Clerk’s Office and Election Workers Lauded for Efforts

By Adam Swift

Town Manager Tony Marino and Town Council President Jim Letterie thanked Town Clerk Denise Quist and her team for their efforts during the presidential election on Nov. 7 at last week’s council meeting.

“A special thanks to Denise and her team, and the registrars, the voters, and the election workers,” said Marino. “It was no easy task.”

Election turnout in Winthrop tracked higher than the national turnout, according to Letterie.

“Nationally, I believe the turnout was roughly 64 percent voter participation,” said Letterie. “In Winthrop, we were at 66.3 percent, so it was a little higher. I think that is just a testament to people getting involved and it is great to see.”

Overall, there were 9,451 votes cast in Winthrop, with about 4,200 votes taking place before election day through either early in-person voting, absentee, and mail-in voting.

Letterie noted that there have been over 9,000 votes cast in previous presidential elections, but that a higher percentage of them were cast on election day.

The town is able to scan the early ballots when they come in, but they are not opened and counted until election day, Letterie said.

“Usually, when it is a slower election, the election personnel have the opportunity during the day to just throw in the ballots, the absentees, so they can get caught up,” said Letterie. 

With the busy presidential election, Letterie said that was largely unable to happen this year. He also noted that the ballot this year was a longer one with a number of lengthy state ballot questions.

Letterie and Quist and her team were up until the early morning hours catching up on those ballots.

“The results didn’t come out until early in the morning, but that was just because of the work they had to do to put in all the absentee ballots,” said Letterie. “It was great to see consistent participation between all precincts.”

Having five polling locations for the separate precincts at the middle school worked well to keep things moving along during the day, Letterie said.

“The personnel were very professional, they were very courteous, and they were keeping things going,” said Letterie. “So again, a heartfelt thanks from the council for that.”