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Deschutes County Ballot Counting System Certified

BEND, OR -- Deschutes County officially has certified its ballot counting system, ahead of the November 8th election. County Clerk Steve Dennison says Monday’s test ensures an accurate count, “We use a system called Clear Ballot. It is a state and federally certified voting system. These voting system vendors do a great job with their software and it does work as designed. But, this is just one more piece of the puzzle to let us know - and we can, of course, in turn let you know and voters know the system is operating as designed.”

Hand-marked test ballots were run through the machine, “To test each position on every ballot, in every precinct and ballot style. So, we’re basically testing that our system is tabulating the way we expect it to." Dennison noted the process required 1,500 test ballots because with 50 precincts and even more so-called “splits,” the machine has to be able to read 60 different ballots, “So, around 60 individual pieces of paper, you know, ballots that are unique from one another, we need to test all positions on each one of those instances.” The machine will be tested for accuracy one more time after the election, before the results are officially certified. 

Dennison says his office feels the pressure as federal and state elections officials target dis- and mis-information, “We have the technology in place, we have the know-how, we have the institutional knowledge in our staff to conduct these elections accurately and fairly. So, we always have that sense of ‘this is critical.’ All we want to do is get it right."

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