How's Voter Turnout in Brookline?

BROOKLINE - It was gray out. It was rainy. And it was not the warmest - until about 4 p.m. But Brookline voters showed up to the polls. By 6 p.m. the sky had opened up and the sun made an appearance. And by the end of the day 5,873 of the town's some 36,000 registered voters had walked past signs and campaign workers making their last minute pitches to cast a ballot in the spring election. That was more than 16 percent of the registered voters. Town voting officials only expected 10 percent to make it.

On the ballot? Seats for School Committee, Selectmen, Library Trustees and almost every Precinct's Town Meeting Members had contested elections - which could account for the higher than normal turnout for a municipal election. (Click here to see who won).

By 1:30 p.m., Town Clerk Pat Ward told Patch the turnout already surpasses last year’s turnout at 6.8 percent. By 3 p.m. voter turnout was at 8.8 percent and growing a percentage point each hour. That jumped to 12.6 percent at 6 p.m.

By 7:30 a.m., just a half an hour after the polls opened, the door to Precinct 2's voting location at the Coolidge Corner Library was not staying closed for long with about one visitor opening it every 2 minutes.

Two campaign workers - one rooting for Susan Federspiel and the other for Michael Glover for School Committee stood in the drizzle handing out fliers and chatting with passersby to catch the early morning votes.

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"The first half hour has been kind of steady," said Barbara Sullivan, an election warden at Precinct 2. The machine indicated that at 7:30 a.m. 15 people had cast votes. By 8 a.m. 31 people had voted and by 9 a.m. 53 folks had voted.

"Being a town election we're looking at a 10 percent turnout. But since it's a highly contested School Committee and Selectmen race, then we might be a little above 10 percent," said Sullivan.

Over at Town Hall, Michael Glover, who is running for School Committee, Selectman Bernard Greene and Neil Gordan were standing in the rain chatting with potential voters headed into Town Hall to vote for precinct 4.

The rain didn't seem to dampen the spirits as they smiled at passers by.

Glover who got involved in town politics when he saw an advertisement in the BrooklineTAB from the town calling for volunteers to work on the override study committee and then ran for School Committee said was hoping to keep his seat on the School Committee.

"There's still a tremendous amount of work that needs to be done," he said citing funds, issues of equality and communication. "When you have the combination of enrollment increase, as we have, and the budget is limited, it just squeezes the rest... and it means you have to make tough decisions," he said, referencing the protracted teachers union contract negotiations that came to a close recently. Glover was on the School Committee negotiation team. "There's a lot of work to do do repair that rift, too."

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Inside Town Hall at 8 a.m. 20 people had stopped in to vote. And one person had been turned away, according to Warden James Slayton. At 6:50 a.m. one woman stopped by before she was scheduled to catch a train in the hopes of getting to cast a vote before 7. "She was very well intentioned," he said. "But that's illegal."

Other than that it was smooth sailing at Precinct 4, he said. During a small lull he said they began processing the absentee ballots. But Slayton, himself a Town Meeting Member for another precinct, said he's been an election warden for a handful of years and it seemed in his experience when the weather started to get better he expected turnout to pick up - if people remembered to vote. And it was looking like at least some were. By 9 a.m 72 people had cast ballots in the precinct.

"The good news is it's about to get nicer outside," he said. "But May elections are a bit complicated in that some people don't realize how much a local election makes an impact."

Slayton who has another two years before he's up for reelection in his precinct, said he loves election day. He leaned forward and excused in advance what he was about to say, saying it might sound sappy, "It's such a privilege and an honor to be part of the day. It's an amazing day," he said.

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Now for a parting picture: Here's a Precinct 2 sample ballot: