it's a situation that can be taken care of and you can vote. That is a process on Election day that tends to cause a bottleneck."

Even with several suggestions to help the voting process run smoothly, final decisions are largely based on the bottom line.

"The Quorum Court needs financial figures in order to make a sound decision for the county."

Although there is no definite timeline for approving suggestions made by the Benton County Election Commission, O'Brien said the goal is to improve the voting process by the 2014 election.