Belmont Votes: 2020 Town Election With Limited Polling Hours

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Photo: Go out and vote

The annual Belmont Town Election takes place on Tuesday, June 23, 2020.

Special Hours: Polls are open from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. 

And below is information that will make the process of casting your ballot all that much easier.

Whose running for town wide and Town Meeting 

Click here for the Belmont League of Women 2020 Voters Guide for candidates and their campaign message.

Polling Places

For voting purposes, Belmont is divided into eight voting precincts, located as follows:

  • Precinct 1 – Belmont Memorial Library, Assembly Room, 336 Concord Ave.
  • Precinct 2 – Belmont Town Hall, Selectmen’s Room, 455 Concord Ave.
  • Precinct 3 – Beech Street Center, 266 Beech St.
  • Precinct 4 – Daniel Butler School, Gymnasium, 90 White St.
  • Precinct 5 – Beech Street Center, 266 Beech St.
  • Precinct 6 – Belmont Fire Headquarters, 299 Trapelo Rd.
  • Precinct 7 – Burbank School, Gymnasium, 266 School St.
  • Precinct 8 – Winn Brook School, Gymnasium, 97 Waterhouse Rd. (Enter from Cross Street)

Please adhere to the posted parking restrictions and use caution to ensure the safety of pedestrians around the voting precincts.

Are You Registered to Vote in Belmont and Eligible to Vote June 23? 

If you are wondering if you are a registered voter and your voting precinct, go to the Town Clerk’s web page or phone the Town Clerk’s office at 617-993-2600.

Arrive early, consider traffic and limited parking 

Belmont Police will designate some voter parking at each of the polling locations however with a  busy election, parking close to the polling places is often a challenge.

Plan ahead: consider walking, carpooling with a friend or voting “off peak” during the middle of the day. Only voters who arrive at the precinct and are in line for the Voter Check-In before the close of polls at 8 p.m. can be permitted to vote; those who arrive too late will miss out.

Need a ride to the polls? Rides to the Polls will be provided by the Belmont League of Women Voters. If you would like a ride to a Belmont polling place, please contact: rides@BelmontLWV.org, or call 617-771-8500. Please include your name, address, precinct (if you know it), phone number, and what time you would like a ride.

Election Results – How Do I Find Out the Results?

Election results for each precinct are announced by the Warden of each precinct after the close of the polls. The unofficial town-wide results will be announced at Town Hall and posted on the home page of the Town website as soon as they are available Tuesday afternoon or phone the Town Clerk’s office at 617-993-2600 on Wednesday morning. Campaign representatives are welcome to wait at Town Hall for the printed results.

Tuesday’s Belmont Annual Election Will Be A 10 And 2 Event

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Photo: Belmont Town Election will take place Tuesday, June 23.

The usual combination of heavy sweaters, boots and gloves will be traded in for summer outfits, sandals and shorts as Belmont’s annual town election was postponed due to the Covid-19 pandemic from its traditional early April date to the first two days of summer.

The Town Election will be held Tuesday, June 23 with new special hours for voting. Poll hours are limited to 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. at Belmont’s eight voting precincts. Only voters will live in Precinct 2 will vote at Town Hall. 

“Voting in person will be different with social distancing protocols and other safety measures in place to protect Belmont’s election workers and voters,” said Town Clerk Ellen O’Brien Cushman. 

“Ideally most people who want to vote in the local election will do so by mail to limit exposure. Voters choosing absentee voting must submit a written signed request to receive ballots by mail,” said Cushman.

This year with expanded voting, approximately 2,000 Belmont voters have received Absentee and Early Voting ballots. All ballots must be received by the Town Clerk by 2 p.m., the close of polls on June 23. To ensure your ballot gets counted, we ask you to deposit your voted ballot in our Town Clerk dropbox, located at the base of the steps to Town Hall at the parking lot level. 

For those who have not yet filed an application to receive an Absentee or Early Voting ballot, time is running out to apply for and receive a ballot. Though the legal deadline to submit an application is Monday, June 22 at noon, per Mass General Laws, the likelihood that a ballot will reach the voter by US Mail on June 23 is slim. 

FYI: Town Clerk Provides Voting Updated For Annual Town Election June 23

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Photo: “I voted” sticker

By: Ellen Cushman, Belmont Town Clerk

Do you usually like to vote in person on Election Day, and vote early in the morning, in the afternoon or early evening? For the June 23 annual Town Election you could miss out. 

In-person voting at the precincts on Election Day will be limited from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. for the safety of our election workers and voters. 

This is a different election and different behavior will keep us all safe and guarantee your vote gets counted on Election Day. The Commonwealth of Massachusetts has opened Absentee Voting to all registered voters, no excuse necessary. The Belmont Town Clerk encourages all voters of Belmont to consider voting early by mail, instead of going to the polls on Election Day. Every voted absentee ballot received by the close of polls will be counted on Election Day.  

Apply NOW for Your Absentee Ballot: Time is Running Out

Absentee Ballots can only be mailed to those voters who request them in writing, though every voter is eligible during the pandemic. The written request must include the voter’s signature or that of an immediate family member or person living with the voter.  

There are two ways to accomplish this, either complete and submit an application or simply write a letter that contains the voter’s name, voting address, signature, the mailing address for the ballot and contact information for the voter. Voters may choose to request Absentee Ballots be mailed to them just for the Annual Town Election or for the remainder of 2020.

If for all year, the voter must also include which party ballot to send for the Sept. 1 Massachusetts State Primary: Democratic, Green-Rainbow, Libertarian, or Republican. 

Application forms are available on the Town Clerk pages on the Town of Belmont website: https://www.belmont-ma.gov/town-clerk   and select the link on the left of page

Ways to Submit A Request For An Absentee or Early Voting Ballot by Mail

  • Fastest methods are to email the signed Absentee Ballot request to mpiccione@belmont-ma.gov    (by a clear scan, pdf, or photo), or fax to 617-993-2601,  or place it in the Town Clerk drop box at Town Hall (located directly outside the doors facing the parking lot).  
  • If you must, mail it to Town Clerk, 455 Concord Avenue, Belmont, MA 02478 but realize there may be a delay in the Post Office getting it to us. Ballots are mailed out in the order requests are received and  voters are urged to file requests as soon as possible. 
  • The legal deadline to file a request for an Absentee or Early Voting by Mail Ballot is Noon, Monday, June 22, but realistically voters should allow plenty of extra time for mail delivery in both directions.  Ballots may be returned by mail or placed in the Town Clerk Drop Box, as described above.

Absentee Ballots Already Received Are Valid for June 23

If you’ve already requested and received an Absentee Ballot for the election, bearing the original April 7 date, please vote that ballot and mail it in.  New ballots will not be printed for the June 23 date; the special legislation allows the use of ballots that were already printed for the original election date.  

Other Voting and Election Information

For more information about voting or to see the Annual Election Ballot, visit the Belmont Town Clerk’s pages on the Town website at https://www.belmont-ma.gov/town-clerk and select a topic in the green Elections links on the left of the page. Questions should be sent by email to townclerk@belmont-ma.gov   or by phone 617-993-2603 during the pandemic.

Register to Vote by June 12 for the Town Election

Only Belmont residents who are registered to vote by June 12 will be eligible to vote in this year’s June 23 Annual Town Election.  Once you’re registered to vote and remain at the same address, there is no need to register again.

To register to vote, or change your voting address, party affiliation or name, to find out whether and where you are already registered, or where you vote, visit:    www.RegisterToVoteMA.com 

Belmont Can Vote By Mail On June 23 Town Election, But You’ll Need To Request It

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Belmont voters will have the opportunity to vote by mail in the upcoming Town Election on Tuesday, June 23. But you’ll need to request in writing a mail-in ballot from the Town Clerk’s Office in order to cast a ballot.

Belmont Town Clerk Ellen Cushman has issued the hows and whens of voting in all elections in 2020 on Friday, April 17.

HOW TO VOTE IN THE BELMONT ANNUAL TOWN ELECTION 

NOW SCHEDULED FOR JUNE 23

The Belmont Select Board voted to postpone the annual Town Election from April 7 to June 23, due to the COVID-19 State of Emergency. On March 23, Massachusetts passed special legislation to allow all voters to qualify for absentee voting because of health concerns during the COVID-19 pandemic.  

In keeping with the Center for Disease Control’s recommendations for social distancing and Governor Charlie Baker’s State of Emergency and Stay at Home order, the Belmont Town Clerk encourages all voters of Belmont to consider voting by mail, either as an Absentee Voter or as an Early Vote by Mail Voter. Every voted absentee ballot received by the close of polls will be counted on Election Day.  

How To Apply 

Absentee Ballots and Early Vote By Mail Ballots can only be mailed to those voters who request them in writing, though every voter is eligible during the pandemic. The written request must include the voter’s signature or that of an immediate family member or person living with the voter. There are two ways to accomplish this,

  • Complete and submit an application. Application forms are available on the Town Clerk pages on the Town of Belmont website: https://www.belmont-ma.gov/town-clerk and select the link on the left of the page.
  • Write a letter that contains the voter’s name, voting address, signature, the mailing address for the ballot and contact information for the voter.

Voters may choose to request Absentee Ballots be mailed to them just for the annual Town Election or for the remainder of 2020. If for all year, the voter must also include which party ballot to send for the Sept. 1, Massachusetts State Primary: Democratic, Green-Rainbow, Libertarian, or Republican. 

Ways to Submit A Request For An Absentee or Early Voting Ballot by Mail

  • Email the signed Absentee Ballot or Early Voting Ballot request to mpiccione@belmont-ma.gov (by a clear scan, pdf, or photo).
  • Fax to 617-993-2601, 
  • Place it in the Town Clerk drop box at Town Hall (located directly outside the doors facing the parking lot) or mail it to Town Clerk, 455 Concord Avenue, Belmont, MA  02478. 

Ballots will be mailed out in the order requests are received and voters are urged to file requests as soon as possible. The legal deadline to file a request for an Absentee or Early Voting by Mail Ballot is Noon, Monday, June 22, but realistically voters should allow plenty of extra time for mail delivery in both directions. Ballots may be returned by mail or placed in the Town Clerk DropBox, as described above.

Absentee Ballots Already Received Are Valid for June 23.

If you’ve already requested and received an Absentee Ballot for the election, bearing the original April 7 date, please vote that ballot and mail it in. New ballots will not be printed for the June 23 date; the special legislation allows the use of ballots that were already printed for the original election date.  

Other Voting and Election Information

For more information about voting or to see the Annual Election Ballot, visit the Belmont Town Clerk’s pages on the Town website at https://www.belmont-ma.gov/town-clerk and select a topic in the green Elections links on the left of the page. Questions should be sent by email to townclerk@belmont-ma.gov   or by phone at 617-993-2603 during the pandemic.

Register to Vote Now

Only Belmont residents who are registered to vote by June 12 will be eligible to vote in this year’s June 23 Annual Town Election. Once you’re registered to vote and remain at the same address, there is no need to register again.

To register to vote, or change your voting address, party affiliation or name, to find out whether and where you are already registered, or where you vote, visit: www.RegisterToVoteMA.com 

Town Election Pushed Back To June 23; A Virtual Town Meeting In The Cards

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Photo: Wear your shorts, it’s summer time voting in Belmont

In response to the continued COVID-19 pandemic, the Belmont Select Board approved moving the annual Town Election from April 7 to Tuesday, June 23 at its March 26 meeting held via video conference.

In addition to a new day for voters to head for a summertime election, Town Meeting members could be debating the 2021 budget sitting in front of their computers rather than in the Chenery Middle School auditorium as plans are underway to possibly hold a virtual annual Town Meeting in May if the novel coronavirus continues to force social distancing.

Saying “it seemed imprudent to proceed with an election for April 7,” Select Board Chair Tom Caputo complimented the state legislature for passing a bill allowing city and towns to postpone local elections until June 30.

Town Clerk Ellen Cushman and Town Moderator Micheal Widmer, who led the effort to establish a new election date, believed that “for the people who work the elections and the voters in general, the longer we can push that off, the better,” said Cushman. They also had to consider a date in which Belmont public schools had shut down for the summer recess as three of the town’s eight polling stations – at the Winn Brook, Burbank and Butler elementary schools – are located in district buildings.

In the end, the pair came up with three dates; June 16, 23 and 25 with the 23rd receiving the highest favorable response from volunteers who work the elections.

Yet a June date would come after the completion of the annual Town Meeting, which begins on May 27. Traditionally, a new Town Meeting is held after a Town Election to allow new representatives to debate and cast ballots.

But as the Select Board’s Adam Dash noted, there is also no requirement in the new town election legislation compelling towns to hold elections before Town Meeting – as is usually the case.

Cushman said that whoever is actually elected to serve as a Town Meeting member and in town-wide office would be the ones who represent at Town Meeting.

“So it’s possible that you might have [a] group who would represent at the annual town meeting … before the election, and then a completely different group would be at a Special Town Meeting that deals with those zoning articles and other items that took place after the election,” said Cushman.

“I certainly don’t want to set a date … in May, and then it turns out we’re still quarantined and then we have to pump it a second time, which would not be ideal,” said Dash.

Board Member Roy Epstein – whose background image suggested he was speaking from along the pre-1940 Maginot line in France – asked Cushman if the town could hold the election via absentee ballot to lessen the anxiety of voters concerning contacting COVID-19 at polling stations.

Belmont Select Board’s Roy Epstein.

“I guess there’s some possibility that even in June, it wouldn’t be wise to have an election with live polling places,” he said.

Cushman noted that the state has recently altered its criteria for casting an absentee ballot to include voters who are avoiding a polling place as a precautionary measure in response to COVID-19. The state has also extended early voting to municipal elections for the remainder of 2020.

Yet there is one catch; under state law, the town must have at least one “live” polling station on election day to allow voting for anyone who didn’t vote early or with an absentee ballot.

“[I]f people do show up, then you might put them in jeopardy because suddenly you’d have a lot of people located in one location. So there are a lot of considerations,” said Cushman.

In addition to settling on a new election day, Cushman said Belmont and other towns are watching another piece of state legislation. They are hoping language will be added to allow towns to run “remote access Town Meetings” if necessitated by the continued presence of COVID-19 in late May.

Cushman said her office has been in discussions with Turning Technologies, the town’s electronic voting vendor, which indicated there needs to be coordination between its software and Zoom, the remote conferencing service, to make it work.

“But for Town Meeting members, the experience would be virtually seamless. Roll call votes would … be instantaneous, and it’s part of our existing license so it wouldn’t cost us anything,” said Cushman

“So I already have people taking training and webinars … so should [if enabling language] happens in the legislature, we will be pretty much ready to start turning on,” said Cushman.

Caputo said he had recently participated in a work meeting with 254 people, “and it actually worked remarkably well.”

And on the plus side of a Town Meeting via Zoom, suggested Dash, “if you go beyond the time limit [the Town Moderator] can just mute them.”

Town Election Delayed, Town Meeting Tentative Start On May 29 – Budgets Only

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Town elections are “funny little animals,” said Ellen Cushman, Belmont Town Clerk addressing the Select Board last week.

While the ballot is specific to the municipality, they can’t be delayed, postponed or changed by local action. Altering the date, for instance, can only be done through a “higher power,” either going before a judge for a court ruling or via a special act of the legislature up on Beacon Hill.

Asking to tinker with a town’s election dates is a fairly rare request, but circumstances around the world had forced Belmont’s and other communities hands on the matter.

With the advancing coronavirus pandemic forcing the cancellation of gatherings of more than a handful of people, it became clear holding the election on the traditional first Tuesday in April was all but impossible.

It was for that reason the Select Board voted to approve – better known as “calling” – the annual Town Election for April 7 just so it could then start the process of postponing it.

After the Select Board’s unanimous vote, the town prepared plans on what avenue to pursue to change the election date; through the courts as Wellesley had recently done or via legislation. Turns out that neither was needed as just days after the Board’s vote, state legislators stepped in with a universal fix.

As pressure from municipalities requesting delays and postponements began to swamp Beacon Hill, the Massachusetts House and Senate on Monday, March 23, passed legislation, S.2608, allowing municipalities to postpone 2020 local elections while the Commonwealth is in a state of emergency.

Under the legislation, the Select Board will be able to postpone to a date on or before June 30.

“I’m informed that the House and Senate passed the bill this afternoon and it is anticipated that the Governor [Charlie Baker] will sign it,” Cushman said.

The next question is when will the election take place? Belmont will find out on Thursday, March 26 when the Select Board meets to make the postponement official and sets the new date.

The pandemic has also impacted the 161st annual Town Meeting as the Board along with Town Administrator Patrice Garvin and Town Moderator Mike Widmer decided to move the first day of the annual Town Meeting from late April to May 29, which was already scheduled to be the start of the meeting’s Segment B which focuses on financial articles.

And that meeting will be limited to budgets and fiscal matters, measures vital “to keep the lights on,” according to Garvin.

The non-budgetary articles which were to highlight the April meeting including important topics as imposing a fee for paper bags, restricting gas hookups in new buildings, a lease agreement for the new ice skating rink and zoning changes to facilitate residential development at the McLean property will be delayed to a date yet known.

Garvin said it would be likely those measures will be taken up during a special Town Meeting during the summer.

They’re Off: Incumbents Dash To Secure Nomination Papers For Town-Wide Offices

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Photo: Mike Widmer would be seeking his 13th term as Town Moderator.

The 2020 Belmont Town Election is still 98 days away on April 7, 2020 but it appears this edition will be few if any open seats among the 11 town-wide positions up for grabs when Belmont voters go to the polls.

Incumbents in eight of the 11 possible races have quickly snagged nomination papers from the Town Clerk’s Office in preparation for re-election campaigns.

The current office holders who have taken the first steps for a return to town government are:

  • Town Moderator (1 year): Michael Widmer
  • Town Treasurer (3 years) : Floyd Carman
  • School Committee (Two 3-year terms): Catherine Bowen, Michael Crowley
  • Board of Assessors (3 years): Robert P. Reardon
  • Beard of Health (3 year term): Donna David
  • Board of Library Trustees (Two 3 year terms): Kathleen Keohane, Gail Mann

Of those who have yet to take out papers, the most notable absentee is the Select Board’s Adam Dash, who was first elected in 2017 winning 63 percent of the vote.

But speaking to the Belmontonian in the past week, Dash gave every indication of seeking a second term to the Board, saying he would “decide” on a possible run shortly after the holidays “when people are thinking about the election.”

Only Alexander E. Corbett III of the Cemetery Commission and Donna Brescia, the chair of the Housing Authority, are incumbents who have yet to obtain papers.

It remains to be seen if the lack of “open” seats will deter newcomers from seeking to throw “their hats into the ring.” Incumbents have built-in advantages when they run: name recognition, for many three years of accomplishments, and past supporters they can return to. As Guy Molyneux puts it in The American Prospect, “elections are fundamentally a referendum on the incumbent.”

“Only if [the electorate] decide to ‘fire’ the incumbent do they begin to evaluate whether each of the challengers is an acceptable alternative.”

For those who are determined to run for town-wide office, stop by the Town Clerk’s office at Town Hall to pick up nomination papers; then submit the signed forms to the Clerk’s by the deadline, Feb. 18, 2020, 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 https://www.belmont-ma.gov/town-clerk then select Elections: Running for Elected Office and Town Meeting; feel free to call us at 617-993-2600, or email at townclerk@belmont-ma.gov