Members of the community expressed their concerns about how elections are handled to the Huron County Board of Commissioners.

Concerns were raised by community members during this week's Huron County meeting over the voting process, based on the 2020 election. 

Before public comment, the agenda allotted We the County representative Luke Deming 10 minutes to present to the board what he hopes the board will do regarding future elections. 

“How do we know that these machines are doing their jobs?" Demming asked. "How do we get the county to help us do a hand count of the ballots from the 2020 elections to show that these machines are doing their jobs? We used to always do paper ballots and get them in, in a timely fashion. But as Americans, we have gotten lazy and let a machine do the work.”

Deming’s final call was to ask the board for help as he and the groups he came to represent gather information and are looking to move forward with their inquiry on the 2020 ballots.

County Commissioner Steve Vaughn, with assistance from County Clerk Lori Neal, was able to provide context on the endeavor that Deming was trying to achieve.

“It’s pretty late in the game to do what you want to do," Vaughn said. "The ballots have already been approved, so that is difficult to do. That is something special that would have to be set up with the Board of Canvassers to go over that information. The machines were bought by the state of Michigan. The townships all had to agree to pay for the maintenance and the setup, and the state paid for all of that.”

Vaughn went on to talk about how the state legislators are the ones who are in charge of the elections. The ballots are approved and set up for the upcoming November election and suggested that any recommendations should be presented to the state legislators.

“I am all for paper ballots, we can’t do it for this election because we don’t have time,” said Vaughn. “In the future, this is something that we could probably do, but we around this table run the county. We are not legislators, and this is something that has to be legislated. What you have to do is start in Lansing with your state representative to get it to go forward from there to create legislation to make the state go to paper ballots.”

The conversation moved to one of the issues that revolved around the use of sharpies on ballots, which caused instances of bleed-throughs. Deming questioned the use of markers instead of ballpoint pens, as did community member Len Engler, who spoke during public comment.

“I am here to support Luke,” said Engler. “We have counted ballots in the past and we can do it in the future.”

After Deming’s presentation, the floor was opened up to public comment, where residents from around the county spoke to the board, sharing their concerns over the voting machines used.

Steve, Sally and Colby Guza all attended and spoke in support of Deming’s presentation.

"We do use a ballot but it is just counted by the machine," Steve Guza said. "I don’t know if there was a way for it to still run it through the machine and then have a backup hand count.”

“Right now you've got a lot of problems because people don’t trust these machines,” Sally Guza said. “That’s why I am asking for paper ballots.”

"A lot of people in the community are very concerned that has been brought forward and also support We the County,” Colby Guza added.

“I agree we need more election integrity," Vaughn said. "We at this body support what you are trying to do, but we can’t do it. It has to be legislated and we are not legislators."

During the second wave of public comment, Deming again extended an invitation to view the documentary film "2000 Mules" this upcoming Sunday at 2 p.m., and extended his thanks to the board for hearing him speak and the job that the commissioners are doing.

In other business, the district manager of the Huron Conservation District provided an update on its year so far and how it had a successful summer. Daniel Stevens, who is the community corrections coordinator for the Thumb area Regional Community Corrections, also spoke and asked for participation from the board to have a presence as they restructure their meetings in order to continue helping the communities.

Lastly, Dan Skiver presented to the board of commissioners via Zoom the Blue Cross Blue Shield 2023 renewal plans for county employees.