June 5,2012 – Colorado Springs, CO – The El Paso County Clerk& Recorder, in an effort to educate voters on the proper way to mark aballot, has created a short informative video to help voters understand the correctway to mark their ballot. This video is available on the El Paso County Clerk& Recorder’s YouTube channel.
Here is the link to the YouTubevideo: http://www.youtube.com/epcclerk
Approximately five percent of allballots cast must be duplicated prior to being counted. Often this is due tosimple mistakes which voters make when filling out their ballot. The proper wayto mark a ballot is to use blue or black ink and completely fill in the oval.
Using a red pen, highlighter orpencil will cause equipment to not pick up the marks on a ballot. Using lines, check marks also cause theequipment to not read the marks on the ballot. Sharpie markers bleed through thepaper and cause the machine to reject the ballots. Other mistakes are often spills, rips andmistakes made on the ballot.
“We wanted to offer voters avisual method to learn the correct (and incorrect) way to fill out theirballots. We hope this video will be helpful and informative to voters as theycomplete their ballot,” said Alissa Vander Veen, Chief Deputy.
When errors like these occur, theballot must be taken to a bipartisan duplication board (one Republican ElectionJudge and one Democratic Election Judge) to duplicate the ballot onto a newclean ballot, which then can be counted by the election equipment.
For moreinformation contact Alissa Vander Veen at 719-351-9626 or AlissaVanderVeen@elpasoco.com.
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