After five hours of meetings, Northampton County Council voted Feb. 6 to approve a $311,150 contract with Florida-based Tenex Software Solutions for 350 electronic pollbooks (epollbooks) for this year’s elections.

Northampton County’s elections commission voted Jan. 30 not to purchase the epollbooks. After that decision, the company that printed the county’s paper pollbooks for the past 24 years reported it cannot print the pollbooks.

This change cast doubt on whether the county would be able to hold the April 28 primary election. Pollbooks are used to check in registered voters.

Northampton County Executive Lamont McClure expressed his disappointment and unhappiness with the way the elections commission voted and shared his concern regarding the upcoming election.

Council’s approval vote erased the uncertainty regarding the county’s readiness for the election. Voting yes were council President Ron Heckman and members Kevin Lott, Kerry Myers, Bill McGee, Peg Ferraro and Lori Vargo-Heffner. Voting no were council members John Cusick and Tom Giovanni.

The pollbooks will arrive in about six weeks, leaving Amy Cozze, voter registrar, approximately three weeks to train her staff and pollworkers.

The epollbooks chosen by the county are modified iPads, which contain a complete list of the registered voters for the county.

They are the same epollbooks used in Lehigh County for several years. Northampton County originally avoided them because they are more expensive than the paper pollbooks.

They will be used without access to wireless Internet. However, epollbooks within a precinct will be able to synchronize with each other through an encrypted Bluetooth connection.

It is reported epollbooks make it easier for voters to check in. Unlike paper pollbooks, an epollbook can immediately tell a voter where they should be voting if there is any confusion within different precincts.

Major changes in the election code make the epollbooks more attractive. The voter registration deadline has been expanded and allows applications for no-excuse mail-in ballots up to a week before the election.

It would be impossible to print paper pollbooks that would identify all registered voters as well as those who had applied for a mail-in ballot within such a short time frame.

The epollbooks will include all this information and ensure registered voters can vote. It will also flag those who already received a mail-in ballot.