Technical Difficulty Temporarily Slowed Voting Process in Franklin County

A slight technical problem in Franklin County Tuesday temporarily slowed the voting process at all 13 precincts. 

All of the scanners in Franklin County crashed at every precinct.  The scanners are the machines that read a voter’s valid photo ID and allows poll workers to issue a voter card.

But Bob Ragsdale, poll manager at the Lavonia Precinct said Elections Supervisor Gina Chappalear made sure poll workers were prepared.

“It has flowed extremely well,” he said Tuesday night. “Miss Chappalear was prepared and allowed us to use paper voter lists.  So, everything has clicked along.  Voters who came here early, we just told them we had some electronic problems and if you have to be somewhere please come back later and I think all of them have.”

Election personnel from Atlanta flew into Carnesville Tuesday morning via helicopter to fix the problem which originated at the Elections and Registrations office.

“It turned out to be a minor problem and was easily fixed by State Election personnel,” Chappalear said Tuesday  night.

And by 11a, the scanners were back up and running, although Ragsdale said they continued to use the paper list the rest of the day Tuesday with no other problems.