Nomination Papers For Town-Wide, Town Meeting Election Now Available

Photo: Nomination papers.

Belmont Town Clerk Ellen Cushman announced Friday, Jan. 3 that nomination papers for elected town-wide 0ffices are available for those who wish to run. All candidates must be registered voters of Belmont.

In addition to those races, 12 representative Town Meeting Members are elected for three-year terms from each of the town’s eight voting precincts. This year, there are also some partial-term openings for Town Meeting; vacancies are created by Members moving or resigning.

Stop by the Town Clerk’s office to pick up nomination papers; have your neighbors and friends, who are voters, sign your nomination papers and submit the signed forms to the Town Clerk by the deadline, Feb. 12, at 5 p.m.

The Town Clerk’s web pages contain quite a bit of information to help make a decision to seek office at www.belmont-ma.gov select Town Clerk, then select Running for Elected Office and Campaigning or feel free to call us at 617-993-2600, or email at townclerk@belmont-ma.gov

Running for election is simple:

To be nominated for Town-wide office – signatures of at least 50 registered voters of the Town are required on the nomination papers. The Town Clerk must certify these signatures so we always suggest obtaining about 20% more just to be safe.
To be nominated for Town Meeting – signatures of at least 25 registered voters of your precinct are required on the nomination papers. The Town Clerk must certify these signatures so we always suggest obtaining about 20% more just to be safe. Some current Town Meeting Members will be asking the voters for re-election but all twelve seats are available in each precinct.

Running for re-election to Town Meeting: current Town Meeting Members whose term of office expires in 2019 have already been sent a letter asking if the person wants to seek re-election. Deadline for return of those letters to the Town Clerk is January 22^nd at 4 PM.

Here’s the list of offices that will be filled by the April 2 annual Town Election as of January 3, 2019:

Town -wide Offices	Number of Seats		Term of Office
Moderator		Vote for One	1 year
Board of Selectmen		Vote for One	3 years
Board of Assessors		Vote for One	3 years
Board of Cemetery Commissioners		Vote for One	3 years
Board of Health		Vote for One	3 years
Members of the Housing Authority		Vote for One	5 years
Trustees of the Public Library		Vote for Two	3 years
Members of the School Committee		Vote for Two	3 years
Member of the School Committee		Vote for One	1 year
Town Meeting Members for Each of the Eight Precincts		Vote for Twelve	3 years
Partial-Term Town Meeting Members: For Precinct 1		Vote for One	2 years
For Precinct 1		Vote for One	1 year
For Precinct 5		Vote for One	2 years
For Precinct 7		Vote for One	1 year