Changes could be on the way for the 2022 municipal and school board elections in North Bay.
The city’s General Government Committee has supported a hybrid method — including electronic voting for advanced polls and electronic voting and paper ballots with tabulators on voting day.
Karen McIsaac, City Clerk, presented the options at Tuesday night’s special committee meeting of Council.
One change would be setting up ‘super polls’ for the advanced vote.
“We would reduce the voting locations from eleven to four, so the voters wishing to vote in person would not be limited to a specific polling station, they would be able to attend any one of the four super polls,” McIsaac says. “We would have to have our special polls for nursing homes and long-term care facilities.”
She also says there would only be electronic voting at the ‘super polls’, with help centres set up.
McIsaac says Sudbury and Thunder Bay have both adopted a hybrid vote for the next election while Timmins hasn’t decided yet, but did use a hybrid system in 2018.
Councillor Mark King asked McIsaac about voting issues in Sudbury during the last election.
“Sudbury tried a new system in their last election and that actually failed and they had to re-run the actual election,” he says.
McIsaac says the issues, which impacted a number of cities, have been resolved.
“It was one company it happened to, they thought they had enough bandwidth and they didn’t. It was a lesson learned,” she says. “It wasn’t only Sudbury, it was a number of municipalities.”
One unknown for next year’s election is how it will be impacted by COVID-19 and safety protocols — including PPE, physical distancing, protective barriers, hand sanitizer and more.
“By having an alternative voting method that gives the voter the choice between safeguarding their health and exercising their right to vote. That would be by having an online vote and if they wanted to, they could go in person,” she says.
Exact costs aren’t known but based on their research, McIsaac says the hybrid method is expected to cost more.
“Status quo for in-person and tabulators is $225,000,” she says. “In-person with tabulators and electronic voting would cost at least $350,000.”
Councillor Marcus Tignanelli asked McIsaac about voter turnout and if any other centre saw an increase with electronic voting.
“Yes, when I spoke to the clerk in Timmins, he definitely said there was a higher uptick in voting in 2018 with the two different methods of vote,” McIsaac said at Tuesday night’s meeting.
The change still needs approval from full Council.
