78% Of Bourne’s Voters Take Part In Election

BOURNE- Bourne’s voting went off without a glitch, Town Clerk Barry H. Johnson said, crediting the months and months of preparation and down-to-the-wire background work by staff and election workers.
Tuesday’s historic election, which resulted in a vote for the nation’s first African-American president, brought 10,148 people to the polls in Bourne, about 78 percent of the town’s 12,998 registered voters.
About a half-hour before polls closed Tuesday, a little while after selectmen finished discussing next year’s budget right down the hall, 17 voters were casting ballots in the gym of the Veterans Memorial Community Center, several of them younger voters on the way home from work and mothers freed to vote because fathers had come home to watch the children while they ran out.
Their efforts to have their voice heard was underscored by the number of early voters: 1,271 voters, or about 12.5 percent of those voting, cast absentee ballots.
Bourne’s results, 5,055 to 4,850 votes, followed the national trend, favoring Democratic candidate Barack H. Obama over Republican John S. McCain III, in all precincts but two.
Mr. McCain won by 19 votes in Precinct 1, made up predominantly of residents of Buzzards Bay, and by 40 votes in Precinct 2, which includes Sagamore Beach.
Of the other presidential candidates, Independent Ralph Nader received 88 votes; Libertarian Robert L. Barr Jr., 31; Independent Charles O. Baldwin, 16; and the Green Party’s Cynthia A. McKinney, 10.
In other contested races, Bourne voters favored Democrat John F. Kerry for the US Senate, giving him 5,097 votes to Republican Jeffrey K. Beatty’s 4,536 and Robert J. Underwood’s 228 votes.
Precinct 4, which belongs to Barnstable’s Fifth District, supported Republican Jeffrey D. Perry’s reelection bid to the state Legislature with 1,227 votes to Glenn S. Paré’s 559.
Democratic Representative Matthew C. Patrick won Bourne’s vote to retain his seat representing Barnstable’s Third legislative district in Precincts 5 and 6. Mr. Patrick received 1,842 votes to Carey M. Murphy’s 1,161.
In a very close race, Bourne joined neighboring towns in electing former assistant register of probate Anastasia W. Perrino to the top Barnstable County Probate and Family Court post. Ms. Perrino garnered 4,430 votes to the 4,166 cast for state Representative Eric T. Turkington and the 559 given to James A. Feeney.
Bourne differed from the rest of the county in its choice of two Barnstable County Commissioners.
Town voters joined other towns in selecting Mary (Pat) Flynn, but chose Ricardo M. Barros over countywide winner Sheila Lyons.
Ms. Flynn received 4,367 votes; Mr. Barros, 3,212, Ms. Lyons, 2,664, and William D. Crowell, 2,785.
Joseph A. Agrillo Sr. will sit as Bourne’s representative to the regional technical school committee that governs Upper Cape Tech. He received 4,620 Bourne votes to challenger Donald DuBerger’s 3,541. That race was on the ballot in the other towns served by the school: Falmouth, Marion, Sandwich, and Wareham, where Mr. Agrillo also prevailed.
Precinct 6, Mr. Duberger’s home precinct, voted for him, 632 to 463.
Bourne joined voters statewide in defeating Question 1, which would have phased out the state income tax, 6,029 to 3,824.
They supported Question 2, which asked that the possession of an ounce or less of marijuana be decriminalized, passing that measure by 6,399 votes to 3,456.
Voters also supported Question 3, calling for a ban on greyhound racing. About 56 percent of Bourne voters, 5,478 of them, voted for the ban, with 4,312 opposing it.
In uncontested races, US Representative William D. Delahunt was returned to his seat by almost 98 percent of Bourne voters.
A similar number of voters, 98.5 percent, returned state Senate President Therese Murray (D- Plymouth) to her seat.
Republican Representative Susan Williams Gifford was reelected to the state Legislature by 99 percent of voters in Precincts 1, 2, and 3, which belong to Plymouth’s Second District.
Carole A. Fiola of Fall River was returned to her position as councillor to the governor.
By 8:30 PM, after voting was over, the town clerk’s office remained busy late into the night.
A few were still there, CNN playing in the background on a television, to watch Senator McCain’s concession speech and hear President-elect Obama address his supporters.
On Wednesday, as work continued in the wake of the election, a tired Mr. Johnson asked that Assistant Clerk Wendy Chapman, assistant Anne M. Dastous, and all of the election workers and volunteers be publicly thanked for their hard work.
About a week before the election, he noted, state law changed to allow voters who had moved from town within the last 18 months to come back to Bourne to cast a limited ballot, one that eliminated local races but allowed those voters to be heard in the presidential race.
Ms. Chapman, in particular, took care to ensure that those ballots were available, Mr. Johnson said.