Champaign residents will find several changes when they go to the polls for the State of Illinois’ primary election on Tuesday.

Champaign County Clerk Mark Shelden said the county has purchased new optical scan voting machines to replace the old punch card ballots.

“The federal government passed a law mandating these machines and put $1.2 million federal dollars towards them,” he said. “By the first federal election of 2006, all states must be in compliance.”

The ballots for the new machines require voters to fill in a circle next to the candidate of their choice, eliminating the possibility for hanging chads.

The machine then scans the ballot and alerts the voter to any errors, like casting more votes for an office than permitted, Shelden said.

The county has also purchased Automark Voter Assistance Terminals that allow visually impaired citizens to vote in privacy.

These terminals allow voters to enlarge the ballot, change contrast and also offer an audio component and a Braille keypad, according to a brochure distributed to Champaign residents by Shelden’s office.

Voters may also have to change their usual polling place.

Since the primary election takes place during the University’s spring break, Shelden has decided to consolidate campus polling places.

“It has been tough to get judges for campus precints,” he said. “Hopefully by consolidating, we can staff them better.”

Polling places at the University YMCA, 1001 S. Wright St.; Snyder Hall, 206 E. Peabody Dr.; Skelton Place, 302 S. Second St.; and Rehabilitation Services, 1307 Mattis Ave., have been relocated to Illinois Disciples Foundation, 610 E. Springfield Ave.

Polling places at Daniels Hall, 1010 W. Green St., and Illinois Street Residence Hall, 918 W. Illinois St. or 1012 W. Illinois St., have been relocated to Lincoln Avenue Residence Hall, 1005 S. Lincoln Avenue.

“Spring break dramatically lowers the number of voters who turn out in the ten campus area precints,” Shelden said.

In an attmpt to encourage students to vote early, the Illinois Student Senate’s Voter Registration Committee provided voting vans to the county clerk’s office this week, in cooperation with Volunteer Illini Projects’ I-Vote program, Jennifer Walling, graduate student and chair of the committee, said.

“We recognized there was really going to be a problem with students being able to vote because of spring break,” she said. “Unfortunately we didn’t have a large turnout.”

Adam Yost, sophomore in LAS and president of the I-Vote project, said the disappointing number of voters was due to the lack of advertising.

“We got under ten people during the three days, but the idea was only formed a week and a half ago,” he said. “We had very little time to put it together.”

The county clerk’s office provided voters the opportunity to vote early between Feb. 27 and March 16, but saw a relatively low turnout, Shelden said.

“There hasn’t been a groundswell of people just looking to get it out of the way,” he said. “We’ve just seen the same people who would have cast absentee ballots on Tuesday.”