National

Ohio Sees Mix of Smooth Votes, Machine Problems

Published November 7, 2006 at 1:00 PM PST

This story was published more than 18 years ago.

Kathryn Puckett shows her passport before voting at a polling station in Cleveland, Ohio.

Midterm-election voting in Ohio has been mostly smooth today, but there have been reports of problems with electronic-voting machines at some polling locations.

Turnout was fairly light in Ohio, where it has rained for most of the day. Only 45 of nearly 600 polling places reported delays and problems with voting. In some cases, delays were blamed on workers who failed to show up.

In areas with electronic voting machine problems, eight precincts switched to paper ballots when machines went down. Those votes will be put in the same stack as provisional and absentee ballots. And the law requires that they won't be counted for 11 days.

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This is the first election in which Ohio voting is completely electronic, using Diebold touch screens as well as a ballot with special electronic pens.

Michele Norris talks with Dave Pignanelli of member station WKSU about voting in Cuyahoga County, Ohio, which includes Cleveland.