GILROY
– And the winner is …
Garlic bread was by far the favorite food at the 26th annual
Gilroy Garlic Festival taking the prize over last year’s champion
garlic fries.
GILROY – And the winner is …
Garlic bread was by far the favorite food at the 26th annual Gilroy Garlic Festival taking the prize over last year’s champion garlic fries.
The Santa Clara County Registrar of Voters joined sponsors at the festival’s Garlic Avenue to gather registrations and let people practice with the new touch-screen voting machines. But instead of selecting candidates for office, festival-goers answered questions about popular garlic dishes, the number of times they had attended the festival and whether or not they plan to return.
Top favorites included garlic bread, garlic fries and scampi and least favorites were garlic ice cream, the garlic bologna sandwich and Gourmet Alley’s revised pasta con pesto.
Rob Carlson took a break from handing out roasted garlic Jelly Belly Beans to cast his vote.
“That was so easy. I’m not much of a voting guy, but the machine doesn’t scare me a bit,” he said. Although he may be a little bias, Carlson cast a write-in vote for garlic jelly beans as his favorite garlic food and calamari as his least favorite.
To use the touch-screen machine, voters insert a specially programed identification card. When questions appear on the computer screen, they make their selections by touching the appropriate choice with their finger tip.
“They are very easy to use and there has been a positive response,” Assistant Registrar of Voters Elaine Larson said.
“There has been a lot of turn out here. Even at the county fair we don’t get that much response,” Santa Clara County election specialist Edward Morillo said. He believes they had such a positive response because people visit the festival from many areas.
They not only encouraged visitors to vote for their favorite and least favorite garlic foods, they also helped hundreds of people register to vote.
If the guests reside outside of Santa Clara County, they forward the information to the appropriate registrar of voters.
“We know this is a big election and try to get people to register early,” Morillo said.
Five counties in California currently use touch screen voting machines. Santa Clara County chose the Sequoia model after testing three machines for nearly a year. Liz Guardino remembers using the machine for the first time in the last elections.
“It was really nice, very user-friendly,” she said.
The machines will be used in the November elections and paper ballots will be available upon request. The last day to register to vote for the November election is Oct.18.
