The preliminary results were released tonight for the Annual Town Election.
In a very high turnout by Town Election standards, voters overwhelmingly rejected the Neary School Building Project. The results for the Select Board race were initially less clear — but it looks like that race has been called.
Under the ballot question, 66% of 2,020 voters said No to allowing a proposition 2½ debt exclusion.
The votes were 681 Yes, 1,334 No, and only 5 left blank.
In the race for the Select Board, challenger Tim Fling was listed as receiving the most votes — 1,057. That was 34% of the votes cast for the two seats.
Incumbents Kathy Cook and Sam Stivers each received 32%. Cook eked out a win by just 2 votes. She received 1,009 versus the 1,007 for Stivers. (967 votes were blank or “others”.)
Notably, none of the candidates had been highlighted as winners. But in a later email from Town Clerk Jim Hegarty, I was informed that Stivers will not ask for a recount. (Scroll down for Stivers’ concession/thank you comment he asked me to share with readers.)
In the race for the 1 year School Committee seat, the only candidate on the ballot, Denise Eddy, handily won with 1,350 votes (93% of the votes cast).
Although only 1 vote was listed for Diane Romm who ran as a write-in candidate, presumably most of the 105 “others” written in were for her. (The process for checking and counting the write-ins takes longer.)
The results were labeled “Unofficial”. That is always the case for the night of results, even when winners are identified, since they have yet to be audited. You can view them here.
As for the turnout, Town Clerk Jim Hegarty emailed that he believes it was the highest Southborough has gotten for a Town election in 20 years. It was 26-27% of Southborough’s registered voters.
It’s 59% higher than last year when 1,267 voters participated. And that had been a high turnout for our town. Sadly, it’s still small compared to turnout for statewide/federal elections in the fall. (In November, 6,171 voters cast ballots.)
Sam Stivers asked me to share the following:
While I’m disappointed with the election result, I want to extend my sincere thanks to those who voted for me. I’ve appreciated the opportunity to serve for the past six years on the Select Board and to work with the many dedicated volunteers who share my desire to make Southborough a great place to live.
I offer my congratulations to Ms. Cook on her re-election—I know that she will continue to do an outstanding job on the Select Board. I also congratulate Mr. Fling on his election—with the hope that he will find the Select Board position to be as satisfying as I have.
Thank you again to all of my supporters.
It’s worth noting that Stivers still has other official roles in Town government, currently serving as a member of: the Board of Commissioners of Trust Funds, Cable Television Committee, and the Master Plan Implementation Committee. (He had also been serving in three other positions, but as the representative for the Select Board.)
Updated (5/14/24 12:44 am): Despite an extremely close count, it appears that Sam Stivers conceded the Select Board race.
Updated (5/14/24 9:54 am): I shared Stivers’ concession comment and information about his continuing role in Town government. I also added more context around voter turnout.
Updated (5/19/24 11:21 am): The “official results” have been issued. Diane Romm received 80 votes (9 were for “others” and 581 were blank). In looking at the results, I realized that I accidentally posted incorrect figures for the votes Denise Eddy received. It had been 1,350 (not 1,305) and 93% of total votes cast (not 97%). (In today’s final tally, there were more blank ballots than initially estimated, so Eddy won 94% of the total cast votes.)
Interestingly, there were also other write-ins who received a number of votes for different positions. While Paul Cimino easily won the position of Moderator that he was the only candidate listed for, 14 voters wrote in George Haranis for that seat. And 14 of the “others” votes in the Select Board race went to Lisa Braccio.
You can view the final results here.
The tally for the one-year Southborough School Committee is not yet finalized. I’m only pointing this out because it looks like I only got 1 vote but meanwhile 3 in my family voted for me….. Not exactly sure what happened with the tally. Congrats to Denise and I hope everyone is happy having voted down Neary and yet voted for a person on the Neary Building Committee AND subcommittee(s). Does that make sense to you? It was a landslide and not a surprise as “write-ins” often do not prevail. I wish the Southborough School Committee much success in the next year.
I tried to make it clear in the post that most of the 105 “Others” votes cast were likely for you. But apparently, I didn’t provide enough detail.
The ballot machine can’t scan for write-in names, only for the circles filled in. In past years, when there has been a write-in campaign, Town Clerk Jim Hegarty has explained that the write-ins are classified as “Others” until they can go through them by hand to verify and count the names written in. So, last night, when the unofficial results were released, they hadn’t had time to do that yet.
I missed that the Town Clerk didn’t bold and italicize Denise Eddy as having won. But the margin between the votes cast for Eddy and those under “others” appears to make whose name was written in a moot point.
Hi Beth,
I know this may be shocking to you, but I only had time to skim your lengthy post. The detail you provided in your second post is helpful but I’m not sure the first paragraph was necessary as several folks emailed me and asked me what had happened with the tally.
–Diane
Please post.
I am so happy to see high participation numbers. I truly hope people continue to stay engaged by both voting but also by participating in public meetings and volunteering for boards and committees.
I also want to extend a heartfelt thank you to Sam Stivers. Sam puts in all of the work. Few people if any have attended more meetings to stay on top of what is happening in Southborough. He always comes prepared with data and thoughtful questions. Even at times when I have fervently disagreed with him I have respected him. He is pro-growth and progress and has an unwavering commitment to Southborough. Public service is often thankless and sometimes worse, so I wanted to make sure that as his term as Select Person comes to an end that his service to Southborough is acknowledged.
Now that the dust has settled on the proposed new school facility, it is clear that the Neary Building Committee has acknowledged a connection between the school property and the closed town dump. Regardless of whether a new facility is built or the current one remains, the vulnerability of the site to possible contamination persists.
The failure to fund a replacement school does not eliminate the need for environmental vigilance. The installation of the proposed monitoring wells must now move forward without delay. In addition, a comprehensive plan should be developed to respond swiftly and effectively to any evidence of potential threats to the school’s safety that such monitoring may reveal.
Following the defeat of the New Neary building warrant and its accompanying budget override, where does that leave us? Here’s my opinion on what direction to take.
First, I believe that pretty much everyone recognizes that the existing Neary building is approaching its final years. Plan on closing the building as an active school by, say, the summer of 2027, or no later than the summer of 2028. Perform only the needed maintenance at Neary to allow this to happen; funds that should already be in the town’s planning budget for ongoing maintenance of our buildings. Cancel any major renovations that might have been done if the school were to continue operation for longer but which are not really needed for a facility that will soon be torn down. It may be possible for some school administration functions to remain at Neary for a year or two longer, if necessary while finishing office space elsewhere.
Meanwhile, figure out how to add 2nd graders into Finn, change Woodward from grades 2-3 to grades 3-4, and add grade 5 to Trottier. All of these buildings already have sufficient classrooms and the town budget already identifies projected maintenance actions to keep these buildings in good shape for the coming decades.
Yes, there are challenges to putting grade 5 in Trottier. During the New Neary info sessions, we heard why it might be “better” for students or “easier” for teachers to keep grade 5 in an upper elementary setting. Such factors may have been benefits to the New Neary approach, but they are not sufficient to warrant a new $108M building. That’s off the table.
Instead of spending tens of millions of dollars on new construction, what can you do in the next two-to-three years with just a fraction of that and with no matching contributions from the state? A town-operated bus system that segregates our middle schoolers from the high schoolers? Relocating some of Trottier’s specialized classrooms to allow fifth (and sixth?) graders to have their own Trottier neighborhood? Putting a second lunch period into the schedule? Modification of Trottier’s “bell” system to minimize disruption in the fifth grade classrooms? Changes to curriculums and certifications? Sounds like a lot of items, but still far fewer than with a new building. In fact, it appears that building modifications are likely simple enough to execute during one or two summer vacations, minimizing disruption during the school year. There should be no need for any temporary modules.
The school board and the NBC already spent the last couple of years identifying the challenges in their attempt to justify New Neary. Now, resolve those challenges without a New Neary and without spending more than what the town can afford.
A final thought…. What is the NBC’s charter? The members of the NBC have accumulated a lot of “corporate history” on this topic, but is this committee still empowered following the defeat of their proposal? Are they the right people to shepherd us through the next few years of changes?
The Select Board is meeting with the School Committee and NBC tomorrow night to discuss future steps. People interested in this topic may want to watch the discussion, and potentially comment to weigh in.
As for the NBC’s charter, I’m not sure when that expires, but current members’ terms expire at the end of June. As it is an ad hoc committee, it will be up to the Select Board to decide any changes to the charter and whether to extend members’ work, dissolve the committee, or revamp the charge and potentially recruit new members. I’m sure the path they will take will be part of Tuesday’s discussion.
For those following this thread about the write-in results:
Now that the official final results are in, the number of “others” shrank but blanks increased. I reached out to Jim Hegarty for a reminder and clarification on “others” versus blanks.
Voters with at least five votes are listed by name. (I updated the post to specify the names and numbers in the final results.) Those with less than five names are simply listed as “others”.
The exception is people who are fictitious or deceased, etc. Those are converted to be counted as blanks. (For instance if someone fills in the circle for “other” but lists Mickey Mouse or Ronald Reagan as a protest vote, that’s counted as a blank.)