001e e e good evening and welcome to waca town election coverage for the May 21st 2024 election to set the table for tonight we're broadcasting live from the gymnasium unfortunately it hasn't been a great turnout for a municipal election we'll talk a little bit about that more later tonight but let's set the table we've got two candidates running for the select board Yolanda Greaves a longtime incumbent uh longtime uh School Committee Member longtime uh select board member and a newcomer to the ballot tonight Makita Keegan is running for her first uh attempt at the board tonight then we jump to the assessor Steve Greenberg's running for re-election again he's running for a three-year term and then we have the school committee we have some uncontested races and all current candidates running for reelection we have
002Christina f FIS and Mark Terry and then for a one-year term finishing up a one-year term that she was appointing to we have Marcy coverall then for the important Board of Library trustees we have Claire GS and Linda wean running both for reelection for there Board of Health is going to be a little bit of interesting topic tonight here as uh as wacka does live election night coverage uh local Legend Edward Burman is running for re-election for the Board of Health and that's going a three-year term and then we actually have three wrin candidates for the Board of Health tonight so that'll be an interesting race as we get down and we go to election results for Housing Authority another very important position in town we have Deborah neelen running for re-election I've had the
003pleasure of working with Deborah on the Housing Authority for many years a great candidate from there and then on planning board another longtime uh devoted person to the town of ashin Patricia Kendall is running for reelection for a five-year term on planning board so a lot of things going on here tonight in the gymnasium like I said unfortunately we haven't had a great turnout we've had just shy of 500 people voting in person here today and then uh we had a limited amount of people voting uh early voting which uh took place last week I'm actually going to right now uh do the most important thing in America I'm actually going to take a minute and I'm going to go vote so you guys can follow me over to uh Precinct 2 so it's about
0047:26 on Election night and I looks like I'm the only guy voting right now so we're not breaking down the doors to get here but good evening how are you I'd like to vote if I could please oh you know what I left my ID over there f f the first j n you could say your full name John featherston 98 Heritage Avenue in Ashland Massachusetts John and that's me guilty is [Laughter] charged thank you very much great thank thank you and thank you for doing this today all right Paul give me a little wave if you can hear me there he is so I'm in The precin Ballot Box making my selections now for select board and now voting for assessor and school committee Library trustees wants this once again a very important position
005Board of Health housing auth Authority and planning board the greatest right that we have in this country is our ability to cast a ballot and I've said it for years and I'll continue to say it if you don't vote you can't complain I take a quiz take a quiz okay I'd like I like quiz John featherston 98 Heritage Avenue in Ashland take that straight facing up there we go so now I'm actually voting I'm casting my vote my ballot is pro processing and my ballot has successfully cast and and can I get a scker oh just one there you go all right you have a good night so how's the day been busy no no that's that's with me that's 86 in Precinct to well thank you for uh doing this it's an important thing
006so thank you so 86 votes in Precinct 2 uh I think that's the new level of pathetic that we have in town uh you know got important positions on the ballot here tonight we've got uh select board we've got Board of Health we've got school committee so what you're going to do is you're going to want to stay tuned uh just now 7 30 we'll be updating uh throughout the night with election results you're watching waca television and the election coverage of the 2024 municipal election e e e picture by R oh we're live we're back here for election night coverage here we're live in the gymnasium we have a VIP guest here right now Cindy our Cindy Livingstone our famous town clerk elections don't happen without the town clerk uh let's talk about your
007day and how all the work that goes into this uh you make it look seamless but a lot of work goes into this uh well we started planning for this about a week after the uh March election was over um there is a lot of planning I always say it's like planning a wedding which I enjoy so I love event planning and that's I treat this as an event um each year I try to add more and more to make it better looking for people like maybe get them to come out here more I try to get the word out there more each year um unfortunately for locals it doesn't always work that way the turnout is not very well so it's a long day so you start the day here probably what six six
008in the morning I get to my office at 5:30 5:30 in the morning and you'll probably be leaving your office if you're lucky tonight at what 9:30 9 so a very long day and you and you have to come back to work tomorrow you know so you for 11 hours you don't have the day off again tomorrow so a lot goes into it but then as we span you know here you've got people in every Precinct yes they're here all day too A lot of people I don't think most of my workers do work all day I do have some we split some shifts um but for September and November elections we will probably have everybody here all day because I need a lot more staff for those elections okay so let's talk you know
009so coming up you know we've got tonight you know it's the annual election it's you know may may election then we've got a primary in September any thoughts on the primary in September um we'll have a much larger turnout than this but it won't be anything compared to what we're going to expect in November for presidential okay and then in November the big one yes what do you anticipate for November uh turnout's probably going to be about 85% and I'm guessing probably 40% of that will be done by vote by mail really 40% yes 40 so let's talk about the workload that that adds to your office though too 40% we did some math and every single um application that we receive is 12 minutes to process from start to finish from the time we
010get it we get it entered into the system we get the ballot mailed out wait for it to come back get it processed there get it to elections get it processed that day get it through the machine so we'll do about probably between four and 5,000 vote by mail ballots for the the presidential and it's about 700 man hours so you've been a town clerk in Ashlin for quite some time you were the assistant Town Clerk and now you're the full-time town clerk you've heard my rants over the years that local elections are the most important election I say it all the time your local Board of Selectmen or select board can impact your life so much more than a Donald Trump or a Joe Biden could ever do your school committee can decide how
011successful your kids are going to be in Life or what your property value is going to look like your plan board can decide what your property value is going to look like or what your road what the town's going to look like so you must get frustrated because a lot of work goes into this and not a lot of people participate and you do a phenomenal job of getting the word out getting the word out so how do we get people to pay more attention I don't know you don't know I don't know and unfortunately I have I have to plan each election if I'm going to as if I'm going to have every voter show up unfortunately so um I don't know I i' I've tried doing mailings I did a mailing last year
012um signs up on the boards I don't know if you guys have noticed the welcome to Ashland Signs Now say vote Tuesday I have I just bought those um our website is we have so much information on our website Chris the deputy Town Clark he uh he is awesome yeah he's been a great addition to the town yeah he definitely has I couldn't do without him and all of these lovely people yeah I mean it's great it's great you see most of the same faces year after year so it's great so Cindy thank you so much thank you it's very important we we'll come back and ask you for the results later you're watching live election night coverage here on waa and we'll be back shortly e e e I had to leave the town
013for personal reason I'm back here now I do want to serve the community which I've been serving in the past and I enjoy being on the board of health because there are various uh items come up like for examp food license food permit and then streamlining those activities was one of those activity I took over and we also went to the covid-19 smoothly and transition to Better Health I like to see that Ashland becomes a town of better health for everybody thank you thanks well said all right yeah okay hi can you tell me who you are and why you decided to run for the astral and select board yes hi my name is Makita Keegan and uh I'm running for select board because I care deeply about the future of Ashland my family has
014been in town for about 21 years now uh I have a son in the public schools done a lot of volunteering around the community but when this opportunity came up to run for a board uh a select board seat uh I decided to go for it because I want to make sure that I'm in a position to be able to inspire and encourage other folks to participate more in town politics and government starting to rein so how is the uh the voting process been going today well you know we've seen uh traffic EB and flow um from what I I understand uh you know numbers are slowly ticking up I would personally like to see more people come out and vote and participate we've got a lot of big issues uh coming up in town
015around affordable housing Green Space uh infrastructure you know it's important that people select the their leaders select the people that will be working with them to work you know on these issues so I would like to see the numbers come up a little bit more uh I've got a great number of volunteers who are out there trying to encourage people to vote uh even though we've got a lot of uncont uncontested seats it's important that people participate in the process e purple sign or go to the and iose okay just tell me uh who you were and why you decided to run for ashin Board of Health my name is kg n I been on the board of health uh three two two three year terms before and as was the Conservation Commission and then
016uh I had to leave the town for for reason I'm back here now I do want to serve the community which I've been serving in the past and I enjoy being on the board of health because there are various uh items come up like for example food license food permit and then streamlining those activities was one of those activity I took over and we also went to the covid-19 smoothly and transition to Better Health I like to see that Ashland becomes a town of better health for everybody thank you thanks well said all right yeah okay hi can you tell me who you are and why you decided to run for the Asal and select board yes hi my name is Makita Keegan and uh I'm running for select board because I care deeply about
017the future of Ashland my family has been in town for about 21 years now uh I have a son in the public schools did a lot of volunteering around the community but when this opportunity came up to run for a board uh a select board seat uh I decided to go for it because I want to make sure that I'm in a position to be able to inspire and encourage other folks to participate more in town politics and government starting to rein so how is the uh the voting process been going today well you know we've seen uh traffic EB and flow um from what I understand uh you know numbers are slowly ticking up I would personally like to see more people come out and vote and participate we've got a lot of big
018issues uh coming up in town around affordable housing Green Space uh infrastructure it's important that people select the Le their leaders select the people that will be working with them to work you know on these issues so I would like to see the numbers come up a little bit more uh I've got a great number of volunteers who are out there trying to encourage people to vote uh even though we've got a lot of uncont uncontested seats it's important that people participate in the process yeah as am I yeah June 14th so that's the day after Tom Brady did the day after what Tom Brady day oh Tom Brady day is June 13th e e e hey we're rolling again so welcome back to waca election night coverage May 21st 20124 resetting the official ballot
019for the select board select board are your CEOs of your town and we have Yolanda grees running for reelection and Makita Keegan running for her first seat on the select board most you know some people will tell you it's the most important board in town uh they considered the fathers of the community uh so I would agree that it's a very important town uh position in town another important uh maybe if you pay attention to your tax bill you might think this is the most important position in town for assessor what the assessor does is he assesses the value of your property in town and Steve Greenberg has been doing it for many years years and he is running for reelection tonight unopposed as well uh the committee that I have the most respect for
020in in the community is the school committee uh I've done a lot of uh Municipal positions over the years uh school committee might be the most challenging that I've ever seen we have three candidates running for re-election all un opposed Christina fais Mark Terry and Marcy coverall so they are all running if you're watching this you have about 7 minutes to get down here and cast your vote uh Board of Library trustees another important you know your library is an important thing in your in your community Claire Goss and Linda weeny are running for reelection Board of Health which deserts you know the how safe your restaurants are how safe your schools are how safe uh your community is through a a worldwide pandemic nobody better in my opinion thaned Ed Burman who who led
021the town through the pandemic uh he is running for re-election this year running unopposed tonight we also have three candidates running uh for a right-in campaign for the Board of Health so that might be the most interesting story here in about six minutes when the polls closed Housing Authority the Housing Authority a lot of people probably don't understand the Housing Authority elects four local members from the community and then a fifth member is actually appointed by the governor the Housing Authority runs the low income senior disabled housing in your community uh and that's right over by Stone Park uh it's a great job it's a great asset it's a a very important thing in the community the most important thing you know the go the governor has said it the lieutenant governor just said it
022yesterday the most important thing in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts right now is affordable housing so the Housing Authority is definitely in an important position and Deborah neelson is running tonight unopposed for re-election for that and then your planning board which is a five-year commitment to the town all these other boards that we're talking about tonight are three-year commitments the planning board is a 5-year commitment and they basically essentially decide what your town looks like looks like what your new development looks like what your new growth is going to look like they set the standards for how you visually see your town so important stuff going on here and as Paul can pan out across the crowd uh I don't see anybody voting uh we got about six minutes left I see the town manager talking
023to a few of the pole workers uh we pan over here a little bit we've got the town clerk you know and the assistant town clerk they're going to get ready to uh count ballots here in about 6 minutes uh and we'll be back with more live coverage from waa in the Ashland high school gym for local election coverage on May 21st e e e aoll so we're back with election night coverage here live waca from the Ashlin gymnasium just about one minute before the polls Clos and look who we found the town manager Mr Herbert good to see you good to see you too very nice to see you here tonight so let's get your thoughts on the local municipal election sure so um you know it's always a great day for democracy um
024especially when you're talking about a local election I know usually the presidential elections are the ones that get all the attention but your local elections are just as important if not more important in terms of your everyday life so you know it it's been a great day it's been a great process uh great campaign you know it's unfortunate we didn't have you know too many contested elections um but that is kind of I think a sign of the times and not just you know uh particular it's Ashland but you know all you need is one or two great candidates uh to to make a team and so we're very very fortunate for the people that the people who did decide to run um are all excellent candidates and excellent professionals and really have Ash land's
025best interest at heart well you know you bring up a good point I mean uh you know hard to be a police officer nowadays hard to be an elected official nowadays I mean a lot of animosity so you have to respect both and people say well hey it's an uncontested election why why come out and vote well you come out and vote because you thank that's your way of thanking the candidate you know yeah like you know because you're going to go through the next three years have to work with this guy and I know which is which is should have Hazard pay to it right you know so I mean I couldn't agree with you more and we've I've talked about it for a long time your select board can affect my family's life
026much more than Joe Biden or a Donald Trump is ever going to affect my life why don't people understand that you know John I I I don't know I I think um I think people just in general as we're taught well I think it begins actually at school and like elementary school and you know when you're talking about history and you're talking about um you know the the past and you're talking about government it's really focused at the federal level and to a certain extent sometimes the state level very little uh discussion happens at the local level or about the local level and what happens you know in your community and I really think that's where it stems from is that you got to start ear at an early age and help people understand you
027know that again at local elections where the rubber meets the road that's what affects your life and you know when you have a kid you know who wants to be a police officer or you know a firefighter nobody wants to be a town manager when they're when they're when they're don't when they're like in third grade I don't think they even know what a town manager is I'm still trying to figure it out myself but you know as you're talking to a political nerd here yeah Town manager's job is fascinating because you you touch everything in the town you touch the police department you touch the schools you touch the DPW touch the fire department you you touch Animal Control you touch the roads uh it's fascinating to see because you know it's it's not
028easy what you do uh no I mean it's it's not and you know especially coming out of a worldwide pandemic and you you know handle the town uh it's important that people are involved and you know the one thing that I've always enjoyed about Ashlin is ashlin's always had that can do Spirit for sure and you know there's never a shortage of Volunteers in Ashland and everybody always wants to step up and that's that's really nice but we do need to encourage people and I like your theory about starting earlier in school to get people more involved in the process because respectful disagreement is what makes government work absolutely and that's how you get better Solutions I you know if you can have an honest disagreement that doesn't become personal but becomes focused on the
029issues and you have different perspectives attacking a problem you're going to get to a better solution and that's what I'm saying like you know these kids who are like interested in being a police officer or a firefighter leverage that as a way to kind of okay well this is how a police officer fits in the whole structure and what and what they what they do and what their responsibilities are it's not just about catching the bad guys or with a firefighter in you know in Ashland in a lot of communities you know it's just as much about the medical calls as it is going and responding to you know a house fire or something like that so and you know just talking about that and and I embarrassingly had the Ashlin fire department at my
030house a couple weeks ago had a fire alarm that wouldn't go off and you know kudos to the ashin fire department and you know Tony dooka I mean you know I mean no surprise but I mean it's just you know that's what defines your community exactly it's those relationships relationship um you know you you I mean you were on the select board and you were also a member of the Board of Health and so you've been involved so you know you know I think a lot of our firefighters you know by name and stuff but you know wouldn't be surprised I wouldn't be surpris if a lot of our residents don't know one or two firefighters personally or police officers personally and again it's it's that relationship well you know kudos to you though because
031I mean with our new beautiful public safety building you're doing a lot more Outreach showing off the beautiful building and everything but you know it's it's it's important if you know who your police officers are and you know who your Public Safety people are your firemen you your EMTs are that's important you know I know that guy he's a good guy so that's important so you you're doing a great job keep it up than John I appreciate good luck with everything it's always a pleasure to see you and uh you know hopefully you know in September we'll have better turnout but uh always a pleasure to talk to the town manager Michael Herbert hardest working man in Ashlin so thank you everybody we'll be back with more live election coverage right here on W actv
032in just a minute e e e so welcome back to waa election night coverage polls are closed about uh 807 and look who I found Claudia Bennett she survived her first year on the selectboard so it's been a year today a year today let's talk about give or take yeah give or days yeah might might might be two more days actually so 364 days or so so what your thoughts on the first year on the select board well you know it's been uh a learning curve for me I um there's there's a lot every day to learn and and understand um it's there are certainly you know it's very rewarding too you know I really appreciate that um I'm still trying to figure out the best way to communicate with people and the best way
033to um get feedback from folks making sure that we always you know have people engaged I think um you know we're trying to explore new new ways to do that Michael's Weekly Newsletter has been huge it's I got to tell you it's it's well done it's done it's it comes at the right time in the right place it's huge yeah yeah so you know but if I can editorialize here uh known you for a long time no surprised by what I'm going to say but uh you're the calming force on the board cuz you you you I can see you thinking but more importantly I can see you listening well you're very kind John but I think that um we have a very good board no it's not a shot anybody Bo it's it's a
034compliment to you and I'm compliment everybody else as well but yeah but uh I think you know that's what you know I mean you know former educator you know former School principal uh I think you know that experience serves you well I mean do you agree disagree yeah no absolutely I think that it you know experience in life is uh certainly important and it does serve you well um and and I I would like to I was saying to somebody today I'd like to see more young people involved in town politics because really in the future it is going to be their town and and while I appreciate the experience that myself and others might bring to a situation it's really important to have that younger voice I think in our um in all our
035decisions so you know we can't let election night coverage go without giving a shout out to Rob Rob who's leaving the board um another great guy you know on the board you know does his homework and you know respectful nice man he's a gentleman uh he'll be missed on the board he absolutely will he was you know I knew him years ago when I was actually on school committee and he was on the select board right and uh and then he kind of you know got busy for a while with his four kids and uh and then came back and served the town again and I know that going forward he'll continue to find ways to to serve the community he did he does have quite the long um honeydew list I understand that he
036did text me the other day that he was already working on it she's got him she's got him working on yeah and so uh yeah but a good a big shout out to Rob Sherry I mean Class Act good guy uh he'll be missed on the board and looks like you're going to have a new board member we're going to have a brand new board member with some New Perspectives and uh new thoughts and very thought I know her a little bit through the schools and um so I'm excited to work with a new person who will bring another breath of fresh air to us all change is good change is good so I would think that with ashlin's gonna have four female select board members yeah four women and then then Mr manani will
037be the fifth uh so that'll be interesting that'll be you know yeah absolutely can can we get to five uh in the next next election because I think Joe will be up what again next year so maybe that'll be interesting so Claudia great job always a pleasure to see you thanks for stopping in uh tell people it's important that they vote right before you go you know it sometimes the place you can have the most influence is in your local government there's so many things that really are out of our reach a lots of times but local government even if you know whether you vote whether you I mean voting is important but even getting out there and having conversations with people and reaching out with your ideas and your thoughts and just you know
038trying to to stay engaged in the town it's so important to keep our T and uh what we want could agree more Claudia Bennett from the select board you're watching live election night coverage right here on WCA television thanks John thank you always a pleasure e e e we're back with a live election night coverage here for waa television the Ashlin 2024 municipal election hot off the presses Cindy has the results okay so for select board we have an uncontested raise for two seats uh Yolanda Greaves with 3155 votes and Makita Warren with 363 um assessors Steve Greenberg with 355 votes also uncontested a three-year seat on the school committee uh two seats both uncontested 339 for Christina fadus fanus and 337 for Mark Terry uh the one-year seat for school committee uh Marcy called
039well uh 344 uh Library trustees uh two seats both uncontested CLA Goss 355 Linda wean 340 Housing Authority one seat uh Deborah neelon 347 planning board Patricia Kendall uncontested at 360 uh for the Board of Health we had I didn't get EDS total um Chris Chris sorry um we had three w candidates um and one seat um one we had three candidates running from one open seat for the Board of Health no we had four candidates opening for one seat one was on the ballot three were rins uh for the right in race we had um kg Ariana at 124 uh Maurice cner at 81 and Pam Mims at 20 and I will get you the number four um for Ed Burman so there you go we've got live election results we have have a
040Victor here that uh might be a friendly face uh to all out there watching Makita you have one looks like you're the biggest vote getter tonight in town why don't you come over and let's talk a little bit about it congratulations thank you John welcome welcome to uh the election night coverage but more importantly welcome to the Ashlin select board wel welcome to public life well John waa thanks for having me tonight and first and foremost I just want to thank the people of Ashley for selecting me uh to be the next uh member of the uh with the member of Select board uh it's a tremendous responsibility and honor uh I've had the privilege of getting to know many of you during the campaign process uh I knocked on a few doors had a
041few events attending some uh community events it's been tremendous to hear what's on the minds of folks here in town and I look forward to continuing that dialogue continuing that communication and uh serving you to the best of my ability there you go so tomorrow you got to get sworn in and then the rubber hits the road so you excited um you know I it's it's a little it's a it's a lot it's a little and a lot I'm actually a little bit for a l loss of words um but tonight's for celebration I I I I I think so again I just want to thank I want to thank everyone who voted for me and I want to really thank my dedicated volunteers all of you there's so many I can't even name but
042you have really made the difference in uh just getting the word out connecting people across town not just letting people know about my campaign but getting people involved in Civic action and that's one of the things that uh I again I want to continue doing on the board of on the select board um getting more people activated more people connected to their government uh more people getting out not just voting but participating in our town and creating our future good for you like I said congratulations enjoy this evening get to work tomorrow thanks Sean thank you thanks everybody you've been watching live election coverage here from waa television the annual uh Town election and we'll be back with more coverage in just a minute e e e was Ed here m is live so so
043just a recap uh live election result coverage here from wacv at the Ashlin high school gym recapping tonight's results for select board Yolanda greeves 315 votes Makita Keegan uh newly elected to the select board with 363 votes for assessor Steve Greenberg 355 votes for school committee the three-year term Tina Fates uh with 339 Mark Terry with 337 to fill the one-year seat for the school committee Marcy coverall 344 votes Ed Burman was elected to the Board of Health with 344 votes for Library uh trustees CLA Gus 355 and Linda weeny 340 for Housing Authority Deborah neelson 347 votes and for planning board Patricia Kendall with 360 votes the Board of Health had three candid is running for a right-in campaign kg nariana uh finished with 124 votes uh Maurice cner with and which Mims was
044running uh with with with with 20 votes so kg will fill that uh seat on the board of health with 124 votes so that's going to wrap it for another year with election coverage we'll be back in September and cover the primary you're watching live election night coverage here on waca television