HOLLIDAYSBURG — Blair County leaders said Tuesday that a decision on their anticipated purchase of new voting machines will hinge on which become certified by state and federal election officials.

While commissioners showed interest in a touch-screen voting machine demonstrated Tuesday by John Thompson of Hart InterCivic, that machine has yet to be certified for use in Pennsylvania because it’s a direct-recording electronic machine with no paper report to back up vote totals.

If Pennsylvania leaders indicate that they’re not going to certify DREs, then Thompson said Hart won’t submit the paperwork asking for consideration.

“We’re at their mercy,” Thompson said.

Hart InterCivic was the third company this summer to demonstrate voting equipment for commissioners who are thinking about the proposed purchase with money from a bond issue to be set up later this year.

County Director of Elections Sarah Seymour has recommended the purchase of new voting machines because replacement parts for the current system are going to become too difficult to get. Another reason, she said, is that the state has indicated that at some point, it will no longer certify vote totals from counties without a paper trail to back up their counts.

Thompson showed commissioners an option his company offers which creates a paper trail.

In a demonstration, Commissioners Chairman Bruce Erb cast a paper ballot by filling in ovals beside candidates’ names and by intentionally over-voting for one of the offices. After submitting the ballot into the Hart ballot-reading machine, Erb was advised of his double vote. Without a change, those votes won’t count, Thompson said.

“This seems like we’re taking a step backwards,” Commissioner Ted Beam Jr. said later about the paper-ballot machine.

Beam pointed to the DRE machine’s touch-screen accuracy, of being able to enlarge the type on the voting machine’s screen and an optional headphone so those with sight or hearing impairments can hear a reading of the ballot.

The touch-screen version would be more attractive to younger voters, Erb acknowledged.

Before Blair County began using its current e-Slate electronic voting machines, which require the turning of a dial to move through the ballot, it used a punch card balloting system with votes counted by machine. Before the punchcard system, the county used paper ballots that were counted manually.

Thompson said that Hart’s machine, which reads paper ballots, would be less expensive for the county to purchase over the DRE voting machines.

But the use of a DRE machine will save money over time, Thompson said, because it eliminates the need to print ballots every year, Thompson said.

Commissioner Terry Tomassetti asked Thomp­son if votes recorded by the DRE machine are linked to a code provided to each voter to gain access to their ballot. Thompson said no because doing that would link a voter to the specific votes they cast.

While the DRE machine has no paper trail, it counts the votes cast in three separate ways, Thompson said, with each able to reveal and expose tampering.

In June, commissioners also viewed voting machines available from Dominion Voting of Toronto, Canada, and by Election Systems and Software of Omaha, Neb.

Mirror Staff Writer Kay Stephens is at 946-7456.