Sarnia council will reconsider its decision to only have online voting in the 2022 municipal election.
A request by resident Wendy Marsden was endorsed Monday.
She had asked why paper ballots would be eliminated “if the cost could have been substantially reduced, by reducing the number of polling stations.”
Councillors Margaret Bird, Dave Boushy, Bill Dennis, George Vandenberg and Mayor Mike Bradley voted to reconsider. Councillors Terry Burrell, Nathan Colquhoun, Mike Stark and Brian White were opposed.
There was no discussion with the matter being referred to council's next regular meeting March 22 at 10 a.m.
Council decided to get rid of paper ballots February 8 after hearing a proposed hybrid approach would cost an estimated $600,000.
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Sarnia council has awarded close to $3 million in sewer separation work.
Van Bree Drainage and Bulldozing submitted the lowest tenders for both reconstruction and sewer separation on Queen Street and sewer separation on Stuart Street.
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City council has allocated $100,000 from its building reserve to fund the digitization of building records.
The building department currently stores about 300 banker boxes of paper files related to land parcels within the city.
Transitioning the files from paper to digital allows a more modern service delivery that can be accessed from anywhere by the corporation.