Hilltowns elect officers, weather power outage on primary dayDate: 9/15/2022 WESTERN MASS. – Despite the pouring rain on Sept. 6, voter turnout for the state primary averaged around 20 percent in Southwick and many of the Hilltowns, with more Democrats voting than Republicans in most communities.
Westfield’s participation rate was a bit lower, at 9.57 percent, with 3,116 Democrats casting ballots and 2,096 Republicans.
In Huntington, a non-partisan special municipal election ran simultaneously with the state primary. With 347 ballots requested, the number of voters has continued to climb in town in 2022, from a low of 63 in the regular municipal election on May 21, to the 240 residents who voted on two override questions in the special municipal election on June 4.
In the Sept. 6 election, sole Selectman candidate William Hathaway of Pisgah Road received 288 votes, and write-in School Committee candidate Lisa Dana Goding received 105 votes.
A total of 355 state ballots were requested in Huntington, 205 Democratic and 150 Republican.
Chester’s state primary turnout was slightly lower than other communities, potentially due to a townwide power outage that afternoon. Sept. 6 was also the first day on the job for newly appointed Town Administrator Donald Humason Jr., who said the outage didn’t affect Town Hall and voting.
“As soon as the power went out, the first thing I thought of was voting,” Humason said, adding that the polls stayed open because Chester has a generator and doesn’t vote with electric machines, but rather on paper ballots that go in an old wooden crank box, as in most of the Hilltowns.
“Old school is best,” he said, adding, “You never want to see anything disrupt an election day.”
In all, 173 votes were cast in Chester out of 923 registered voters, an approximately 18.7 percent turnout, with 93 Democratic and 80 Republican ballots turned in.
“The power outage didn’t affect anything,” agreed Chester Town Clerk Terry Donovan. “The generator was up and running and since we have no electronic voting machines we were good to go. Probably the rain might have made things a little slow.”
Turnouts in other towns followed similar trends. In Blandford, there were 211 ballots cast in total, 108 Democrat and 103 Republican. In Otis, 279 voted out of 1,268 registered voters, 218 Democratic and 61 Republican. Southwick saw 711 ballots cast in the Democratic primary and 703 for the GOP.
Montgomery was one of few towns with higher Republican participation, 91, than Democratic, 80, with 171 of the town’s 648 registered voters turning in ballots.
Overall, local primary election voters followed statewide trends, though there were some exceptions. Maura Healey scored an overwhelming majority statewide and in Westfield, Southwick and the Hilltowns for the Democratic nomination for governor. Westfield and surrounding towns, however, all favored Eric Lesser, a Longmeadow state senator, for lieutenant governor, even though Lesser lost the statewide nominating race to Salem Mayor Kim Driscoll. Westfield, Southwick and Hilltown Democrats also favored Shannon Liss-Riordan for attorney general over the statewide nomination winner, Andrea Campbell.
Republicans in Greater Westfield and the Hilltowns chose Geoff Diehl over Chris Doughty, with the majority also voting for Diehl’s preferred running mate and the eventual GOP nominee Leah Allen over Kate Campanale for lieutenant governor. One exception was in Huntington, where Republican voters favored Campanale over Allen, 76 to 67.
Democrats in Blandford, Chester, Huntington, Otis and Southwick voted overwhelmingly for Paul Mark over Huff Tyler Templeton III to succeed retiring state Sen. Adam Hinds in the 57-town district that stretches from Southwick through the Berkshires to the New York and Vermont borders. There was no Republican candidate on primary ballots. Mark will face an independent candidate, Brendan Phair, in November.
In Westfield, Montgomery and Russell, incumbent state Sen. John Velis ran unopposed in the Democratic primary. In the Republican primary, challenger Cecilia Calabrese also ran unopposed, setting up a two-way race for November.
Agawam Democrat Anthony Russo and Southwick Republican incumbent Nicholas Boldyga were their parties’ only nominees for state representative in a district that includes Agawam, Southwick and Granville, and is expanding to also include Blandford, Chester, Huntington, Montgomery, Otis, Russell and Tolland. They will face each other in November.
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