MAPLETON – At the behest of council here, township clerk Larry Wheeler is on the hunt to find out the cost for additional voting methods for next year’s municipal election.
At council’s Aug. 10 meeting Wheeler presented a report outlining the pros and cons of different voting methods in response to a motion earlier this year from councillor Michael Martin.
Residents already have the option of slipping on a pair of shoes and making a trip to cast their ballot in-person or by slapping a stamp on an envelope and mailing their vote.
But Martin called for the township to “explore alternative internet and phone-based methods of voting” for the 2022 election. The recommendation before council on Tuesday, as amended with Martin’s suggestion, was backed by councillor Marlene Ottens.
“Our turnout is never going to be extraordinarily high here just by the nature of our demographics … but I think if we are reaching out to the younger demographic, voting by internet is something that we really need to consider,” Martin said, adding he doubts the success of mail-in ballots.
The township is already financially committed to the mail-in option for next year’s election, having entered into a binding agreement with DataFix Voter List Management Services ($21,000 for a retainer and voting kits) and Dominion Voting Systems Corp ($17,850 for tabulator rentals).
“We’ve got Xplornet towers going up, we’ve got fibre optics, the rural internet is a thing that’s being pushed across the country and for municipalities like us I think we need to start tapping into that too—at least provide the opportunity for people,” Martin said.
Mayor Gregg Davidson said he was under the impression voter turnout actually declined when Centre Wellington turned to internet and phone voting in 2018—the only Wellington County municipality to offer such options.
Centre Wellington did experience a drop of three percentage points in voter turnout, from 45% in 2014 to 42% in 2018, but data provided to the Community News by Centre Wellington clerk Kerri O’Kane shows election turnout has declined overall since 2003 when voter turnout reached its highest point of 48%.
Hot issues, rather than voting methods, O’Kane said, are typically what drives a higher voter turnout.
“We went to extraordinary lengths last election to make sure people were given every opportunity to vote,” she said in a phone call with the Community News.
In 2019, voter centres with internet access were set up and subsidized housing, along with congregate settings like seniors’ centres, were visited, O’Kane said.
Ottens sided with Martin despite Davidson’s caution, saying, “We need to move with the times here.”
“You can’t just always do things the same way because that’s how you’ve always done it,” Ottens said.
“I agree it’s something to definitely look at for the future and to keep the options open.”
She suggested the better question might be why people aren’t voting.
In a later call with the Community News Davidson said multiple voting options come with substantial additional costs and can be cumbersome for counting votes.
Voting by mail is the more expensive option over internet/phone voting, Davidson said, but with the challenge of getting a reliable internet connection in rural communities, voting couldn’t be done by internet alone, forcing an expensive hybrid approach and more costly elections.
“I don’t know why it’s a big rush for municipalities to grab on to all these alternative voting methods,” he said.
Councillor Dennis Craven declared during the meeting he would be “so opposed to telephone voting it isn’t even be funny,” citing the “disaster” it was the last time it was used.
“I would not be interested in even thinking about that,” he said.
The Community News reached out to Craven for further comment but did not receive a response before publishing.
Craven also criticized the “sorry state” of the municipal voter’s list, produced by the Municipal Property Assessment Corporation (MPAC).
Wheeler said the list is in an “embarrassing state” but that it will be relied upon again for the 2022 election before the list is taken over by Elections Ontario in time for the forecasted election in 2026.
“They simply don’t have the tools … to put it together,” Wheeler explained of the MPAC, which bases voting lists off property records.
Each election year, voter cards bear the names of the deceased and absentee land owners or altogether don’t exist for those who are renters or children of parents at an address who are old enough to vote.
“We’ll handle every one, every day,” Wheeler said of the calls township officials are preparing for.
As for Wheeler’s first call on Monday, he said it’ll be to O’Kane to get an idea of the cost of running a phone and internet-based voting option along with the cost of cyber security.
The “drop-dead” deadline for a report back to council on associated costs is May 2022, but Wheeler said he expects to present his findings next month.
The next municipal election is scheduled for Oct. 24, 2022.
