With election dates coming up on August 18 and November 3, the Duval County Supervisor of Elections says his office ready for all voters, including those with blindness.
For voters with disabilities that make it difficult or impossible to mark a ballot at the polls, Supervisor of Elections Mike Hogan said Duval County has special ballot-marking devices in all 199 precincts.
“Right now, we have the autoMARK in every one of our early voting sites, and we do send out mail ballots to the blind.”
Related: More Local, State And National Election News
The AutoMARK Voter Assist Terminals gives visually disabled voters the benefits of a touch screen with the added reassurance of a printed ballot. An audio function allows visually impaired voters to listen to their choices prior to marking the ballot.
More information about the AutoMARK system is available on this Duval Supervisor of Elections webpage and at this VerifiedVoting.org webpage.
Anyone can request a vote-by-mail ballot by contacting the Duval Supervisor of Elections office.
Hogan said in the future he hopes to offer an online voting tool that lets blind or disabled voters cast their ballot securely and independently.
But for now, the system called “Democracy Live” is only approved for military overseas.
Michelle Corum can be reached at mcorum@wjct.org, 904-358-6308 or on Twitter at @MCorumonME.
