County clerks in rural Colorado said they have no idea how to meet strict new election-security rules imposed Wednesday by the secretary of state.

"I'm sorry. I don't know how my county can comply. I don't have the money," said Jackson County Clerk and Recorder Charlene Geer.

Last week, a Denver district judge agreed with plaintiffs in a lawsuit that Secretary of State Gigi Dennis did a poor job in certifying new computerized voting machines for the election.

Experts testified that those machines - used in every county in Colorado - are vulnerable to tampering and fraud.

Judge Lawrence Manzanares ordered county staff to recertify the electronic machines after the election and to come up with security improvements for this election to compensate for possible security weaknesses.

The new demands of counties are precise, detailing everything from who gets access to computer passwords and rooms where equipment is stored, to temperature controls in those rooms and continuous video surveillance.

Jackson County, on the state's northern border, has 1,262 registered voters who vote in two polling places, Geer said.

Geer's office has already spent this year's $21,000 election budget on the primary and the Nov. 7 election, she said.

"I'm going to need considerably more to do this," Geer said.

Dennis said she has heard from concerned county officials. She said she believes most counties will not face "overburdensome costs."

Counties can rent video-monitoring equipment for about $300, she said, and could meet other standards - such as keeping equipment off the floor - by asking local hardware stores for free pallets.

"They just need to think outside the box a little bit," Dennis said.

Cheyenne County Clerk Kay Feyh said she didn't think her county could afford the video equipment.

"Well, I guess we'll have to go through it and try to comply as much as we can," she said.

In Cheyenne County, on the state's eastern border, officials store their six computerized voting machines in the basement of the county building, Feyh said. "I'll probably have to take the key away from the janitor," she said.

Moffat County Clerk and Recorder Elaine Sullivan groaned when asked about the new requirements. "Every week there's something else," she said. "We're going to struggle to do this. Everybody is."

In Moffat County, in the northwestern corner of the state, voters with disabilities appreciated using the new computerized machines in the primary, Sullivan said.

"Buying them is probably the most proactive thing we've done," Sullivan said.

But the machines, mandated by the 2002 Help America Vote Act, have turned out to be more costly than many administrators anticipated.

"All of us were already hit hard with programming and printing costs that we didn't expect," Sullivan said.

Staff writer Katy Human can be reached at 303-954-1910 or khuman@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx.