Earlier this month, the Coconino Country Oversight Board signed a three-year contract with a third-party vendor to print ballots, process first-time mailings of early voters, and print and mail 90-day notices for early voters. Acknowledged.

Lambeck will receive $250,000 annually under the terms of the new deal.

“For the November 2010 general election, we had to prepare and mail 17,000 early ballots internally,” Coconino County Recorder Patti Hansen said, adding, “And , I had to hire a lot of temporary workers and I had to work from 9 to 10 p.m. every night.”To prepare the first mailing in time for the statutory deadline (29 days before his election) to send out the first mailing

Runbeck was founded in 2012 to take over many printing services. Hansen said the company’s work as a contractor has grown in importance over the years. He said the number of people on the early voting list has continued to grow since 2010.

In November 2022, Lambeck processed 64,300 mailings, including mailed ballots.

Hansen said the county’s growth and the complexity of the ballot-printing process made partnering with a company like Lambeck a natural step.

Coconino County has approximately 660 different “voting formats.”

“This is because ballots are printed per constituency, candidate names must be rotated by constituency, and each constituency has a ballot for each party in the primary election, and the Because some of the races could be on some of the precinct ballots,” it was within the precinct, not the other,” Hansen said. “For example, some constituencies have divisions where part of the constituency is within the city boundaries and requires a city primary candidate, and part of the constituency is outside the It will be a style that does not include lace.”

Hansen said there were between six and 13 different ballot formats in each constituency in the August 2022 primary. Depending on the size of each constituency, Hansen said he could have had to print as few as 25 copies of the same ballot and mail them to the correct voters.

Hansen said the county turned to an Arizona-based company when looking for a vendor to handle the complex printing and mailing process.

“With the slowdown in U.S. mail delivery in recent years, I don’t want to use a printer outside of Arizona. “They have an excellent reputation in the field of election security and they stay up to date with federal and state standards and laws regarding election security and ballot printing.”

Before signing with Coconino County, Mr. Lambeck printed early voting mailings for Pima and Maricopa counties for many years. Runbeck itself is more than 50 years old with his technology being used in 23 states.

Hansen said that before winning the contract with Coconino County, the election team toured the Lambeck facility and spoke with several of the company’s other customers to see if it could meet security and insurance requirements. rice field.

Mr. Hansen said security is extremely important.

“Printer security should also be a concern. This includes cyber security and physical security. I understand,” Hansen said. “The ever-increasing importance of security means we need printing and postal companies that understand the importance of these requirements and can meet them.”

The county also renewed its relationship with Lambeck because the company has proven to be reliable.

“In 2022, there will be a national paper shortage, and Mr. Lambeck solved the problem months before the election. We definitely got it,” Hansen said. “Ballots must meet certain criteria for vote counting equipment to count ballots correctly. This is not the kind of paper you can go to the Office Depot and buy off-the-shelf.”

In 2018, Coconino County purchased ballot printers from the company to use at vote centers on Election Day.

“At the time, I was using a Diebold Optical Scan ballot tally, which is why I decided to purchase a Runbeck BOD (voting on demand). was the perfect printer for tallying ballots, meeting our exact printing requirements,” said Hansen.

Because Lambeck is located in Arizona, Hansen said it can deliver replacement boards to Coconino County vote centers within three or four hours. With its “ultimate failsafe plan,” the county agreed to the takeover.

Hansen said he hoped the elections would go smoothly.

“There is no danger of printers or postal services breaking down. We cannot postpone the election,” Hansen said.