2 weeks Ago By Michael P. Buffer
WILKES-BARRE — The Luzerne County election board voted Wednesday to use mail-ballot drop boxes in Wilkes-Barre and Hazleton for the upcoming May 20 primary election, and the drop box in Wilkes-Barre will be a new, technology-enhanced box with a front-facing camera and internal scanner. The board voted 4-1 to use drop boxes in Wilkes-Barre and Hazleton and 4-1 to use the technology-enhanced drop box from Phoenix-based Runbeck Election Service. Election board Vice Chairwoman Alyssa Fusaro voted against both motions.
The election bureau bought the Runbeck drop box for $12,500 in March as part of a pilot program and would have received a refund if the board didn’t vote to approve the use of the drop box. Board members said the Runbeck drop box helps address election-integrity concerns that drop boxes encourage fraud and ballot stuffing. The Runbeck drop box has a narrow opening that allows a voter to insert one ballot envelope at a time.
Voters can insert mail-in ballots for others in a drop box only if they get authorization on an affidavit from a disabled voter. Luzerne County voters had access to two ballot drop boxes for the November general election last year at two county-owned sites — Penn Place in Wilkes-Barre and the Broad Street Exchange building in Hazleton. The Runbeck drop box is set up inside Penn Place.
It has a front-facing camera to take a photo of each voter inserting a ballot envelope in the slot of the drop box and an internal scanner to capture an image of the ballot envelope and the correspondence number on the envelope. A drop box is an option for voters who don’t want to go to the polls on election day and don’t want to mail a ballot through the U.S.
Postal Service. Drop boxes in U.S.
became a more popular option during the COVID-19 pandemic. Legislation in 2019 expanded mail ballot voting in Pennsylvania by no longer requiring an excuse to vote with a mail ballot..
