This election marked the first time every New Hampshire citizen who wants to privately cast a vote can.

In July, Secretary of State William Gardner and Assistant Secretary of State Thomas Manning partnered with Granite State Independent Living and rolled out a training program on the latest accessible voting equipment which allows voters with disabilities, including those who are blind or visually impaired- to vote privately and by themselves.

“New Hampshire has worked very hard to make polling places accessible to all voters and with this new technology we hope even more voters will feel confident about coming out on Election Day and voting,” said Manning.

The program trained employees of Granite State Independent Living, a Concord based Independent Living center, to travel throughout the state and demonstrate the latest equipment to community groups, human service agencies, senior centers and at libraries. With regional offices in Manchester, Nashua, Keene and Littleton, in addition to Concord, Granite State Independent Living staff was able to hold more than 80 voter equipment training programs throughout the state prior to the November 4 election.

“This is another terrific day in the rich tradition of New Hampshire to make sure that every citizen can get into a polling place and vote in private. New Hampshire has one of the highest election participation rates in the country and these changes will only increase that percentage,” said Clyde Terry, Chief Executive Officer of Granite State Independent Living.

Founded in 1980, Granite State Independent Living is a statewide nonprofit organization whose mission is to promote life with independence for people with disabilities and those experiencing the natural process of aging through advocacy, information, education and support.  The organization provides services and advocacy on behalf of over 200,000 people with disabilities and every resident of New Hampshire.

Making sure every citizen with a disability was aware of the availability of accessible voting equipment is in line with Granite State Independent Livings mission.

To the voter, the accessible voting equipment looks like a telephone and a fax machine. To use it, the voter calls a number, enters a code and the device reads the ballot to the voter. The voter then makes selections on the key pad for their choices in each contest. When completed, the fax machine receives a print out of the voter’s selections. That ballot is then deposited in the ballot box along with all other ballots in the polling place. For this election, the equipment has been adapted to also allow voters who have limited use of their arms to use a sip and puff device to mark their ballot. 

“Granite State Independent Living is honored to work with Tom Manning from the Secretary of States Office to participate in such an important activity.  The Secretary of States office has worked very hard to put all of this equipment in place with well trained poll workers at every polling place, and we wanted to do everything we could to make sure voters realize that this new accessible equipment is available for their use,” said Debora Krider, Chief Operating Officer at Granite State Independent Living.

To compliment Granite State Independent Living's work, the Secretary of State’s office provided comprehensive training sessions throughout the state to educate local election officials and poll workers about the new accessible voting system. These seminars included disability etiquette information and suggestions about how they can respectfully assist all people with disabilities.