Officials have confirmed to that a ballot printing issue led to widespread voting problems in Cambria County Tuesday morning.
Cambria County Commissioner Scott Hunt confirmed that the voting problem was caused by how the ballots were printed, and not a problem with the machines.
He confirmed that mail-in ballots are not affected by this problem.
County Solicitor Ron Repak said the machine was unable to read the ballot markings, based on how they were printed. He said they conducted tests before Election Day, but because of the nature of the problem, the mistake was not able to be discovered until voting commenced.
Repak is urging voters to continue to cast their ballots and trust that their vote will be counted.
“We’re going to continue to work with the state and ensure that we either get it fixed or we continue to count the votes, and if we have to count by hand then that’s what we’ll
have to do,At the end of the day, we have measures in place to make sure we can take care of this.”
Repak said the solutions are three-fold.
First, elections officials are hand counting ballots that were delivered into drop boxes earlier Tuesday. Second, they have express voting machines to help speed up the process. Third, officials have ordered additional ballots and hope to commence with normal voting by Tuesday afternoon.
A court order has extended voting times from 8 p.m. to 10 p.m. in Cambria County. In the filing, election officials reported that the Electronic Voting System in Cambria County experienced a software malfunction, which prevented voters from scanning their completed ballots.
Until the issue can be solved, county election officials report that voters are able to fill out their paper ballot and have it placed in a secure and locked drop box.
Voters have reported to 6News that some polling places were not following that directive earlier, instead turning people away and telling them to come back later.
Officials want to reassure individuals who have already voted that their ballots are secured. In a statement, the Election Board reports that emergency protocols to safeguard election integrity have been taken, and that each vote will be secured and counted.