Decatur County Chief Elections Official Carol Heard spoke to the Decatur County Board of Commissioners Tuesday about the new voting machines being introduced for local voters this cycle and to invite the board and the public to an open house on Oct. 9.

The open house will be attended by Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger, who will help demonstrate how the equipment works with voters and answer questions about the machines. The open house runs from 5 p.m. to 7 p.m. at the Courthouse Annex building on Water Street.

Decatur County is one of only six counties in Georgia to serve as pilots for the new statewide voting system. The other 153 counties will use the new equipment on March 24 for the presidential preference primary.

“The state has invested 100 $million at least in this new equipment,” said Heard. “We are very honored to be a pilot county.”

The driving force of the new voting system is the paper ballot that is printed after a voter marks their ballot using the electronic machines.

Voters will digitally scan their printed ballot on another machine, turn in the printed ballot and leave. Printed ballots are not a receipt and are not allowed to be taken from the polling site.

Currently, there are 15,561 active voters in Decatur County and 1,564 inactive voters.