Township of Blandford-Blenheim Council learned more about the municipal online voting process during their regular meeting on Wednesday, May 7, 2025.
Staff initially brought forward a report to Council on Wednesday, April 2, outlining options for a voting method in the next municipal election, which is scheduled to take place on Monday, October 26, 2026.
Sarah Matheson, Clerk for the Township of Blandford-Blenheim, explained that there were four voting options to choose from including the traditional paper ballot method, the vote-by-mail method, the vote by internet and telephone method, or the hybrid method.
“Option number three is to vote by internet and telephone, and it would be a process where voters would securely log-in to an online platform to access, mark and cast their ballot. Telephone voting would allow a voter to call in to a platform to make selections using an automated voice system, and it would require the voter to have a smart device such as a cellphone, tablet or computer, or to have a telephone to cast their vote,” she said. “Option four is a hybrid which would be a combination of paper ballots and internet voting. This approach would essentially result in the preparation and conduction of two elections at the same time, two sets of policies and procedures, more staff resources and higher costs.”
Matheson added that according to a post-election survey conducted by the Association of Clerks and Treasurers of Ontario (AMCTO) after the last election in late 2022, that internet voting is becoming the preferred method of conducting an election.
“Fifty-eight per cent of municipal respondents used internet voting for the 2022 municipal and school board elections,” she said. “Locally, the Town of Tillsonburg and the Townships of East Zorra-Tavistock, South-West Oxford, and Zorra all voted online in 2022, and to my knowledge, plan to do so in 2026.”
She also noted that while the link between internet voting and higher voter turnout has not been definitively established, it offers the potential to “engage younger voters while providing a convenient, efficient, and accessible method for individuals to take part in the electoral process.”
The Clerk said that with all of that in mind, staff were recommending the internet and telephone voting option, noting that there are plenty of benefits when it comes to the method. She also said that while, of course, there could be potential drawbacks and concerns like not having access to a computer or fraud, they did have several solutions in mind.
For example, as far as older voters or people that don’t have access to an electronic device, Matheson said that they could set up a location where people could come in, fill out a form and receive in-person assistance.
Following her presentation, a majority of councillors said they would be in favour of leaning towards internet and telephone voting, but that they would like to see a demonstration of how it would work.
During the most recent meeting on May 7, Dean Smith, President and founder of Intelivote Systems Inc., made a virtual presentation to Council explaining how an online system would be used.
He explained that while there are several companies based out of the U.S., Israel and Spain that offer similar platforms, Intelivote is a company based out of Dartmouth, Nova Scotia, and that the money used to acquire its services would stay in Canada.
Smith also noted that since 2006, Intelivote has participated in a total of 315 municipal elections and by-elections, and that most recently, out of the 222 municipalities that used electronic voting in 2022, the company provided its services to 102 of them.
He said that as far as questions and concerns, one of the most common ones he gets are those surrounding older voters.
“There’s this notion that older voters don’t know how to vote online. The single, biggest misconception about electronic voting is that older citizens don’t know how to vote, or don’t know how to use the internet,” he said. “Older voters over the age of 60 in electronic voting, vote twice as much as the younger cohorts in, say, the 18 to 25 segment,” said Smith. “So, we know they vote, we know they like to vote and they have a history of voting. A lot of them can’t get out, they may be infirm, they may be in a retirement home, or they may be traveling as snowbirds and stuff like that, so they vote and it’s easy to do it. They use the telephone at probably a 20 per cent rate, which is higher than most cohorts.”
Smith added that as far as concerns with someone stealing the piece of mail that contains the online voting pins or fraud, he said that that would break five Canadian laws and they also require a secondary security feature to help deter such issues.
Throughout the rest of the meeting, Smith showed Council what the mail package would look like and include, and walked them through the steps on online voting, as well as telephone voting via cellphone or landline.
Following the presentation, Mayor Mark Peterson took the opportunity to ask those present in the meeting how they felt about the potential of using internet and telephone voting.
While there were some concerns, many of them saw how it could be a positive option for voting.
Council then voted to receive Smith’s presentation as information, though the decision on the voting method doesn’t have to be made until spring of 2026.
Kimberly De Jong’s reporting is funded by the Canadian government through its Local Journalism Initiative.The funding allows her to report rural and agricultural stories from Blandford-Blenheim and Brant County. Reach her at kimberly.dejong@brantbeacon.ca.
