Our map shows what voting technology you’ll use in Nov.

• Ed Mahon
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  Ed Mahon comes to Spotlight PA from PA Post, where he covered state politics and policy, produced radio stories that were broadcast on public media stations throughout the state and on NPR’s national newscasts, and co-wrote a weekday newsletter. Prior to joining PA Post, Ed worked for six years as an investigative and political reporter for the York Daily Record, part of the USA Today Network. His reporting on failures in Pennsylvania’s system for protecting domestic abuse victims was a finalist in the national 2018 Livingston Awards for Young Journalists in the local reporting category. He was also part of a team whose coverage of the criminal justice system, including the aggressive use of civil asset forfeiture by York County prosecutors, received the 2018 G. Richard Dew Award for Journalistic Service from the Pennsylvania NewsMedia Association. Before joining the York Daily Record, Ed covered K-12 education at the Centre Daily Times in State College and worked as a stringer for suburban sections of The Philadelphia Inquirer. He grew up in Delaware County, Pennsylvania.

 Matt Rourke / AP Photo

Shown is an ExpressVote XL voting machines displayed at City Hall, in Philadelphia, Wednesday, Oct. 2.

2020 deadline for all counties to create voting paper trail

Matt Rourke / AP Photo

Shown is an ExpressVote XL voting machines displayed at City Hall, in Philadelphia, Wednesday, Oct. 2, 2019. Philadelphia plans to launch its new system in November. (AP Photo/Matt Rourke)

• PA Post’s Emily Previti sorted through many documents to create this interactive map that shows what progress each of Pennsylvania’s 67 counties has made toward replacing their voting machines. Many voters probably won’t notice much change when they go to the polls for next month’s municipal election. But voters in about two dozen counties will see significant change — aimed at creating a paper trail for every ballot cast.

• Introducing a new method can create some confusion and delays at the polls, as Emily reported back in May, when Montgomery County rolled out new machines. A few weeks ago, The Inquirer’s Jonathan Lai looked at how one suburban Philadelphia county — Montgomery — plans to make the change go as smoothly as possible. Answers include more precinct scanners, better poll worker training and increased physical privacy.

• Nearly 30 counties changed their voting method in May or will change them this fall, including Lehigh and York counties, the map shows. (A hat tip to graphic artist Tom Downing for creating the interactive map based on Emily’s data.)

• A lawsuit from 2016 Green Party presidential candidate Jill Stein and a subsequent settlement with Gov. Tom Wolf’s administration led to these mass upgrades. Most counties have until April 2020 to replace their voting systems, although the Wolf administration says counties that already have older hand-marked paper ballot systems can request an extension until June 2021.

• Still to be determined: Who pays for the expensive upgrade? Gov. Wolf wants to use the state’s bonding authority to raise $90 million to help counties cover the costs. Republicans in the legislature are opposed. In fact, the legislature approved money for voting machine replacements during the budget debate this year, but that money fell through when Wolf vetoed the measure, a step he took because he didn’t like a GOP-backed provision to end straight-ticket voting.

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Reid R. Frazier / StateImpact Pennsylvania

President Donald Trump speaking to workers at Shell’s Beaver County ethane cracker August 13, 2019. (AP Photo / Susan Walsh)

• President Trump will appear at a natural gas conference in Pittsburgh on Oct. 23, Reid Frazier reports for StateImpact Pennsylvania. Trump traveled to western Pennsylvania in August for another energy-related event — a visit to an under-construction ethane cracker plant. That event was an official White House visit, although WESA’s Chris Potter reported that parts of it seemed like a campaign rally.

• Mark Sanford, a long-shot Repubican challenger to the president, launched his campaign in Philly on Wednesday. The Inquirer’s Anna Orso was there to cover it. In fact, she was the only one there to cover it.  “And when it began, the only others around besides his two aides were a family 30 yards away with a selfie stick and a group of students from Paris who wanted to know why he had such a big check,” she writes. “(Answer: It represented the burden of the national debt.)”

• Later on Wednesday, Sanford stopped in Harrisburg. Justin Sweitzer of The PLS Reporter posted this video of the former South Carolina governor and congressman speaking at the Capitol.

• If you’re looking for some Pa.-centric analysis of Tuesday night’s Democratic debate, Julian Routh of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette attended a watch party with more than 80 Carnegie Mellon students.

• USA Today surveyed more than two dozen Democratic strategists, including county leaders, about what it will take to win Pennsylvania and three other swing states. The story includes this fun bit of info: Dauphin County, by one measure, is the county that most closely resembles all of the United States.

• In non-presidential news, supporters of adding a community college in Erie County have a plan that “focuses on re-energizing and remobilizing support for a community college among elected officials, including Erie’s state delegation and Gov. Tom Wolf,” GoErie.com reports. Two Erie foundations awarded a $300,000 grant for the plan, which will use earned media and social media to bolster support for the effort.