The Lincoln County Board of Supervisors has approved thepurchase of 30 new electronic voting machines to alleviate longlines that occurred at poling places during the general election inNovember.

At the request of Circuit Clerk Terry Watkins, supervisorsapproved $49,500 to purchase the TSX touch screen demo units at acost of $1,650 each. The machines will be distributed among thecounty’s 32 voting precincts based on the number of registeredvoters that visit each polling place.

“We found during the last elections that we had people standingin line waiting to vote,” Watkins said. “We don’t want peoplecoming in and saying, ‘I’m not waiting in this line’ and leavebefore they voted. We don’t want to deter anyone from voting.”

Watkins said she originally envisioned the purchase of 50 newvoting machines. However, she was doubtful the request would begranted in time for the new machines to arrive by March in time fornext year’s primaries for federal elected offices.

Instead, she asked for, and received, 30 new machines to beadded to the 103 already in service in the county.

Watkins placed the order for the machines on Monday. They areexpected to arrive within three weeks.